Month: May 2008

Bear Kacha Toy

Posted on by Anna

How about another dose of cuteness?

In Japan I picked up a miniature capsule toy machine, somewhat akin to the Frog Style toy that I blogged about a while ago. But this one is Rirakkuma!

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Some assembly is required, with stickers to decorate the outside of the machine and stickers to put on the inside of teeny tiny capsules (that actually open).

After assembly…

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I love the detail involved with this toy. It even comes with a tiny clip that you can use to attach two capsule machines together, as in a bank of machines that you often see.

Turn the crank and the capsules pop out!

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If you’re wondering where you can get this awesome toy, I have just one more, and you can WIN it by entering this year’s Mochimochi Photo Contest! I’ll be announcing all the details in early June (check out the details from last year’s contest here), but you can go ahead and start entering now by uploading your photos to the Mochimochi Friends Flickr pool.

Hello Kitty Edamame

Posted on by Anna

My friend Kana just came back from a visit to Yamagata prefecture in Japan. Apparently that region is known for its delicious edamame, so I got the cutest cell phone strap as a gift!

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Peas have an extremely high cute factor to begin with, so Hello Kitty peas are off the charts! The little pod is just about one inch long.

Save the Merpeople

Posted on by Anna

Last year, husband John worked with the nonprofit organization Oceana to write and direct a humourous commercial about the plight of the merpeople, whose habitat and chances for a hot date are being destroyed by reckless overfishing. The idea was that the fake campaign would encourage people to get behind a real (and very important) cause.

The finished commercial and accompanying website are now online for all to see. (My friend Sarah Ries stars in it as the lovely-but-desperate “Merbachelorette.”)

If you like what you see, please visit the website to find out how you can help protect ocean life and ecosystems. The merpeople will thank you.

Lucky (or Splat?)

Posted on by Anna

Since I made it for the “Plush You” show at Schmancy last year, I’ve gotten a lot of inquiries about Squirrel-Infested Tree. I was happy to find that there was interest in a pattern, but since I made it as a one-of-a-kind toy, there is no pattern for it (and the toy has since been sold). But I love trees, especially less-than-happy trees, so I recently made another to be available as a pattern.

luckyorsplat

This is Lucky—or maybe Splat, I haven’t decided yet. He’s not having such a great day, but the birds tell him that to be pooped on is a sign of good luck. He’s not convinced.

Any preference on the name? Or if you have other name suggestions, I would love to hear them!

Good Stuff!

Posted on by Anna

I got an exciting newspaper clipping from my mom in the mail yesterday: recent police calls from my hometown newspaper! Mom had written “Good Stuff!” at the top, and had marked a full 17 of the calls in yellow highlighter to convey her enthusiasm for her fellow citizens’ less-than-shining moments.

My favorites:

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10:55 a.m. — Reporting party advised that a subject was posing as a magazine salesman. Reporting party advised that the subject was asking questions such as do you have dogs in the house.

7:08 p.m. — Reparting party advised that two people came to his home looking for his son and said they were going to ‘take care of this’ at Red Robin

8:36 p.m. — Reporting party wants an officer to look at the bone that dog dug up.

12:52 a.m. — Police Department and Air Marshalls are training and air marshalls locked themselves out of their vehicle.

9:31 p.m. — Subject dressed as the Grim Reeper [sic] is chasing people around the parking lot.

Thanks for the laugh, Mom!

Grass En Français

Posted on by Anna

A landmark event just occurred in Mochimochi Land: a pattern has been translated into another language!

Christhalinette, a knitter in France, was inspired to make the pattern for Grass accessible to non-English-speaking French knitters. So she published a full translation on her blog!

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The idea of translating my patterns into other languages actually hadn’t occurred to me much, but I love the thought of that many more people being able to make Grass. My three or so years of French in high school didn’t prepare me for reading knitting patterns in French, but I’m sure Christhalinette did a great job. Thank you Christhalinette!

I don’t know what it is about this particular pattern, but so far it has been altered for knitting in the round (unfortunately the blogger who did this shut down his blog, so if anyone wants to try again, please do!), modified for crochet, and translated into French. I can’t wait to see what’s next for it!

Stack Those Cats!

Posted on by Anna

I was lucky enough to have three fabulous testers help out with the Stackable Cats pattern, two of whom have shared their results with me!

Kounting Sheep made a darling trio of musically-inclined cats…

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… stacked just high enough for the littlest one to reach those piano keys!

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And Hannah of BitterSweet chose beautiful shades of blue for her “column of kittens.”

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Love them!

Thank you to you both, and also to Marti for your help with the pattern!

Kewpie is the New Hello Kitty

Posted on by Anna

I was disheartened to find on my Japan trip that Tarako Kewpie seems to be no more. The doll dressed up as a nasty fish egg condiment that had taken the country by storm just one year ago had gone the way of Dango Sankyoudai.

But there is good news! As the ad I blogged about a earlier this month indicated, Kewpies have morphed into a Hello Kitty-like blank canvas ubiquitous to all department stores, kiosks, and souvenir shops.

Though Tarako Kewpie is gone, we now have Mushroom Kewpie and Beer Kewpie, among hundreds of other variations. You can even get Kewpies dressed up as popular anime characters.

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The craft mecca Yuzawaya now has a whole wall of naked Kewpies in multiple sizes for people to dress up as their food or beverage of choice.

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I suppose you can also get these in the U.S., but it seems that the Japanese have claimed Kewpie as their own. Could it make a comeback here?