8/27: I’ve been thinking about making this camel for a couple months now, but I keep going back and forth on what I want to do with it. I had also hoped to use up existing yarn, but it looks like I won’t have enough of the main color, so I had to order more of that, and I ordered a couple other colors while I was at it. Oops!

I’ve made some other Heidi Bears animals before: a few hippos, a horse, a dragon, a bird, but it’s been a couple years.

I’m making some modifications. First, I’ve decided to do the granny motif rather than the flower for the solid-colored body pieces. Those go faster and the holes are smaller. Also, since there’s no variation in color, you can’t see the flower as well anyway. I might do a flower motif for the head piece. I might also do the blanket/saddle in the flower motif, or I might use a different pattern I’ve had my eye on. We’ll see when we get there.

I’m also going to attempt to alter the feet by incorporating the “toes” from the Smaug pattern. How can you have a camel without camel toes, right??? I’m going to do the three motifs of that pattern, then I’m hoping I can just add the regular camel legs on top of those (so instead of “sealing” the camel’s legs at the bottom, they’ll attach to the top of the feet). Fingers crossed.

8/28: Usually when I make these animals, I create all the motifs first, then use JAYG to join them all together. This time, I’m making and joining them as I go. (In other words, not making all the motifs first, just making them one at a time as I need them.) I’m doing this because I wanted to make sure my modified legs would work. I’ve done one leg, and I think it will work, but I’m going to go ahead and keep making-joining-making-joining because there’s less tying off that way, plus you get the benefit of seeing it come together quicker.

I’m a LITTLE concerned the legs might make the camel a little lopsided. (Dragons have haunches, and camels…don’t really have haunches, but we’ll see how it goes. Unfortunately I won’t really be able to tell until I have the body going, and I need to finish the other three legs before I get to that point.

8/30: Done with three legs. Getting kinda bored with them, looking forward to starting the hump.

9/2: I’m done with all four legs, I’ve connected them at the belly, and have started the side. Connecting the third leg was a major PITA. I kept attaching the wrong side and getting the toes backward and stuff. I think it took me five tries to get it right. VERY happy to finally be moving on to the body.

9/9: I’ve finished the hump and have started the neck. It looks like a decapitated camel now. If I counted right, I only have five motifs left to “finish” him (plus the ears), but I also want to experiment with eyelids/lashes, and THEN I need to figure out what to do about the blanket/headpiece/adornment. So while I’m almost “done,” I’m really nowhere near being done, but that’s okay. I’m just getting to the good stuff.

9/13: The camel part of the camel is done! (Except for the ears—I’m not adding those until I figure out what I want to do about a headdress.)

I debated between dark brown and light brown/gold eyes. The gold looked BEAUTIFUL but I was worried there wasn’t enough contrast, so I went with dark brown. I also debated between 8 and 10 mm eyes, and went with the 10. Camels have big eyes.

I also added eyelids and lashes (two strands of black embroidery floss). I’m not sure how I feel about the lashes and might remove them.

Onto decorating!

10/7: Done! I got sidetracked by other things, and frustrated that my original plan to decorate Kamal didn’t quite work out, but I’m happy with the end result!

I gave him a saddle and headdress, some ponpoms, tassels, etc. I’ve decided to keep the eyelashes. I only did six rounds on the ears—nine seemed like too many.

For now he’s standing, but he’s kind of balancing on his toes, so I’m not sure how long that’ll last.