Some crochet animals/amigurumi require a part of pellets as stuffing to give them more weight. My first amigurumi that needed pellets was Amineko. I looked on line to see what pellets are and where I could buy them. They are little round balls, mostly plastic and available in sewing and craft shops. After visiting a few hobby/craft shops I still hadn’t found my pellets. In the Netherlands they are hard to get. I’d also read toy bullets, marbles or rocks could be an alternative. Well, toy bullets I couldn’t find either and marbles are too large for many amigurumi I believe. That only left the rocks, which can be an option and they are easy to find in pet shops, but they’re kind of small and pointy.
There was something else I’d found in the hobby shop, called Hama Beads. They actually have an other ‘hobby’ purpose and I wasn’t sure they had enough weight, but they seemed worth the try, because the beads had the right size and come in little or big bags and many colours.
And it worked! Beads are heavy enough and good to shape because they are a bit rubbery. If you squeeze the part whit the beads, it keeps that shape and that is a very useful quality. The variety in colours comes in handy too if you haven’t crocheted very tight.
Here’s an example of the Dutch Hama beads:
Conclusion: enough weight, easy to shape with, available in many colours. One downside, I think you can only wash them cold, because if you use them for their real purpose, you have to use a flat iron to melt them together, so washing them hot might cause them to melt. I’m not sure about this, but am not going to try. If I’ll ever wash an amigurumi, I would do a could hand wash with baby soap, because that is best for wool anyway. That was an extra tip wasn’t it!
Goodbye and good luck!
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