Childhood Sewing: A Funny, Fantasy Creature

We got some more boxes down from the attic recently. There were lots of long-forgotten childhood treasures inside, including this weird little doll/puppet/creature I made in primary school about 25 years ago:

I think we had a class project to make something inspired by the film The Dark Crystal (?)

Whatever the brief was, this was what I came up with: a lumpy hand-sewn, hand-painted creature with a big nose and big floppy ears.

Here's the other side:

 

Kinda cute, kinda strange, kinda awesome.

I'm glad to have rediscovered him!

P.S. Last year we found this bear in another box: I stitched him for my sister when I was eight. Click here for more pics and to read all about him.

Childhood Sewing: A Bear for My Sister

Our attic clearout continues. This weekend's rediscovered childhood treasures included a box of soft toys belonging to my youngest sister, including the very first bear my mum bought for her when she was a day old (awww).

One of the teddies in the box was not like the others. His nose is very wonky, he's not very well stitched and his stuffing is showing but his reappearance still prompted squeals of delight. He's a scrappy teddy bear I made for my sister when we were both very small!

  
I was in primary school when I made this, I'm guessing maybe ten years old? (Update: my mum reckons I was actually about eight).

I loved sewing and one of my mum's friends, who did lots of dressmaking, would sometimes give me bags filled with fabric scraps to sew and craft with. There were some lovely velvet-y scraps in one of the bags - I wanted to make a soft, cuddly bear for my sister, and this fine fellow was the result.

 

His nose is a button I repurposed from a craft project we did at Brownies (the crafts were always my favourite bit about Brownies). His body is an old handkerchief, and he's stuffed with fabric scraps.

I didn't follow a tutorial or make a pattern, just stitched him together as best I could from the fabric I had. The result is very lopsided but quite charming, I think? My sister loved him, anyway!

 

It's delightful to have rediscovered this bear after all these years, especially as I now I design and make stuff like this for a living :)

Sew Sweet Creatures: Adorable Plush Animals to Stitch!

I have lots of fun news to share this month! It's funny the way these things work out - you work on a whole bunch of different projects at different times, then they're all published at once and you seem like a super-busy crafting machine.

Today I'm delighted to be able to show you guys the projects I designed for Sew Sweet Creatures, a new book from Lark Crafts which features 16 plush animals with matching accessories:

I know I am a teeny bit biased but this book is straight up ADORABLE. I actually emitted a small high pitched squeak upon seeing everyone's projects - all the animals are very cute and their accessories are super charming.

You can make a cupcake-baking squirrel, an adventurer bear, a party-loving fox, a lumberjack beaver (complete with logs joined together by velcro so you can "chop" them!), and more!

I designed four creatures for the book.

There's Alex the crafty bunny, who loves to knit and sew...

... (look! there's Alex peeking out from the inside cover of the book!)...

... Olivia the fairy mouse who's here to grant your wishes...

 

... Lynne the festival-loving panda...

 

... and Samuel the superhero pig!

It was an absolute joy to design these animals and all their accessories, and so much fun coming up with little stories about them and their lives. I hope you guys will have just as much fun stitching them when you buy the book!

Sew Sweet Creatures is out now in the USA and will be published here in the UK later this autumn. It's available from Amazon USA, the Book Depository and many other bookshops, and you can pre-order it from Amazon UK. Please note: The Amazon and Book Depository links in this post are affiliate links.

Crafty Ladies: Meet Wendi Gratz

Time to meet another Crafty Lady! 

Wendi designs wonderful, joyful sewing patterns. She's a master of lots of stitchy skills, creating patterns for machine sewing, quilting, handstitching and embroidery which she sells in her shop, Shiny Happy World. 

She creates video tutorials for every technique you need to complete her projects (such a great idea!) and also shares lots of free patterns and sewing lessons.

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Hello! My name is Wendi Gratz and I design sewing, quilting, and embroidery patterns especially for beginners. All of my patterns include links to videos teaching you every skill you'll need to complete the project – and you can find all my patterns, videos and tutorials at Shiny Happy World.

