Thursday, 7 January 2021

Wiggler Pot (Monster Hunter World)

This is a pattern I've had marinating in my mind for a long, long time. I absolutely love the wigglers from Monster Hunter World, to the point where the Wiggler head layered armour became a bit of a permanent fixture on my character. It goes with everything, I promise.

And now I've finally crocheted it! The body and pot itself are fairly simple, but it took me awhile to figure out a way to make its little frills and the spots along its body. This is also the first time I've designed a pattern that's intended to be worked in a spiral, so I had to do a lot of research on how to make the colour change in the pots smooth. I eventually found some helpful resources on that, and there'll be a photo tutorial on it when it comes up in the pattern.

The wiggler stands at about 5.5" (14 cm) from the base of the pot to the top of the head. A small cardboard round at the base helps it stand up properly.

If you'd like a printable version of the pattern, you can find it here on Ravelry for the low price of a loonie.

Here's some quick guff on the ways you can use my pattern:

  • do not redistribute the pattern - just link to this page
  • your results are free for personal use - but I ask that you don't sell your finished product. just hand them out as gifts, ok? your friends will love you for it

With that out of the way, on to the pattern!

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Materials

  • Size E (3.5mm) Crochet Hook
  • Worsted Weight Yarn
    • I used Red Heart Super Saver in:
      • Country Blue
      • White
      • Coffee
      • Warm Brown
      • Light Blue
      • Black
  • Yarn Needle
  • Stuffing
  • Cardboard (corrugated works best)

Abbreviations

  • ch – chain
  • sc – single crochet
  • hdc - half double crochet
  • inc – two single crochet in same stitch
  • dec – invisible decrease
  • ss – slip stitch
  • cc – colour change
  • blo – back loop only

Techniques

I have a useful guide on all the different techniques I use when I make amigurumi. Obviously, you should stick with whatever techniques you are comfortable with when making amigurumi, but I still recommend checking it out if you wanna get a result as close to mine as possible!

This pattern will ask you to work invisible decreases while working in BLO. To do this, work the invisible decrease the same as your would regularly, but use the back loop instead of the front loop.

This pattern is worked in a spiral. Therefore, there are no joins at the end of rounds.

Wiggler

Starting in blue (Red Heart Super Saver Country Blue).

Rnd 1: sc 6 in magic circle. (no join) (6 sc)
Rnd 2: inc around. (12 sc)
Rnd 3: (sc, inc) around. (18 sc)
Rnd 4: (sc 2, inc) around. (24 sc)
Rnd 5: sc around. (24 sc)
Rnd 6: sc 12, cc to white, sc 12, cc to blue. (24 sc)
Rnd 7: dec, sc 8, dec, cc to white, dec 6 times, cc to blue. (16 sc)
Rnd 8: dec twice, sc 2, dec twice, cc to white, in BLO sc 6, cc to blue. (12 sc)

Stuff the head.

Next, we'll create a neck through repeats of a round. I recommend that you stuff the neck every 3 repeats or so, otherwise it could be a little difficult to do at the end.

Rnd 9-16 (x8): sc 6, cc to white, sc 6, cc to blue. (12 sc)

At the end of the last repeat, cc to dark brown instead of blue. ss into first.

Pot

Rnd 1: in front loop only, inc around. (24 sc)
Rnd 2: (sc 3, inc) around. (30 sc)
Rnd 3: BLO: sc around. (30 sc)
Rnd 4: (sc 4, inc) around. (36 sc)

Now, because we’re working in a spiral, we’re going to use a special technique for the colour change to make it nice and even. For this, we’re going to do a special finish called an invisible finish.

Please note that the photo tutorial I’m about to show you is for a point later on in the pattern where we’ll use the same technique. This is because it is easier to see the process with the lighter coloured brown yarn than the dark brown yarn.

Rather than finishing off as normal, cut your yarn then pull up on the loop until the end is pulled through. Thread the tail into your needle, then enter the second stitch of the round from front to back.
Then insert your needle into the back loop of the last stitch of the round from front to back. Now you have a seamless join with a fake stitch over the first stitch of the round (marked here by the bobby pin).
To help disguise the change even further, I like to attach the new colour at a different point along the round.

Continue with the next round as normal. You'll work into the false stitch like it's a normal stitch.

Remember, that photo tutorial is from a point farther along in the amigurumi. Right now you should have just joined that light brown that will eventually turn into that little design along the pot.

Rnd 5: sc around. (36 sc)
Rnd 6-8 (x3): (sc 3, cc to dark brown, sc 3, cc to light brown) around. (36 sc)

You can drop the dark brown on the last rep.

