Here is my collection of plushies. I've divided them into three sections: reptiles, lions, and a smattering of other creatures. Please click on the thumbnail photos to get larger pictures.

Reptiles, Dragons, and a stray Frog

Dragons

Emrys

This is Emrys.

(Click for Emrys's page. Large images, may load slow)

Emrys is my largest plushie. He was made in Wales, and his plush is more a short fur, even inside the mouth and ears. The wings look especialy silly with the fat belly -- this is one well-fed dragon.

Max and Verox

Verox is a combination of the roots 'ver' for 'green' and 'ferox' for 'ferocious.' When I got him, he actually looked like he might bite someone. Max is a scaled up version of Verox -- at the time, he was the largest plush dragon I had ever seen, hence 'Maximus.' Verox's twin was rescued from a thrift store. He was sun-faded a bit more than Verox was, but they have evened out now.

I caried Verox with me when I moved from one city to another to get work. I told the person picking me up at the bus station to 'Look for the stack of suitcases with the stuffed dragon on top.'

Max and Verox

Spot

Spot is the first plush dragon I ever bought. He's about a foot tall. He has a letter-opener for a sword, and I made him a bota (wine skin) to his size. He was in The Old Country, (Busch Gardens, Wiliamsburg, Virginia) the first year it opened.

The Old Country is a collection of small European areas. The original ones were England (a Tudor vilage with a theatre inside an oversized replica of Shakespeare's Globe theatre), Scotland (mostly a stable with some of the Budweiser Clydesdales), Hastings (a castle with catapults on the walls!), Aquitaine (a small French village), and New France ('Canadian' log buildings and a log flume ride). Busch Gardens has since added Germany, Italy, and Ireland.

During the first year, there was a human running around in a dragon costume. I never saw him after that. I imagine the suit was incredibly hot -- a heavy vinyl instead of a fur you might get some ventilation in. I remember the poor thing getting a hug from a little girl holding an ice cream cone -- and most of the ice cream ended up on the dragon.

Scorch, the Beany Dragon

There are other Beany Baby dragons, but Scorch is the only one I picked up.

Dinosaurs

Rainbow

Rainbow is my largest dinosaur, and the goofiest looking. She's sort of a brontosaurus built on a giraffe pattern, only more so.

Honey

Honey is just your basic golden tan plush brontosaurus. Nice, mellow personality.

Hospital Dinosaurs

My hospital dinosaurs travel with me to the hospital. The one with the cord around him kept jumping off the bed, so I put a harness on him and a long rubber band, and let him bungee-jump. His job is biting nurses when they can't find my vein the first time. If they make it, he cuddles up to them.

The other one wandered in a few hospital visits later. Now they live in my "grab it and go" bag.

The Singing Dinosaur

It just looks like it's standing there, singing its heart out.

Lizards

Scaley

Scaley is one of the Beany Babies.

Chameleons Abounding

Big Rainbow is the size of a Folkmanis handpuppet chameleon I own. Her smaller companions are also generally chameleon shaped. There were two slightly different patterns: Rainbow and Iggy. But there were a number of Rainbow pattern (and Rainboy tagged) animals in Iggy (blue and green mottled) plush.

   

Chameleon page

Lizzy

Here are Lizzy, a Beany Baby, and the McDonalds miniature of Lizzy. There is a rare variation of Lizzy that is another color, but the book value is way out of my reach.

**New!**

I got a Lizzy Beany Buddy! She is rainbow fabric.

Combined Lizzy page.

Geckos

In shape, these are closest to geckos, even though one is patterened like a rain forest frog, and one is dark green glitter fabric.

Goofy Gator

The name says it all.

Rescue

I rescued this one at a yard sale. He looked like he was trying to climb up to me, in a pile of other plush.

Greenie

I made this fellow, modifying a teddy bear pattern, trying to get some kind of lizard. But with those bright eyes and the nose, he looks more like a green featherless bird. and another view

...and the Frog

This is the oldest plushie I still have custody of. Sir Hillary Bombifrons. He was a gift from my roommate's mother. He used to have eyelids, but one got damaged so I removed both of them.

Hillary reminded me of an old country squire, one not too high-brow to do some actual farming himself. His name comes from 'hyla', a family of tree frogs, and 'Rana bombifrons', a species of tree frog, both the same bright green that Sir Hillary is.

Another view of Sir Hillary.

Lions

My roommate is a Leo, and one of my colleges had a blue lion as a mascot for its basketball team. So I ended up with a number of lions, of many sizes and two very different colors.

Lion page.

A few samples:

Rhinos

Beany Baby Rhino I have a herd of rhinos. Of course, you've heard of rhinos? (I know, in print, it's a pretty lame joke.) Some years ago, I wanted to make some rhinos for sale in the SCA. I bought a Beany baby rhino and tried to duplicate it.

My version is flatter, plumper, and softer -- I didn't get them stuffed quite the same way, and I wasn't about to take the original apart to see its innards.

I found out that there are way too many pieces in the critter, too much fussy sewing, to make it worth my while for what I could sell them for. But I've been looking at them again after several years, and they might have real potential scaled up as pillow covers.

The rhino herd.

Sheep

A tumble of sheep. I have a pair of larger sheep, but they are in repair right now -- I need to empty them, clean them thoroughly, and then re-stuff them.

And the last strange thing...

Baby Cthulhu

Baby Cthulhu