I live in the US in a pretty remote area - the nearest fabric store is over an hour away. I'm up high in the mountains in North Carolina with my husband (Alan), our daughter (Jo), our dog (Augie), and way too many chickens. :-)

If I don't have a needle in my hand, I probably have a book. Or a spoon. I love to cook and eat good food and I post a lot of recipes on my blog too.


Recently I've been making. . .

Softies! I love designing softies and I've got three “collections” going on right now – so I've been making a lot of them. :-)

The Cuddle Club softies are cuddly and huggable and made from the amazingly soft cuddle fleece I discovered a little over a year ago. I've been moving from big, fat pillowy stuffed animals to some lankier guys with long arms and legs and weighted hands and feet that are lots of fun to pose and play with.

The Party Animals are smaller felt critters. They're more at home on a shelf  - not really designed for vigorous play and trips through the washing machine. :-) These guys are all hand-sewn, which is good because I'm completely incapable of sitting in front of the television without a needle and thread in my hands.

The Dress Up Bunch are all dolls with the same basic body so they can all wear the same clothes. It's so much fun to design outfits for them! And this year I'm starting to design some other accessories too. I'm working on a pet for them right now. :-)

I've been working on. . .

Quilts! I love non-intimidating applique quilts and I've built quite a collection of patterns. I always like to invite the maker to play with the patterns. I show them the effects they can get by tilting the head a bit, or playing around with the placement of the ears, and I make all my quilts with the same block size so makers can mix and match the blocks – like adding a single cat block to the bird quilt. :-)

I'm working on taking that a step further with a quilt that has a lot of mix and match possibilities built right into the pattern. I'm working on a bunny quilt right now, with mix and match bodies, ears and faces. I'm hoping to have it ready in time for Easter crafting! And then I've got something totally new to come by summer. I'm still trying to figure out how to make it work really well, with lots of opportunities for creativity and play – but still keep it super easy. :-)

I've been blogging about. . .

My tidy studio. Seriously – it's like I can't stop talking about it. But I did the most successful declutter of my life at the end of the year and it has completely changed the way I work.

I love it! And I'm expanding the tidiness out into the rest of my house as quickly as I can. Supply-hoarding is a problem for a lot of us creatives, so people seem ok with the fact that I've been writing about this a lot. :-) The two best posts are this one that's a tour of my whole studio, and this one that answered reader questions about how, exactly, I did the declutter.


I've been watching. . .

The Good Wife and Foyle's War. I watch an hour or two of television every night while I do handwork and right now we're bouncing between these two series. I love them both! We don't have any kind of cable or satellite – so we only watch what we can get online or through Netflix. I'm also in love with Master Chef Junior. Other favorite series I turn to are Firefly, Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries and Elementary.

I'll admit – it's sometimes hard to stay focused on my work when I'm watching Miss Fisher. The costumes are spectacular!

I've been reading. . .

A lot! My husband is a writer and I worked in children's publishing for about twenty years before starting my business – so we're a family of readers. I hardly ever read craft books, but I read lots and lots of fiction. I love good stories – no matter what medium – and I wish my designs were better at telling or suggesting stories. It's something I'm working on and I have the work of some of my favorite artists hanging in my studio. :-)

I read for an hour or more every night after I'm done working. Some of my favorites from the last month or so are Clariel (the fourth book in the Abhorsen series by Garth Nix), The Girl with All the Gifts by M. R. Carey, The Girl of Fire and Thorns by Rae Carson, and Tongues of Serpents (in the Temeraire series by Naomi Novik). I just started The Dead in Their Vaulted Arches by Alan Bradley - I love the Flavia deLuce books!


Wendi's 3 Top Tips for Happy Crafting

1. Don't be afraid to make mistakes. I know people say this all the time, but it's hard to take it seriously when all you see online are beautiful images of the successful projects that made the cut. But I mean it. If you're trying to learn something new, you're going to make mistakes. If you're not producing some spectacular failures, you're not pushing your skills enough.

2. Don't feel like you always have to push yourself. I know – I just talked about pushing your skills. But you don't have to do that all the time! Sometimes the happiest way to spend an afternoon is working on an easy project that you know you can nail. Don't be ashamed of doing things that are easy.

