DIY Life

This awesome Yoshi mosaic, by Craftster user anneandkita, was made for a university lab that studies video games. What could be more appropriate for that location than one of the stars of the Mario Brothers franchise?

Unlike most of his equally-recognizable brethren, Yoshi doesn't come from the 1980s; he made his debut in 1993's Super Mario World. Since then, though, he's become one of Nintendo's most beloved characters.

The pixelated look of old-school, low-res video games lends itself nicely to crafting: recognizable depictions can be made with a series of modular squares in the right colors. Any medium that uses elements with an equal height and width will work, so there are some especially fun things done in cross stitch, single crochet, perler beads, and square mosaic tiles.

If you'd like to try something like this, please join me after the break for some mosaic-making links and tips.

Do you remember Pikmin, the two-part series on the Nintendo Game Cube? These strategy games featured tiny, intelligent, plant-like creatures who could help a spaceship captain rebuild his crashed vehicle. The Pikmin came in several different colors and maturity levels, with each type having unique abilities.

The franchise was designed by Nintendo guru Shigeru Miyamoto (sometimes called "the father of modern video gaming"), and its look was unique and interesting, but it doesn't have the same level of recognition that older games do. More recently, though, the Pikmin have come back into gamer consciousness due to a featured role in the immensely popular game for the Wii, Super Smash Bros. Brawl.

Craftster's AniMei has brought Pikmin to life with this cute little Yellow Pikmin mascot. To make it, you need four colors of felt (yellow, green, black, and white), matching green and yellow thread, glue, a pipe cleaner, and a small amount of stuffing.

Download the pattern from the Craftster page, cut out the pieces, assemble as shown in the photo, and you'll have a helpful little friend in no time! This would also make a great package decoration for a gift, or maybe, months from now, a nice holiday ornament, if you stitch in a ribbon loop near the top.

One of the hottest presents under many trees this holiday season will be the Nintendo Wii. The inexpensive (comparably) gaming system features one f the neater gameplays and controllers in recent times and the games are very engaging. For the young and old, the Wii has become the gaming system to have this year.

Once you have a Wii, a few remotes, a buncha games and maybe even a Dance Dance Revolution floor pad or other larger accessories, what do you do with all that stuff when it's not in use? How about hiding it all in a life-size cabinet designed to mimic the Wiimote handheld controller?

This is, by far, one of the neater game-related hacks I've seen in quite a while. This cabinet even features outcropped "buttons" that really do look like the buttons from the actual Wiimote controller. If you want to have a conversation piece this holiday and you have some gamers in your family, building one of these will keep the conversation nice and lively.

Like everyone around my age who had any sort of access to a house with a Nintendo/NES console in it, I logged plenty of tween-age hours with Mario and Luigi. I wasn't particularly good at any of the Super Mario Brothers games -- I don't think I ever rescued the princess, and it took a borrowed Game Genie to get me past more than the first few levels -- but hoo boy, did I ever have fun.

Therefore, this Super Mario Villains scarf by Craftster user peeloutyourface warms my heart. The scarf is made in intarsia, and probably some duplicate stitch, with fleece fabric blanket-stitched to the back. You'll see familiar "frenemies" like the Koopa Troopa, Goomba, Cloud Dude, and Bullet Bill, and you'll notice that the tension on the motifs is a little bit tight compared to the rest of the scarf, though it looks good overall.

Even better: the designer has posted all the graphs she made to create the characters. That means that you could knit your own scarf, or you could add the motifs to a sweater you're making: try them around the hem, or maybe one over your heart. Or, you could add them to purchased knitwear via duplicate stitch.

The pixelated world is yours, and it probably won't even take you as long to make as it would have taken you to win the darned game.

[via BoingBoing]

Whenever I think of my original Nintendo Entertainment System (NES), I get a warm, glowing feeling inside. Growing up in the early 80s, I have such fond memories of all those classic games -- being the first kid in my class to beat level 8-1 on Super Mario Brothers, finally figuring out how to kill Ganon in The Legend of Zelda (gold cartridge, of course), becoming an accredited, Nintendo Power-certified Tetris master -- so you can imagine the great and profound sadness I felt when I finally had to put down my original NES console. I've since replaced her with a nearly-new model from eBay, but I keep my original system in the closet, and still pull her out from time to time just to reminisce.

As the years have gone by, I've begun to wonder if I could find another use for my old NES friend. I hate to have her sitting in the bottom of the closet, gathering dust and spiders, when she could be repurposed for a different, grander purpose. After looking around online, it's amazing just how many DIY projects exist for old NES units.