A Birthday Elephant

I've been getting the Simply Homemade magazine regularly, since issue 1.  A few issues back, there was a pattern for a lovely crochet elephant.  I decided to make it for my mum and adapted the pattern a little bit, to suit what I wanted.

The elephant is basically the same, except that I made the "arms" a bit thinner than the legs because I thought they would look neater that way.  However, the original pattern was just for an elephant, with no garments.  I thought it would be nicer to make a dressed doll, so I invented a dress, hat and bag - complete with little friend!

 Here she is! She's rather nice, I think...

 And she has a hand-made dress, hat and bag... and a little friend!  

See, the little mouse?  I invented him too - no pattern! 

The elephant and mouse are made in double-crochet (US single crochet!), using the circular technique popular for amigurumi style toys.

The bag is two granny squares slip-stitched together, with a narrow ribbon strap.  And the dress is a fab stitch I found in my crochet stitch bible, adapted slightly to make it flare; the bodice is double-crochet again, with some lace I had in my stash, to make it pretty. The yarn for the majority of the dress is one of those "self-striping" yarns, in cotton. It's produced a great patchwork effect which I'm very pleased with.  I used a plain lilac cotton for contrast, which I also used on the hat.

I didn't photograph the back of the elephant... probably should have, as she has a dear little tail and her dress fastens down the back, with narrow ribbon bows.

I'm really very pleased with how this has turned out!  It's taken me about five months to complete it all, as I don't have much spare time for crafting, but now it's ready for my mum's birthday at the beginning of July. She adores elephants, so she will love to have this as a gift.  Eeeeee.... I can hardly wait to give it to her and see her big smile!