Tag Archives: plushie

Celstial Plushies – part five

Ok, so this isn’t actually a plushie, but it was made for a friend’s plush bear so it still counts! I didn’t want to try resizing a standard hoodie pattern, so I used the Apostrophe Patterns MyFit Tee for the bodice. You can enter the measurements of whoever (or whatever plush / doll) you are making for, and the pattern is generated for you, with your chosen seam allowance!

That bodice would give a t-shirt or a sweater, but my friend wanted a hoodie for their bear. So, I printed off the hood from the 12 months Ellie & Mac Around the Block Hoodie at 75% and removed some of the height of the hood to fit the bear’s head.

Why not head over to Minerva to see all the details of this make!


* – affiliate link
Hoodie bodice pattern: Apostrophe Patterns MyFit Tee (https://apostrophepatterns.com/collections/customizable-patterns/products/myfit-tee) Hood from Ellie & Mac Around the Block Hoodie* age 12 months printed at 75% and edited for height.
Fabric: Celestial plush fleece from Minerva (provided as my Brand Ambassador project for this month)

Celestial Plushies – part four

Having made two bears and two penguins from ‘tried and tested’ patterns, I thought I’d dive in with a pattern I’d downloaded but never actually made before.

Choly Knight’s Owl Plush pattern is a relatively simple shape, but the main feature is the applique face pieces. I used some black felt I had lying in my sewing box for the pupils, but all the white detailing is the reverse side of the fleece.

Check out my latest post at Minerva for all the details!


Pattern: Choly Knight’s Owl Plush
Fabric: Celestial plush fleece from Minerva (provided as my Brand Ambassador project for this month)

Celestial Plushies – part three

Ok, my last penguin was a little bit of mess in places! But I didn’t want to leave it as a ‘failed’ make, so I decided to make a 150% sized penguin to prove that it is possible for me to make one properly from this fabric!

Enlarging the pattern worked perfectly, and my penguin actually came out almost how I expected it to. It does have a twist to the tail but I think that adds some quirky character, so I’m not too worried about that.

Head on over to Minerva to check out the full details of my make


Pattern: BeeZee Art Penguin Plushie
Fabric: Celestial plush fleece from Minerva (provided as my Brand Ambassador project for this month)


Celestial Plushies – part two

Following on from the two bears, I wanted to make another penguin from a pattern I’d used before. This one wasn’t so successful, and resulted in a lot of frayed tempers and arguments… never argue with a plushie penguin – somehow you will never manage to win!

Head on over to Minerva to check out the full details of my make


Pattern: BeeZee Art Penguin Plushie
Fabric: Celestial plush fleece from Minerva (provided as my Brand Ambassador project for this month)

Celestial Plushies – part one

I wanted to do something different for my latest Minerva Brand Ambassador project, so I decided to see how many things I could make from a metre of fleece. I started with two bears, using the white reverse of the fabric as a contrast for the ears.

Check out my latest post at Minerva for all the details!


Pattern: Simply Sewing Magazine, issue 24
Fabric: Celestial plush fleece from Minerva (provided as my Brand Ambassador project for this month)

More bears?!

I’m sure you’ve realised that I really enjoy sewing bears – especially ones from the Polar Bear pattern that was in Simply Sewing several years ago. I was offered the opportunity to make something using this faux fur, and it just had to be two brown bears!

These bears were made at 200% sizing, which was just the right height for this one to try helping to sew his brother!

I’d crocheted these mugs and cakes several years ago, and they seemed the perfect photo props to use for these two bears.

Not long after these photos were taken, these two bears went on a little adventure of their own, moving to live with an old school friend’s two sons.

Head over to the Minerva site to find out more about these really cuddly bears I made.


Pattern: Polar Bear from Simply Sewing issue 24
Fabric: Chestnut super soft cuddle faux fur from Minerva

Ribbit ribbit

I’ve never made plushie frogs before, but when I had the opportunity to make something from Velboa, it seemed a natural choice!

I’ve sewn with various styles of faux fur before, but Velboa is totally new to me. It does have a nap (so the fur can be brushed in one direction), but this particular velboa has an abstract pattern where the nap changes direction multiple times. This meant it was a bit more challenging to lay the pieces out, but I tried to just get the background nap in the same direction at least.

I wanted to try out the glow in the dark fabric paint I bought in the sale from Minerva a couple of years ago, so I used that on the white felt eyes for two frogs. It does give them a bit of a strange look in daylight, but the glow works perfectly once the lights are out at night.

As you can tell from my stack of frogs, there’s also a Manta Ray lurking with them. I had enough fabric left over after making those four frogs, and thought a Ray would be a good companion for them.

Head over to Minerva to check out my Ribbiting make!


Patterns: Frogs by Choly Knight & Manta Ray by Choly Knight
Fabric: Velboa Faux Fur Garden Mint from Minerva

Bertram Bigfoot

I can’t resist entering competitions, so when I spotted that Choly Knight had a Halloween Plush Contest, I had the perfect idea…. a fake fur Yeti!

Unfortunately, the fabric shop didn’t have any white fur in stock. However, they did have some amazingly sleek reddy brown fake fur tipped with a silvery white shade – perfect for a Bigfoot instead.
After all, the only difference between a Bigfoot and a Yeti is the colour of their fur, right?

Instead of adding an applique face, I trimmed the fur to make it look two-tone. That also made the applique features easier to sew in place. I didn’t risk using any fusible web to hold the eyes, teeth and mouth in place, so I tacked them down by hand first, before zigzagging around them on the machine.

You may notice that Bertram’s teeth are a creamy brown shade rather than white…. that’s just because he forgot to take his toothpaste with him!

I did also try trimming the fur for his paw prints, but that wasn’t quite so successful – I think that would’ve worked better if I’d trimmed that after I’d attached them, as once they were sewn in place, a lot of the detail around his toes was lost.

Despite that, Bertram was a really successful make – he only took me a few hours to make, and that included spending what felt like ages on the cutting out!

 


Fabric: half a metre of fake fur from Fashion Fabrics

Pattern: Bigfoot plush by Choly Knight

Jumbo Bear (UFO)

I loved the look of the bear’s paws in the Emma’s Bears Jumbo pattern, but unfortunately, Happy didn’t come with those “pulled toe” instructions. Jumbo lives up to his name, using an entire metre of fabric, and potentially multiple bags of stuffing!

I was going to machine sew the seams for strength, but the weight and bulk of the fake fur was pulling it away from the needle as I stitched, so the majority of the seams ended up being hand sewn. For added strength, I used 4 strands of thread twisted together, and backstitched the seams.

I did use slightly smaller eyes than the pattern suggested, as I only had 11mm eyes to hand at the time, but I don’t think that’ll be too noticeable once his ears are added, and he’s fully stuffed. There’s a couple of seams that I need to finish and I want to redo his neck seam to make his neck slightly shorter…. but there’s no major rush, as at the moment I’ve run out of stuffing anyway!

Starry Skies and Blue Bats

A month or so ago, I was browsing for sewing inspiration when I came across this glow in the dark fabric. I wasn’t too sure how well it would actually glow, but I thought it would look great paired with some blue “minky” to make a bat.

Using the bat pattern from BeeZee Art again, I marked out the pieces on the fabric using a white pen, as I felt that would be easier than using chalk. This is the first time I’ve tried sewing a bat from this pattern with “minky”, and although it has a tendency to slip and slide while I’m sewing, I think this bat is much better than my first attempt, which used regular fleece.

There are a couple of elements that could have been sewn slightly more accurately – my bat does look like he’s got one foot standing on the other, but that just gives him character. And to make him really special, those stars actually glow in the dark!