3. Don't look too closely at your mistakes. You're going to see them. You'll see mistakes that nobody else in the world will see, even if they're using a magnifying glass. But don't dwell on them – or feel like you have to rip them out and redo all of them. Just make a mental note of them so you know where to go slower or use more pins next time, and move on.

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Visit Shiny Happy World to see more of Wendi's work and check out her range of patterns and tutorials. You can also keep up with the news from Wendi's world on her blog, or on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and Instagram. 

Click here to read more posts in the Crafty Ladies series.

Please note: the Amazon links in this post are affiliate links.

How To: Felt Candy Corn Plush

After making some felt candy corn ornaments I couldn't resist scaling up the pattern and making some GIANT CANDY CORN :)

I stitched a big mama candy corn and a baby candy corn. A giant candy corn or a whole family of them would make great decorations for Halloween, propped up on a bookcase or tucked among the cushions on your sofa.

They're dead easy to sew - and I've even re-sized the templates for you so you can just print them out and start sewing. Hurrah!

 

To make the plush candy corn, you'll need to refer to the candy corn ornament tutorial.

Follow steps 1 & 2, cutting out the pieces and sewing them to some backing felt.

At step 3, instead of adding seed beads for the eyes you'll need to add black felt eyes. Sew these in place with black sewing thread and whip stitch. Sew the smile with black embroidery thread (floss). I used three strands of six-stranded thread.

Follow steps 4 & 5 to cut out the candy corn shape and cut a backing shape. If you want you could make the back match the front (minus the face!) but using plain felt saves you lots of time.

Skip step 6 as you don't need to add a ribbon.

Then follow steps 7 & 8 to sew up the candy corn and stuff it. I used blanket stitch for sewing the larger versions of the candy corn as it gives a neat finish, but you could stick with whip stitch if you prefer.

And that's it! One giant plush candy corn, ready to spread some cuteness this Halloween.

Click here for template sheet 1 and here for template sheet 2. Make sure you're viewing them at full size, then print them at 100%.

This tutorial is for personal use only: you can use it to make as many felt candy corn as you want for yourself or as gifts, but please don't make any for sale. You may borrow a couple of photos if you want to blog about this project, but remember to credit me and link back to this page on my blog, and do not reproduce my entire tutorial / share my templates on your site. Thanks!

Enjoyed this free tutorial? Buy me a "coffee" and help support my blog!


Subscribe to my newsletter for a monthly free pattern and visit my crafty tutorial archive for lots more free projects.

Visit my shop to buy my printable PDF sewing patterns:

Crafty Ladies: Meet Stacey Trock

Time to meet another awesome Crafty Lady... say hello to Stacey from FreshStitches!

Stacey is a prolific crochet designer who sells adorable amigurumi patterns and kits, teaches online workshops and blogs about her work and personal projects. She's also the author of three books: Cuddly Crochet, Crocheted Softies and Modern Baby Crochet.

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Hi there!

I’m Stacey and I’m the girl behind FreshStitches Amigurumi Crochet. I design the patterns, run the website, write the blog posts and package & ship the kits. I also teach knitting and crochet at national events and on Craftsy as well as write books.

I live in Minneapolis, MN with my sweet hubby, and we’ll have a baby girl in January! I’m really passionate about urban self-sufficiency. I love cooking, baking, canning, sewing, knitting... you name it! I also enjoy running and yoga.

Recently I’ve been making…

Since we’re expecting a baby girl (our first!), I’ve been devoting my crafting time to baby things. I just love knitting little baby sweaters... they’re small, so it’s easy to feel very accomplished! I’m not sure I’d ever take on a fully-cabled sweater for myself, but it seems not so daunting in a miniature version.

I do a little sewing, but it’s usually a summer activity for me. I just finished a faux elephant taxidermy head (designed by Abby Glassenberg) that I’m just totally in love with!

Since winter is quickly knocking at our door (it comes fast and cold here in Minnesota!), I’ll probably squeeze in some hats and socks (knitted). I love wearing hand-knit socks. They’re so warm and they always put a smile on my face.

