It'd Be A SSssshame...

As (hopefully) many of you know, about a month ago I wrote a set of instructions for my old Portal Sentry Turret to enter into a contest on the DIY website, Instructables. And as probably even more of you know, the XBLA version of Minecraft came out a short time ago. Since the contest wouldn't end till this week, and the results wouldn't be out for at least a week more, I started spending my time perusing projects on the website (as well as losing myself in the time-sink vortex bottomless-abyss-from-which-there-is-no-escape that is Minecraft!)

One of the more impressive projects I happened across was a walkthrough/template for a Creeper Plushie by DucttapeNinja, and the longer I continued my in-game excavations, the more the idea of bringing some of that pixelated, explodey-goodness into my home dug into my mind (pun intended).

As it turns out, I'm apparently not a half-bad seamstress...

The model is built at the recommended scale of 1 pixel = 0.5" (12.7mm), which works out to a finished product at 4" (10.2cm) wide x 13" (33cm) tall x 6" (15.2cm) deep. Being my first attempt at a plush, it took about 20hrs collectively.

Overall, I'm more than satisfied with how well it came out; the patterned green fleece I used was a very lucky find and matched the creeper's multi-colored skin (fur? scales? What the hell are creepers, anyway?) much better than the flat green of the original design. The mouth is the only piece that bothers me a little. The original design called for the eyes and mouth to be embroidered on, but it just didn't look that good up close (no offense to DucttapeNinja), so I opted to take a chance and cut out holes to sew in patches of black fleece. Given my novice skill level, it really came out better than I should have expected, but the mouth still stands out as a little uneven on one side.

Now, back to building my fortress complete with inter-continental rail system!