A while ago the shark plush has found a new home, but I didn’t want him to be the only plush in his new abode. So I made him a friend!
I used the same Kraken pattern from SewDesuNe as for Brian, however, I exchanged his face from one from the Octopus pattern. The original features included in Kraken are ‘angry’ and ‘happy’ but I wasn’t too big a fan of the happy one. The Octopus has some other fun options and I chose the ‘smiling eyes’. I tried to use fabrics that were sea-coloured, hence the blue-ish hues. For the bottom suckers, I used a dotted minky.
I think he’s very cute and hope he’ll have a lovely life.
Months ago, I had a chat with the colleague who made the Safari Mobile about what she wanted to get for a gift. I showed her some of the stuffed animals from the past and she immediately fell in love with the giraffe (and who wouldn’t!). So I set out to make the giraffe during my holiday in June. She asked for realistic colours so I googled giraffe and set out to find some brown felt. I chose to do his body in the off-white that I had, because none of the other colours would really work. The horns, legs and tail would be brown, with his snout and inner ears white.
As usual, a Choly Knight/Sew Desu Ne pattern comes together really easily. It starts with meditative stitching of the spots and other details. Then sewing the pieces together where all the notches actually line up and then stuffing it to within an inch of its life. Once I had the head and the body both finished, I tried to pin the head on to see where it should go. It was a little lopsided and it looked so cute that I left it that way and sewed it on crooked. Look at his little face! I love him so much and I hope his new family will too.
So it did take slightly longer than expected but the Platypumpkin I mentioned last time is now fully formed! This is a pattern that is part of the Patreon rewards of CholyKnight/Sew Desu Ne that they made a while ago and is now in a retired patterns folder. The combination of a pumpkin body and the platypus elements really amuses me. I chose to make it in the same colour scheme as the original was, with an orange body, brown feet, tail, beak and stalk and a green leaf.
It came together easily, as almost all Sew Desu Ne patterns do. You sew the body pieces together but gather them slightly first so that they resemble a pumpkin. The leaf gets incorporated when the body is put together. Then the feet and tail are stitched to the bottom circle which then gets attached to the body in one fell swoop. Then the eyes, beak and stalk get added and the playpumpkin is done!
I don’t generally do anything for Halloween, but I think this guy is going to be my decoration and put a smile on my face every time.
After debating it for a while, I finally jumped on CholyKnight (Sew Desu Ne)’s Patreon. I’ve been using so many of their free patterns for my plushies that I decided that it was probably time to give back a little. As there was also a recent birth, I needed a tiny baby gift. Cue the Manta Ray pattern. This is a free plush pattern already but if you are a patron, you can also get access to a mini version. It’s got three pattern pieces, made out of four bits of fleece fabric and with optional spots. I left off the spots for this version but did include the eyes and the blush.
You first apply the blush, eyes and eye whites, then stitch them down. Then you attach the top fins to the top piece. Attach the bottom to the completed top piece while leaving a bit of the tail open. Turn it right side out and sew along the top fin seam so that the fins stay flat. Stuff the body a little and close up the tail and DONE. This was a super easy evening project and I really like it. As usual my living room was filled with fluff until I got the lint roller out, but that’s the price you pay for super soft plushies. That same evening I also cut out a pumpkin platypus but I’ve yet to complete that. Stay tuned though, it shouldn’t be too long.
Intimidating(?) Kraken looking at you when I try to scale a wall.
While I might only boulder once or twice a year, my desire to own all the things means that I’ve been wanting to make a chalk bag for a good long while now. There are lots of examples out there of fun looking chalk bags and that was exactly what I had in mind. So I set out to find a suitable plush pattern to create a bag out of. It took me a while to find what I was looking for and in the end I went with the angry kraken. I had already purchased that pattern from CholyKnight/Sew Desu Ne (here) and made Brian the Derpy Kraken.
