Sewing Stuffed Animals

During this time at home I've been able to do some sewing projects that have been in the back of my mind for ages. I have a small selection of fleece fabrics and thought it would be cute to make some little stuffed animals. I say little because some of the fabric is in quite small pieces and I wanted to use up what I already have.

The first one I made was this dolphin. I used this pattern by Choly Knight. She has a lot of free patterns and when I just went on her site to get the link I found even more things I want to make!
I reduced the size of the dolphin pattern a lot as my white fleece is in very small pieces, so this dolphin comfortably fits in the palm of my hand. As it was so small I hand sewed it together which worked fine.

Next I made this crab using a pattern from While She Naps. As this one is a little bigger I was able to machine stitch the main body section together. Things got a little crowded under the sewing machine so a few bits shifted, resulting in the pincers and claws not being completely symmetrical on both sides, but it's cute nonetheless.

And finally, as I've made a start on Christmas stock, I made this little Rudolph by adapting this pattern found on Handsome and Pretty. It was a bit fiddly and the antlers are a bit wonky, but I like it, and am very pleased that I got it to stand up. I'm wondering whether to add some string or ribbon to make it into a hanging ornament.

Are there any projects that you've finally got round to during lockdown?

More Animal Pots

My Mum's been busy crocheting so I've made some more animal boxes. Like the last ones my Mum crocheted the blank pots and I added the felt features to make them into cute characters.

The purple hippo is my current favourite. Look at those ears, and the teeth!

This cute cat has embroidery thread whiskers that stick out.

And finally the monkey with it's sticky out ears.

What other animals could I make?

Animal Sock Boxes

First craft in my new flat!

My Mum retired at Easter and has been spending some of her free time crocheting up a storm. She came up with the idea for these boxes, which are made by crocheting around sturdy muffin cases, and left it up to me to make them cute.

I used felt to add on the features. This green one started off as a crocodile but now I think it looks more like a dragon.

To make these into sellable gifts my Mum had the idea to put a pair of socks inside, which double up as the animal's tongue.

What do you think? She's also made a pink and a purple one - what animals could they be??

Hedgehog Painting

My Mum's school have given their classes animal names and she asked if I'd do a water colour painting for her class, like the ones I did for my previous school.

I used the same technique for this hedgehog as I did the last one, using a candle to create wax resist spikes.

This painting will go on display in my Mum's classroom surrounded by the children's own versions.

Watercolour Animal Paintings

The headteacher at the school I work at is leaving soon so the other teachers asked me if I would produce some pictures to go on the front of cards for each class to give to the head.

Each class has an animal name so the five paintings I produced are of each animal.

I decided to try a different technique for these paintings. I used water colour paints with colour pencil over the top. 

For the hedgehog I added another step of making marks with a candle first to get the white highlights on the spines.

I really love how the paintings turned out, and so do the rest of the staff. In fact they were a bit amazed as they were only expecting cartoon drawings. 

I think my favourite is the rabbit, but I might be a bit biased because I work in Rabbit class.