Pigwidgeon

Meet Pigwidgeon. He is the owl who is given to Ron Weasley by Sirius Black after Ron "loses" his former pet, Scabbers the Rat. He is often described as fluttering around Hedwig being very excitable and quite a silly excuse for a post owl.

Disclaimer: I realize that this is the 3rd Harry-Potter themed make of mine posted on this site. I really wish I had a good excuse for this. I tend to get wrapped up in fantasy stories. I think it's because I feel like so many people that I know (myself included) were made for something more fantastic than what they're doing now...something incredible, something magical. My current obsession is the Twilight Saga, but for a long while, Harry Potter was my world...or rather, I wished it were. The scarf, the pitcher, and even Pig here are all completions of projects I started in my HP prime. With the Half Blood Prince coming out this July, I'm getting excited about the world of Hogwarts again. So I figured I would revive my HP love with some HP craftiness. (End disclaimer.)

Needle felting entered my family a number of years ago when Megan saw a wool nativity at a craft show, which she duplicated for her mother-in-law for Christmas. It turned out so well that my mom started putting her bushels of wool roving to good use by making wool nativities for sale. Then Amy took it to another level. (You can see her work in her etsy shop.) One year--I believe it was for my birthday--Amy made wool felts of the three main pets from the Harry Potter series: Scabbers the rat, Crookshanks the cat/kneazle, and Hedwig the snowy owl. When Scabbers turned out to be not quite what he seemed, Ron got Pig to replace him. So I decided to craft Pig to complete my felted set.
It's clear that when it comes to detail work, Amy is the far superior felter. (Seriously...isn't Hedwig incredible?) But Pig is supposed to be a silly, tiny little thing. So even though he looks more like a miniature penguin than an owl, I'm pretty happy with his quirky, bug-eyed, off-balance caricature.

Just for fun, here is a picture of another owl I made a while back under Amy's tutelage. I haven't named him yet. I guess he could be Errol, but I always pictured Errol to be skinny and kinda distressed-looking. So maybe this is no post owl at all. Anybody have a good idea for a name?

A word of apology: I'm sorry I didn't post a new invitation last week. It got away from me. And this coming week, I will be in Philadelphia for a trip with the youth group. (Don't I sound excited? I bet my enthusiasm is just leaping off the page.) So I don't know how much making will happen...except maybe making the most of it. So for now, I leave you with the lingering invitation of finishing long-unfinished projects. As for me...well, wish me luck. :o)