T. K. Arispe

My latest ridiculously overambitious project: an amigurumi Gigantoraptor with its nest! Since I'm going to be a guest at Fall Fossil Fest this year, I thought it would be fun to put together an amigurumi of one of Idaho's native dinosaurs. I love oviraptorids and this was a great excuse to make an adorable plush of one. Ever since I started doing amigurumi, it's been a goal of mine to design some scientifically accurate dinosaur plushies--nothing against the sort of generic green cartoony dinosaur plush patterns you see elsewhere, but as a pedantic nerd I was craving more.

 This fella was a lot of work, and honestly there are places where it didn't turn out perfect--the neck is too thin and too droopy despite a pipe cleaner insert, so I think for future dinos I'll make the neck thicker and try to stuff more rigidly. The arms/wings are also pretty flimsy, so I think next time I'll make four of each wing and sew them together with stuffing in the middle. It also didn't turn out perfectly symmetrically... but honestly I've been really tired lately and I'm pleasantly surprised it turned out as good as it did. I think the head is absolutely adorable though.

For the wing and tail feathers, I attached, tassel-style, some Lion Brand Homespun, which is a notoriously flimsy yarn made of countless tiny acrylic strands. Terrible for amigurumi... unless you brush it out into some beautiful feathers! I love finding creative ways to use scrap and found yarn.

Honestly I don't think this turned out too bad for a first go! I learned a lot that I can apply to other dino species moving forward. My secret goal is to just create an amigurumi Jurassic Park in my house. Except all the dinos are friendly and well-fed.

If you want to make one of these for yourself (or order one from me!), you can buy the pattern or place an order for a plush in my amigurumi shop!