Word Nerd Review: Pompom Pokemon – Sachiko Susa
by Trisha Quezada
We’re a Pokemon obsessed family and I have a not-so-secret love of crafts and projects. So I was super excited when Pompom Pokemon arrived on my doorstep. For those of you who aren’t up on the arts and crafts, yarn pompoms are showing up everywhere. You can even find rugs (yes, rugs!) made entirely of hand-made pompoms. Pompom Pokemon gives you excellent step-by-step instructions, along with templates for each tiny little piece, so that you can make your own tiny, fuzzy, adorable Pokemon collection.
After filling the book with sticky notes and making a rather large shopping list, I headed out to the fabric store for materials. While the book itself is great, it proved difficult to find what I needed at my local store. I needed to make several modifications to the yarn weights and colors if I was going to be able to get started right away. I was able to find decent substitutes for everything but the thinnest yarn (which of course is used in Pikachu).
So, if you’re a purist about these things, I recommend planning ahead so that you can order online.
Once I got everything home I realized that these are MUCH harder than they look! They’re adorable and worth the effort, but there’s absolutely a learning curve to making a decent pompom.
Now that I’ve got that down though, I’m hoping the process gets a bit faster. Here’s a picture of my first attempt: Torchic
If you compare mine with the photo in the book I don’t have it quite right…but it’s not bad for a first attempt. These things are TINY. It’s really difficult to cut out all of the teensy pieces. They’re only about 3 inches tall when completed.
Here’s the goal photo followed by a quick glimpse of the instructions for Torchic:
As you can see, the instructions are detailed. Every step is clearly written, photos and drawings are provided, and helpful tips are plentiful.
Pompom Pokemon will help you jump into the pompom craze. Just beware, it’s kind of addictive. You will want to make all the creatures in this book and then let your creativity loose and make your own pompom pets.
