Murray the Sea Otter

I decided to work on something a little different during this (3rd?) lockdown. I’ve dabbled in amigurumi in the past and I’ve seen some gorgeous, inspiring posts on Instagram featuring adorable amigurumi.

I bought myself a couple of books and I’m aiming to crochet a few of these creatures.
The first is from a book called Animal Friends of Pica Pau by Yan Schenkel.

Image from Amazon.co.uk

There are 20 glorious little animal patterns contained in this book. One of my favourite wild animals is the otter so when I saw one in the book I knew I had to crochet it first.

I had bought some inexpensive cotton yarn from my LYS in a selection of different colours.

The pattern was worked from the head down. I was reluctant to share photos on social media until I was sure it looked somewhat like it should. The eyes are 8mm safety eyes which I inserted and then added superglue to make sure the backing disk is held in place permanently. The nose and the mouth were embroidered on with DMC cotton embroidery thread.

It took me 2 days to get to this stage. I stuffed the body quite firmly so that the otter would be able to stand upright with no support. At this stage I was very excited as it looked very similar to the photo in the book.

In the photo you’ll see my new crochet hook, the 2.5mm Addi Swing. My crochet hooks of choice have always been the Tulip Etimo rose however I couldn’t find one online in the 2.5mm size. I decided on the Addi as I wanted an ergonomic hook (as crochet can cause pain in my fingers) and this one looked the business. The Addi Swing is ideal for my knife grip plus it’s nice and long enough to support my hand.

I finished Murray in 3 days, look at him, isn’t he cute!

Murray from behind. He is stuffed firmly enough so he can stand upright unaided.

I thought it’d share a photo of what he looks like from behind. While I was crocheting the body I had a bit of a wobble wondering if I was crocheting him right due to the spiralling of the stitches on the left of his back. Of all the photos shared online by others crocheting him I only saw a handful that showed the back and these also had the spiralling stitches that I had encountered so that encouraged me.

The pattern was easy to follow and the if I needed a refresher on how to do certain techniques I could flick back in the book to the photo tutorials that are included.

Murray is an extremely satisfying make and I have plans to make some friends to accompany him.

Murray in this morning’s first snow of the year.

Take care, stay safe. Jean