Easy Peasy Soft Animal Toys - Blue The Sheep!

Just a quick tutorial about some super duper easy little softies I made this week.

Meet "Blue" the sheep.

Here's the story of Blue The Sheep.
I fell in love with some cute animal print fabric at my favorite local sewing store. It was a precut yard of adorableness. I had some scraps left from making a Popover Dress (Free pattern here) for Delilah. I had to think of something to do with them.

Oh, you wanna see the adorable cuteness of my daughter in her dress before we get started?!!? Well, if you insist. I can't blame you. She really is the cutest thing going...action shot ahead!

(I have a tutorial to make the Popover Dress here)

Delilah LOVES animals, so I guess it's no wonder I have quite a lot of fabrics with cute creatures in my stash. So I imagine more of these little softies are in my future!

I got started by selecting Blue from the crowd of animals. He stood out. I think it was his blueness that caught my eye.

Then I cut a piece of wool felt roughly the same size as the first cutout.

I drew a sewing line about a half an inch around Blue, and pinned the right side of the fabric to the piece of wool felt. (The key here, is to not have any sharp angles to sew. It makes a difference when turning.)

I sewed sorta kinda on the line I drew, leaving about an inch and half wide opening to turn.

After sewing, I trimmed all around the sewn line to about a quarter inch.

And handstitched the opening closed.

Oh, he is so cute, he may have a permanent home in my sewing room as my little helper.

But then he might miss all his friends.....

I think some of these softies would be a good project for the toy society.

Earlier this week I mentioned a smocket tutorial was in the works. It's almost finished, I just need my little model to wear the final creation so I can finish it off. The smocket tute I am posting is a modification of someone else's pattern. I'll be linking to them, their pattern, and showing you my modifications. Hope that makes sense!

Thanks for stopping by today.

- Janimal

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Toy Society Drop

I completed my first Toy Society drop! AND I CHALLENGE YOU TO DO IT TOO!

Don't know about the Toy Society blog? Check it out here. Basically people across the globe are encouraged to make a toy, package it according to the directions from the site, and leave it as an anonymous gift somewhere.

Here is the birdy I made for the drop. Made from wool felt and sewn by hand. Simple, little, cute (I think).

Once the toy is left, the donor is asked to upload it's picture, along with a picture of the drop location and some details, to the Toy Society website. Each toy is assigned a number and shown on the site. Sometimes, (and it's really cool when this happens) the finder of the toy will read the enclosed note and let the Toy Society know they found the toy and those found notices are posted too.

I got my hubby involved and asked him to help me think of a good place for the drop.

Here's a picture of our location:

Good-bye little birdy. I hope you found a good home!

Janimal