This squirrel photo was taken in July of 1981. There's also a
crocheted lion barely visible in the background. 
Puss in Boots is actually knitted, not crocheted. The feathers in the
hat came from our lovebirds. I'm not sure when I made him, possibly in the
late 1970's.
In 1978 one of my brothers was attending a college whose mascot was the
hornet. I don't know why that made me curious to see if I could figure out
how to crochet one. It was a singularly useless project, but it did use
up a lot of leftover rug yarn.
This photo was taken in September of 1983. I had afghan yarn left over
from a kit and the colors reminded me of bears. They were about 3 inches
small and had eyes that rolled.