I made much use of the instructions from the ‘do it yourself’ chalk bag pattern by Edelrid for most of the proportions. Then the original Kraken bag was printed again on 130% scale. I chopped off the top, and redrew the sides to be a little bit straighter. I needed to be able to put my hand in it, so the opening had to be large enough. The spots were placed in slightly different locations and the side flaps(?) were also redrawn to fit the new proportions. The outside was light blue wellness fleece, the spots and other details are felt. The lining is black fleece and the stretchy blue closure fabric was some jersey. Some blue paracord for the closure and blue tape for the belt loops. His suckers are grey minky fleece.
It was very easy to put together, basically the same as Brian the original. The only difference was adding the lining and closure jersey. I was worried that overlapping the light blue to the inside would be too thick to sew through but that turned out to be fine. Because it’s so thick it really keeps its shape well and stays open. I did make one small change and that was to add some stitches to the middle of the underside to keep that from sagging too far down.
Hopefully, the corona situation eases up again and climbing will be possible so I can test out if he works in situ. I do smile every time I look up and I see him laying there, looking at me. So that’s at least something nice about this project.
Making a Vulpix/Kitsune mascot for a friend’s birthday
A friend of mine had their birthday at the start of November, so I needed a gift. I’m not sure how it started, but I’ve generally gifted her self-made things over the years. So when the birthday came around this year, that was the intention again. However, I first needed to come up with a plan. Since we were supposed to start a new roleplaying campaign, I figured I’d try to make a representation of our planned character species, a Kitsune. Because I was entirely unsure how to do a fox person, I settled on a pokemon. SewDesuNe/CholyKnight has a free pattern available of a Vulpix. As Vulpix is quite fox-like and also has multiple tails, it seemed like a good option.
The original pattern has a weird hair roll thing on the head, and tiny curled tails. That hair was left off and I decided to draft my own tails, so there are three somewhat curved tails and two that are more upright. It was quite a fast sew, and interesting construction where you sew a front and a back, attach those together and then sew on arms, legs and tails separately. I think I started sewing down his features on Friday evening and sewed him together on Saturday evening, maybe?
There patterns are always lovely to work with as everything fits together so well. The fabric is generally more of a pain, but that’s because it sheds like there is no tomorrow. Again, the lint roller was my best friend while working on this. However, it’s all worth it in the end because they are so lovely and soft and ready for cuddling!
Two little giraffes, orange for a baby and one with a rainbow.
Sometimes things can be serendipitous. This combination of events happened a few weeks ago. My colleague was telling me about the wallpaper they had been hanging in their soon-to-be-born grandchild’s room. It had giraffes on it and her husband was making a cut out of two giraffes to have the grandchild’s name on it. I remembered seeing a free pattern of a giraffe come by from CholyKnight/SewDesuNe like a week before. I showed the giraffe pattern and we both fell in love.
That face!Diverse spotsThose ears are so cute
One of those giraffes needed to grace the new nursery. It just had to happen. So I got to work, asked for some inspiration for the spots, and they had the brilliant idea of doing two colours. The pattern came together fairly easily, and is just adorable. I brought it with me the next Monday when we also celebrated her birthday. Two or three days later and the baby was born, everything was just in time. Serendipity.
With a little tailFluffy bellyBut quite compact
While I was making this first one however, I actually looked at the pattern image. It had a pastel-rainbow spotted giraffe on it. My first instinct was that ‘I can do that too!’, so I cut out a second giraffe at the same time as the first. It’s got bright rainbow spots on its side and some more blue/green spots on his head. Again, came together easily and practically at the same time as the orange one.
Blue giraffeWith rainbow spotsBig ears
This one is still hanging out at home until corona has cooled down enough again to bring him elsewhere. Not sure when that will ever be. It does feel like we are stuck in these corona-times for the foreseeable future again.
Fluffy feetLittle tail
Well, at least that means easy access to the sewing machine and the opportunity to make more little plushies. I know that there will be a pikachu in the future now that I’ve bought some yellow fluff-stuff!
