For as long as I can remember, my secret life’s goal was to design stuffed toys. I didn’t actually know how to go about doing this, nor did I connect the dots to obvious first steps like “learn to sew (or crochet!)”, so I can’t say I ever considered the idea with any degree of seriousness. I had no interest in knitting or crochet despite my mother’s best attempts to teach me. I distinctly remember being dragged to yarn stores and yawning in boredom as she browsed.

How times have changed!

Fast-forward to November 2010, when I joined a local geek/nerd Meetup group that held regular crafting sessions on Sundays. I decided to knit a Ravenclaw scarf. How hard could it be?

…Learning to knit did not go well. 

I managed to knit six wonky-looking inches and I hated every minute of it. Then, one week I arrived at the group to find a young woman using yarn to make a stuffed Nibbler from Futurama. I stared at her.

What was this? Stuffed toys from yarn? I had to know more. I asked her how she was doing it and she told me that I had to learn how to crochet. 

One hook had to be better than two needles. The rest, as they say, is history.

The road to Wayward Pineapple Creations has been a long and winding one, with more than one dead-end and the occasional unexpected cliff. I didn’t originally intend to make crochet my profession. For me, crochet was just an excuse to make dolls of my favourite TV show characters.

But gradually I started toying with options to make a bit of side money from my hobby. I got a booth at FanExpo Vancouver and witnessed first hand the excitement on someone’s face when they saw a doll they loved. Then I started a small blog, tossed up some photos of my dolls, and posted a few of my original patterns. 

I know the next part of this story should be “and then one of my patterns went viral and now I’m making $200k a year!” – but I’m still waiting for that to happen! The truth is that I was working full time in a stressful tourism job in Vancouver that left me little brain power for anything else. 

But I did make some small advancements. In 2019, I re-branded and relaunched my website as Wayward Pineapple Creations, then spent the pandemic designing and releasing new amigurumi patterns. In 2021, I landed a book deal to publish my first book of amigurumi patterns: Amigurumi for Beginners: Learn to Crochet Creative Figures with 20 Easy Patterns. The book was published in November 2022 by Callisto Media – learn more here!

These days, I’m balancing my time between building the business and working to pay the bills. I’m hard at work designing new patterns and exploring ideas for future expansion, and I’m excited for what the future holds!

I hope you enjoy browsing my website. If you have any questions or comments, please contact me. I’d love to chat!

– Julia