11 August 2010

Petunia the Cow

Petunia and her friends were cut out before Christmas and have been waiting (patiently?) to be sewn. I was finally in the mood and they jumped to the top of the 'to be done' list. Besides, the refrigerator had to be cleaned before I could mark them using the 'light box'. (table opened, clear fridge shelf placed where the table leaf would go, lamp on the floor)

Two weeks of sewing and two spools of thread later and here is what Petunia x3 look like after their cold water bath to remove the marking pen marks and before their trip through the washer to attempt to shrink the muslin lining.

Sewing went pretty smoothly, but then I had learned on the horse to gather the curves on the belly piece before attaching the legs. Lots of sewing, lots of lines ... but nothing too hard.

And here's Petunia, freshly stuffed with eyes on. Her face is still drying after removing 'eye marks' ... but she gracefully consented to a photo shoot.





I'm pretty happy with her. I've made the snake and a horse so far. Next up, the sheep - or maybe the pig. After the rest of the sewing pile is finished. Two unstuffed 'petunia' will be delivered to their owners in September.

Patterns for Petunia, and the rest of the menagerie can be found here.

'bean' - aka pyramid doorstops

This is one of those 'finish this project in under 30 minutes' projects. I made a bunch earlier (last year maybe?) and then gave some away so that all of the upstairs doors don't have them. The doors continue to slam shut when windows are open ... so these needed to be made. The fabric and interfacing have been cut out for months (or maybe a year) and they just needed to be sewn and stuffed.

I think it took all of 10 minutes to sew 3 of them followed by a trip to Walmart to buy some pinto beans to stuff them with. They look cute, work great. A niece named them 'bean'. Tutorial found here.