Why shell out big bucks for a real iPhone, Nintendo, or Ferrari, when a homemade replica that you knit or sew is just as good in every way? Except of course, for the minor point of being completely useless?

The author of the blog Daddytypes writes that his mother knitted him an iPhone. She started with the pattern for knitting a Pop-Tart cell phone cozy. The project required a total four to five hours, and involved testing various yarns for suitability.

"Blueblythe" on the Craftster.org forum sewed a Nintendo. The cover opens so you can put game cartridges in, and she made two games - Mario 3 and Duck Hunt. She made a controller and a gun that can be plugged and unplugged. She also "made a television with interchangeable Mario and Duck Hunt screen shots on them that are attached to the tv with velcro."

And the British tabloid The Sun reports that Lauren Porter, a 22-year-old student at Bath Spa University, knitted a life-sized Ferrari.. It's 12 miles of yarn over a steel frame, with a hand-embroidered horse logo. "I get men admiring the racing lines and old women look at the needlework," she told the Sun.

Via Geekbrief, which I watched on my iPhone, which is made of metal, plastic, and glass, rather than knitted from yarn.