There has been improvement...

I rarely ever go back and reexamine things that I have done because usually I'm to hard on myself and hate it (remember the posts about the teddy bears...) Lately I've also been feeling like I've not shown much improvement in my abilities to make my stuffed animals. (Really, I know some of you are going to lecture me, but I know already - I've heard the lecture and I just admitted to how hard I am on myself).

Well, today I pulled out the first Pasha pattern that I made because Chad was questioning that his Pasha didn't have a big orange knitted beak on it. I was able to put my hands on it quickly, knowing exactly where it was (in the craft room - that's quite an accomplishment) and as I did that I started really looking at her.

From a distance she's not horrible, but as I looked closer I realized I was knitting the pattern differently this time than I had last time. First of all, because this time, I'm reading the pattern correctly as it calls for stockinette stitch and this time I'm actually using that instead of mistakenly using garter stitch. Just compare this:
To this:
(I apologize to you non-knitters out there).

Or compare the color changes. This:
To this:

It's a little smoother now. Helps that I know much better what I'm doing!

Additionally I'm able to see that my stitches are now much more even (if your interested examine the white belly and you can see what I mean), my stuffing jobs have certainly improved with other toys, those toys stay together now (unless you have an OCD sister) unlike Chad's which is showing signs of coming apart but part of that I blame on inappropriate yarn, and the teddy bears did show that my embroidery skills have improved (look at the beak picture again if you don't believe me).

So, overall I'm liking what I see! And now, I'm off to make more pieces that look like this:



and then move on to making the belly's.

Otherwise, I'll just share another song:


I'm not ready to explain this yet but I know in coming months I will have to...