I’ve been a fan of the TV Show FRIENDS for years and have always wanted to make a knit & crochet amigurumi Holiday Armadillo pattern but, sadly, I just don’t have the right skills to design something that awesome. Lucky for me, I have friends who can!

>> Scroll to the bottom for a link to the patterns <<

Let me tell you the story behind these two cute characters. After the introduction of the Holiday Armadillo Bonus pattern in the 2019 24 Days of Quickies with Marly Bird and Friends, so many of you asked for an actual armadillo pattern. As I mentioned before, I am not good at designing amigurumi but I have friends that are excellent at it. So, I contacted one of them.

The Designer

Meet Megan Kreiner of MK Crochet and Knits. Megan is an animator at DreamWorks by day and has worked on such films as How to Train Your Dragon (all of them), Kung Fu Panda (all of them) and Trolls (all of them). By night she is an amazingly talented knit and crochet amigurumi designer and author of several books.

Megan and I have been friends for a long while now. I’ve had her on the podcast [ https://marlybird.com/mk-crochet-megan-kreiner/ || https://marlybird.com/yarn-thing-podcast-with-marly-bird-construction-vehicles-to-crochet/ ] and have even had a chance to meet up with her at events where we were both teaching. When I decided I was going to have somebody design an armadillo for me of course I thought of her.

The Ask

I contacted Megan a few weeks before Christmas and asked her if she, by chance, had time to design and make a knit holiday armadillo and a crochet holiday armadillo for me. Knowing it was so close to Christmas and she was sure to have a ton of other things to do, I thought the chances of her saying yes were slim. So imagine my surprise when she told me she thought it was doable and she would sketch something up for me.

She sent me this sketch just hours later and of course I was ecstatic! I immediately responded that I loved it and I would purchase these designs from her to put on my website.

Then she asked when how soon I needed them. To tell the truth, I actually hesitated with my reply because I knew how ridiculous of an ask it was. To ask a designer, no an artist, no a friend….to design and make not 1 but 2 amigurumi DAYS before Christmas is just not a nice thing to do. But here I was, doing just that.

I told Megan that I would love to have them for the last Holiday Armadillo Bonus Pattern of the event which means I needed the pattern and the sample no later than Dec. 20th.

Long Pause….

She said, OK. Hot diggity dog!

The Holiday Armadillos

It was only four days later that she sent me a picture of Arlene Stitchadillo, the Crochet Holiday Armadillo Amigurumi sample and it was love at first sight!

A few days later she sent a picture of Andy Stitchadillo, the Knit Holiday Armadillo Amigurumi sample and again, I squeed!

Just a few days after that I had both of the Holiday Armadillo Amigurumi patterns samples in my hands and this is the picture I sent to Megan to let her know I got them.

The Photoshoot

Once I had them in hand, I went to the store to buy props so that we could have a photoshoot. I must say, I’ve never done anything like that before since I don’t make amigurumi. But I had so much fun.