Making a little reversible gift in the shape of another dragon.
It’s always nice when I get to make something that will have a special purpose rather then just for my own enjoyment. So I was super exited when I heard that someone needed a birthday gift for their child and they like the stuffed animals I’ve made in the past. The kid’s favourite colour is orange and he likes dragons. Easy right? I decided to buy a new pattern for this project. This reversible dragon that turns into an egg, made by CholyKnight/SewDesuNe.
Egg?
What’s that?
Oh a face!
I’d bought some weird almost striped stuff on a fabric market that didn’t have a goal but I just thought it was cool. I decided it would probably work pretty well for the egg portion of the dragon. It was a little thin, so I did put some fusible interfacing on it and got on with sewing the spots and other markings on the different pieces. The pattern is very clear and explains what you need to do in great detail. I always love how CholyKnight makes patterns as both the free and the paid for versions are really good.
Look it’s a dragon!
With wings.
And some more of the egg.
The dragon came together nicely and it does turn into a egg pretty well. I’ve recorded a little video how he goes from dragon to egg. You can find it here. It does feel a little weird when you are actively stuffing something into itself. But it’s a lot of fun to be able to actually do it and then put the little loop around the orange button and have a completed egg or dragon.
Orange eyes
Fully flat
Its belly, scritch-time!
The pattern has different options for horns, wings and different types of spikes. I chose to mainly do the spiky spikes and pointy horns. The dragon wings where the most obvious option for me as I didn’t really think butterfly wings were appropriate in this specific case. I think I want to make another one of these for me, but perhaps not yet. Need to first empty out the bin of plushies some way or another.
The little magnetic sloth that can hang on nearly anything
I’ve now finished all the plushies I cut out that one Sunday some months ago. This last one is a sloth, again a free pattern from Sew Desu Ne / CholyKnight. I chose to use brown for his body and off-white for his face and his claws. This one is the largest of the free patterns that I’ve sewn up. I was almost debating putting a zip in his neck so he could be a bag. In the end, I figured he’d do better as a plush.
Don’t mind me,
I’m just hanging out
Put your hands up
It starts with fusing the face pieces and stitching those down. I sewed down the full face with a zigzag. He’s not completely symmetrical, but I think it gives him a little character. Next, the pattern asks for velcro on the claws for him to hang, but I wanted a more invisible solution so I opted for some magnets that I harvested from a broken fly-curtain. The claws require topstitching which turned out to be exactly wide enough to hold my magnets. Score!
Just sitting here
Sometimes I turn my back
My claws can be free
After that, you sew up the arms and legs while putting the claws in the middle. I forgot to read all the instructions and didn’t put any stuffing in his limbs. So he’s a little floppy in his extremities, but I’d already completely finished him before I figured that one out. Droopy he will stay. Because of his little magnet claws, you can hang him on nearly anything. In this case, I chose to use a giant L-square to demonstrate this. I think he’s pretty cute, and the cover images show sloths with longer fur that are a lovely option too!
While finishing up the hamster, I also finished up the shark. The shark is again a free pattern from Sew Desu Ne / CholyKnight. This mighty sea creature was an even easier sew than most other plushies, just sew two darts, stitch together three fins, align them in place, and sew 4 seams (back, two belly and a tail) and it’s done.
Raaawr!
I’m coming to get you..
Beware of my massive chompers
The only thing that caused a little bit of trouble was his giant mouth. The iron on teeth are formed from a moon shaped piece with triangle sewing. I wanted to stitch the teeth before I put the mouth piece on, but at the first try the thread managed to catch and pull. So I switched tactics and put some paper under the mouth so I could sew beyond the edge without difficulties. This solved the problem and the mouth was soon affixed to his underside.
Surface view
Look at my tail
Noodling along
In the end, it was very easy to create the shark and I do like him a lot. You can’t necessarily see his teeth when he’s just laying down, but that just means he’s got a fun surprise when you pick him up, right?
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