I’ve been working on…

I just finished designing a mummy for Halloween.

I always try to design a few seasonal items each year... and just recently, I was struck with the perfect technique to do for this mummy! Basically, you crochet the base of the mummy, and then do a type of surface stitch to make his little wraps... I’m really pleased with it!

I’ve been blogging about…

I’ve been blogging at FreshStitches for over 5 years now! Whoa! For the past few years, my focus has been on daily posts, updating folks on what I’m doing and such.

However, recently, I feel that the nature of blogging has changed. I think twitter and instagram are filling the niche of ‘telling us what’s happening now’, and blogs are becoming more like archives of great information. So, I’ve shifted to blogging more tutorials and substantive posts. Ones I hope that will be reference points for years to come.

I’m not only interested in blogging crochet tutorials, but also advice for small craft businesses and also advice for time management. Even if you’re not terribly crafty, I think we all feel that managing our work, family and hobbies is a delicate practice!

I’ve been reading…

I know it sounds non-crafty, but I really enjoy reading Apartment Therapy. I don’t live in an apartment, but they have some great DIY tutorials and someone who writes there has a real eye for crafty stuff. I also really enjoy Abby’s blog and podcast, Mollie’s blog and MochiMochiLand. 

While I craft, I’ve been watching…

I’m addicted to documentaries and the History Channel! Or news. I don’t watch much fiction (in fact, it’s so bad that I usually don’t even know the names of the shows that my friends are talking about), but I’ll watch a show about the borders of the American States over and over again.

Since I’m usually crafting, it has to be something that I don’t really need to pay attention to!

 
Stacey’s 3 Top Tips for Making Business Work with Life

1. Set an end time. You need to get off of work. Seriously. Schedule something at that time, if you have to. I typically hit an end-of-day yoga class.

2. Eat the frog (that is, do the hardest thing first). It means that at the end of the week, all the must-dos will really be done, and you’re not likely to have wasted hours putzing on the internet.

3. Schedule by the week, not day. Each week, I pick a few key things I need to do. Scheduling my week means that I still give myself flexibility, which is much better than feeling really bad on a Tuesday because things didn’t go as planned.

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Click here to visit Stacey's website where you'll find her blog and online shop. You'll also find her on Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, Instagram and Ravelry.

Click here to read more posts in my Crafty Ladies series.

Please note: the Amazon links in this post are affiliate links.

12 Awesome Free Stuffed Toy / Plushie / Softie Tutorials

Stuffed toys, softies, plushies, plush, soft toys, whatever you call them they're fun to sew!

Inspired by last week's Guest Post - a review of Abby Glassenberg's book Stuffed Animals: from concept to construction - today I'm sharing a round-up of links to 12 fantastic free softie patterns.

1. DIY Nessie - We Lived Happily Ever After. Make your own Loch Ness Monster!

 

2. Mr Ted - Craft Schmaft. A modern take on the classic teddy bear.

3. Animal Bean Bags - Tried & True. Who knew cubes could be so cute?

 

4. DIY Handmade Walrus - The A & B Stories. I love his tusks!

5. Stuffed Marshmallow - Wild Olive. Super simple and SUPER cute.

6. Playful Stuffed Crocodile - Sew 4 Home. Those teeth! So great.

 

7. Donkey Softie - Myra Masuda, on the Etsy Blog. Love the ears and the cute eyes!

8. Myrtle the Turtle - The Purl Bee. Make use of some of that pretty fabric in your stash.

9. Superhero Soft Toy - Lisa Tilse at CraftTuts+. Easy to customise to create a personalised gift.

10. Stegosaurus - Nuno Life. My favourite kind of dinosaur.

11. Plush Fox Dolls - A Beautiful Mess. Every sofa needs a fox cushion!

 

12. Kawaii Yeti Monster - Amanda Tepie at CraftTuts+. Just adorable.

Got the toy-making bug and want to learn how to design and make your own softies? Check out the review of Stuffed Animals by Abby Glassenberg I shared last week. Abby also has lots of fun free sewing tutorials on her blog, While She Naps.