Rnd 9: sc around. (36 sc)

Do another invisible finish and colour change to get back to dark brown. This is the point that is pictured in the photo tutorial.

Rnd 10: (sc 4, dec) around. (30 sc)
Rnd 11: (sc 3, dec) around. (24 sc)

Now we’ll stuff the pot.

When stuffing the pot, I recommend trying to leave some space below where the neck of the wiggler is so that you can push it down into the pot a little. It’s not a huge deal if you can’t manage this, as we’ll be adding a lip to the pot that’ll help it look like the neck’s sunken in anyway. Basically, you just don’t want that part of the pot seemingly pushed upwards.

Rnd 12: BLO: (sc 2, dec) around. (18 sc)
Rnd 13: in both loops: (sc, dec) around. (12 sc)
Rnd 14: dec around. (6 sc)

Fasten off and do a weaving finish. When inserting your needle into the pucker, pull the tail tightly enough so the bottom become a bit concave. This will help the pot sit flat.

Next, we’ll add a lip to the pot to finish off the main body of the amirugumi.

Attach dark brown yarn into the remaining loop of the first BLO row of the pot. I recommend attaching close to the back of the amigurumi.

hdc in each of the stitches around. (30 sc)

Use the invisible finish technique to join seamlessly. Hide the tail into the body.

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Gills

Now we’ll make 2... things. Fringes, wings, gills? Let’s go with gills.

We’ll be doing a colour change mid-chain. To do that, yarn over with the new colour then pull on the old colour until the loop shrinks. Also, because there’ll be a lot of tails to hide, I recommend leaving the tail from the first slipknot out and hiding it in the body once we sew the gills on.

Starting in medium blue.

First Gill: ch 2, cc to light blue, ch 2. Turn, sc in 2nd from hook, cc to medium blue, sc 2.

We’ll continue with the second gill from here.

Second Gill: ch 3, cc to light blue, ch 2. Turn, sc in 2nd from hook, cc to medium blue, sc 2, hdc.
Third Gill: ch 2, cc to light blue, ch 2. Turn, sc in 2nd from hook, cc to medium blue, sc 2.

Fasten off, leaving a tail to sew the gills onto the body later.

Sewing

Let’s get those gills sewn onto the body. Here’s the placements. Keep in mind that because we worked in a spiral, the white rows are mismatched on either side. The placements look different, but the gills will be aligned with each other this way.

For the gills on the wiggler’s left side:

The bottom point is in line with the first row of white, 2 stitches away.

The next point is one diagonal away. The third, one above that. The last, one diagonal inwards.

Sew through the sides of the last stitch of each gill.

For the wiggler’s right side:

The bottom point is between the first two rows of white, 2 stitches away.

The next point is one diagonal away. The third, one above that. The last, one diagonal inwards.

This placement will keep the gills in line with each other, even if they’re not in line colour-wise.

Sew through the sides of the last stitch of each gill.

Embroidery

We’ll embroider on some eyes using regular embroidery, then we’ll create some dots along the wiggler’s neck using french knots.

The highest marked point is where the eyes will be embroidered on. This will be one row above the white, in line with the end.

For the spots along the neck, the placement doesn’t really matter, but I like to have one spot in line with the first white row, one stitch away. Then for the neck spots on the left side, I go two rows down from the BLO stitches, then two rows below each for the next two spots. For the right side spots, I just have them line up with the spots on the right side.

To embroider the eyes, we’ll start from the marked point and create 4-5 lines into the stitch above. This will create a nice blue base for us to embroider a black pupil into later.

Do both eyes before we move on the create the spots.

Now, a tutorial on how to do french knots.

Because of how a french knot works, we want to use an entry and exit point that are as close to each other as possible. The problem is that a space a stitch wide will spread the french knot out too far, ruining its shape. To mitigate this, try to exit the amigurumi in the middle of a stitch, right beside where we’ve marked. Like so:

Now, to create a french knot:

Hold the yarn taut, then place your needle underneath it. Wrap the yarn around three times, creating four loops on the needle. Be careful not to wrap too tightly - you want the eye of the needle to slide through these loops easily later.
Insert your needle into the marked point and push through. Now you have a french knot. Repeat this process for the other points along the neck.

For the final touch, use black yarn to embroider slit pupils over the two eye spots.

And you're done!

I hope you'll enjoy your little wiggler pot buddy! If you'd like to keep crocheting, all my other patterns are in that link, and they're all free! I don't have any other Monster Hunter patterns yet, but there's some from other games and some nice real-life birds if you like those.

Thanks again for making, and I hope to see you all in Rise, hunters!

1 comment:

  1. That is really cool and looks uber complicated. I can't fathom trying it but I think I'll order one because it is really cute!

    ReplyDelete

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