My Three Stooges Sock Toys

Three Stooges

I bought my first craft book using socks in 1985 when I was still in secondary school (high school).  It became one of my collection of three craft books. I don’t remember if I ever made any of the toys shown in this particular book, but they no longer appeal to me these days.


Though sock toys existed as early as the 19^th century and regained its popularity back in the late 20^th century, it was not known among many Malaysian until very recently.  I re-encoutered my passion with this form of arts when I came across a fascinating craft book in a bookstore a few years ago,  It was a craft book by a Taiwanese author, Danta.  I was inspired by his wonderful ideas. So, I bought it. 

I went through our socks at home and gathered few socks for the project as soon as I was home. Eagerly, I studied the structures and took tips on making  sock toys. I picked a pair of my husband's socks which are still  new for my first project because I love the simple design of men socks. Not following any sample from the book, I created this creature of my own( See picture on the left). This is not his original look. (Note his original look on the group photo above. He had gone through one plastic surgery to get his sexy lips and the big round eyes).                

I named him Muichi after the makeover. What's the meaning of the name? Well, this creature purses his lips like a child who is about to cry. The Cantonese call this " Mui Mui Chou". That’s how the Mui came about and Chi is simply to rhyme with it. Muichi is an innocent and loving creature. He is often being taken advantages of and therefore, he purses his lips all the time :)

My second socks creature was made with my daughter’s old socks. Meet Fri who is very friendly and was born on a Friday. 

About a year later, I discovered the coolest sock toys craft book - Stupid Sock Creatures by John Murphy and Sock Monkeys (200 out of 1,862) by Anne Svenson+Ron Warren on Amazon.com, a place I bought many of my books.  These are black and white photos book of 200 sock monkeys out of the authors astounding collection of 1,863 vintage sock monkeys. These books cost more at our local bookshops but I was fortunate to have a mailing address in the U.S. and an annual personal delivery service to bring them back to me . 

Polo has a long tail

I was so inspired by the book and after looking at 200 vintage sock monkeys, my third sock toy was naturally a sock monkey. It was made with brand new male  socks. Of course, the socks owner, my husband, hassled me for cutting his socks  again! The label for the sock is Polo, so it was named Polo.

It has been quite a while since I made Polo. I had with me two pairs of original Rockford Red Heel socks bought from Chicago last autumn.  It awaits my good mood to make craft out a classic sock monkey.

Click here for a tutorial from YouTube to make a classic sock monkey. With all the free tutorials available online, you don't even need to buy crafting and sewing books these days. Unless you are like me,  who doesn't always have access to the internet, and who loves hard copy versus the computer screen  It is a treat to own a book!