#second life materials

[catschimericalcreations]

just frankenplush things...

Tidying up the living room and my partner is putting away some of my UnMades (stuffed animals I buy specifically to take apart to make my chimera plushies).

He picks up a rabbit stuffie I've modded into a jackalope with very small and nublike horns and goes to throw him in the UnMades box.

Cue me going, "no, he's a made guy, he's a made guy!" like I'm Tony Soprano explaining why he can't have a fellow Mafia Capo murdered.

ETA: the crime boss in question: Hot Water the Jackalope

tip jar

[catschimericalcreations]

cutting up plushies to make a guy: frankenstuffies, zero waste crafting, and remembering what came before

Pulling the stats for my 2025 creations made me want to talk a little more about my frankenplushies.

I'm going to start by quoting the ancient philiosopher, Jadith (2020):

Because real talk, the reason I started keeping track of what parts went into what creation, and making these posts detailing it, is because the idea of a plushie being donated and then being bought up for scraps is sad.

Sid's toys in the first Toy Story are scary, to Buzz and Woody and also to the audience. And when we learn more about them, they're victims - again, to the other characters, but also to us. And in Toy Story 3, when they get donated, it's still sad, even if the ending is bittersweet because he finds a new home and a new child to play with.

I love Toy Story, and Fullmetal Alchemist, and Frankenstein. But Sid is, all unknowing, a vilain to the toys. Peter Cushing's Frankenstein starts out as an arrogant dick and gets worse as the films go on. Shou Tucker's hatability is a meme (as it should be, he sucks).

So I wanted to be able to point my my creation and say, no, the toy that went into this didn't die. He became something else, and the parts of himself that didn't serve him went to bring new life to more of his siblings.

That's why I give them names and record their birthdays. That's why each piece of the donor plushie is tracked until it's all used up. Flashy the Peacock became RJ the Griffin, and the pieces he no longer had a use for? They helped bring five new brothers into the world down the line.

I'll end by sharing a graph detailing all the plushies I've used to date and how many new creations they went into. 1061 plushies to create 721 chimeras as at 31/12/25.

[catschimericalcreations]

showed off a few of my frankenplushies at a local sustainability event

(should have taken photos at the event but I forgot, so here's a later one)

Re-chree-ate had a series of Waste Free Christmas Workshops, and attendees were encouraged to bring along their recycled / upcycled crafts to share. These are the little guys I brought with me to talk about my frankenplushies!