Sewing a unicorn

Or how to make a 5year old happy! ;-)
When I asked my daughter a few weeks ago what she wanted for Easter, she said

“An unicorn. A white one with a pink horn and a green saddle.”

Well …

I actually already had other plans … but why had I asked?!
My own fault!

So I ended up ditching my plans and making a unicorn:

 

I used the (bought) pattern for a stuffed horse and added the horn.
I am really happy with how it turned out.
And considering that I have never made a stuffed toy with a sewing machine before I was quite impressed with my own work. :-) 

 

I made the unicorn out of white corduroy-velvet and used pink cotton velvet for the ears and the horn. 

 

The bridle is made out of beautiful ribbon. And of course it can be taken off. 

 

The nostrils are embroidered pink flowers.
I made the eyes out of polymer clay. Kinda like buttons.
Instead of white dots I made tiny pink hearts and added them to the pupils.
After all it is a very special magic unicorn. ;-) 

 

The saddle is made out of thick green felt with some ruffles around it.
I actually had planned to add some flower-heart-garland kinda embroidery to it as well … but simply ran out of time.
But maybe it was for the better. I quite like how it looks now … maybe it would just have been too much. Or I would have messed it up after all. ;-)

 
 
 

The saddle of course can be removed as well. 

Little bear LOVED it!
She was so happy! Which again made me so happy!

Because in the end I did spend some hours on making it … and the whole time I was worried that maybe she would not like it.

She seemed to have a pretty clear picture in her head … What if the unicorn I was making did not live up to it?

So I was relieved and happy to see how she would not just smile but drag the thing everywhere she was going! :-)

Am so happy that I did not stick with the initial plans … :-)

And another funny thing:
When she found the unicorn – of course it was hidden by the easter bunny –  she instantly turned to me and said “You sewed that!”
I mean she knows that I sew … but still. That instant reaction … I was puzzled. She did afterall still believe in the easter bunny. Why would she think that I had made it?
So I asked her. You know what she said?
She pointed to the ribbon that I had made the bridle out of and said “That was in the living room”
Yes, I do store my ribbons in the living room. I never thought that she would pay any attention to that. And  NEVER would I have thought that she would remember a particular ribbon!
I was speechless!

Hope all of you guys had a great Easter!!!!

Did you make any of your Easter gifts? 

 
More Inspiration via email for you?


 

Homemade Stickhorse

Hello!
 
My name is Marzipan. 
 
I am a cute little big stickhorse.
 
And I have a VERY long nosy nose!!!
 
 
 
 
It is kinda scary when this nose comes right at YA! 
 
Watch out!!!!
 
 
It is perfect for kissing though ….
 
 
 
 
I have pink ears and hair!
 
 
 
 
And big EYES!
 
 
 
 
And I am CUTE!!!!
 
Oh, just in case you wonder … I am named Marzipan because my favourite food are marzipan potatoes. :-)
 
BTW, did I mention that I am CUTE?
 
***
 
Okay, I think I better take over from here … otherwise this silly horse is going to keep talking about his cuteness until our ears fall off! 
 
 
 
You guys have no idea how thrilled and relieved I was to see that little bear LOVES Marzipan!
Because on her wishlist to Santa there was one of those expensive and horrible pinky plasticy and … mommy just does not like it … horses that you can sit on. 
I really did not want to buy one of those!
 
And I really should remember to throw out those stupid toy catalogues that put such stupid ideas in her head!!!
 
Anyway, as I had already planned to make her a stickhorse for her birthday but did not get to do it back then – I figured I could do it now.
 
I was inspired by the awesome horses and unicorns Lier from Ikat bag made.
 
And after Lier shared some true wisdom with me – you have to cut open the pant leg you are using in order to sew on the ears and the hair – it really was not that hard to make.
Yes, I could have figured the cutting open part myself … if I had been THINKING instead of just SEWING. ;-)
 
Sewing on the ears was actually the worst bit. I broke 3 needles while doing that! Argh!
But even with 3 broken needles still cheaper – and ALOT more fun – than that ugly pink plastic thingy …
 
Mission accomplished! 
:-)


 

Cute Christmastree Pillow for Little Ones (Tutorial)

When I was thinking of presents to make for the kids for Christmas I found it hard to come up with something for my little boy. He is just one year old. He will play with anything, really.
But what would be kinda special to him?
So I tried to come up with something that would go well with things he likes …
He loves to cuddle! :-)
He will carry around stuffed pets and cuddle them. Steal his sister’s tiny pillow. Try to haul away the big bear that is almost his own size …
Also he loves to play with small things. Take things apart. He especially likes when taking things apart is accompanied by some noise.
And he is totally fascinated by the Advent calendar I made for his sister some years ago.
SO ….
This is what I came up with:
A soft cuddly pillow in a Christmastree-shape with Christmas baubles that attach with velcro
and therefore make that odd ripping sound when you pull them off.
He is going to love that! ;-)
And I figured maybe you also have some little guy – or girl – at home that would like one. So here is a tutorial on how to make it.
Sorry, I should have included more photos. But I was kinda hurrying to get it all done …
It is easy though! So I am sure you can do it even if there is not a photo for each single step!
Here is what you need:
– fabric for the Christmas baubles – I made 6 baubles and used 6 different cotton prints
– green fleece
– matching thread
– paper for pattern
– scissors for cutting your pattern
– fabric scissors or rotary cutter
– velcro
– stuffing
1. Make your pattern
This is really easy. All you gotta do is figure out how big you want your pillow to be and draw a simplyfied treeshape (triangle with a stem) on a big piece of paper. I used some wrapping paper and newspaper.
When you have your treeshape figure out how big your baubles should be (all the same size or different sizes) and how many you want on your tree. Make a pattern (or several patterns if you want different sizes) for the baubles, too.
2. Cut your fabric
Cut two pieces for the tree out of green fleece. Remember to add your seam allowance!
Cut two pieces for each bauble you want to make out of your cottons – or whatever you use for the baubles*. Here also add your seam allowance.
3. Make the baubles
Take two fabric circles and sew the hooks of the velcro to one fabric circle.
Then sew the circles together with the right sides facing each other – leave a hole for turning!!!
Turn the bauble and put some stuffing in there if you like. Close the hole by top stitching around the whole bauble!

 

 

Now I  have to say I was VERY surprised how hard I found it to sew small fabric circles like that! My seams turned out quite crooked. (As you can easily see in the photos.)
I was not too worried this time as I figured little man simply will not care at all about the seams. ;-)
But I figured if I wanted the baubles to LOOK more pretty I would have used fleece for them as well instead of cottons.
* With fleece you could just cut two circle shapes, sew on the velcro and sew both shapes together left side on left side! So NO TURNING. Just cut the fleece close to the seam – and that would be it!
Repeat this step until you have all baubles finished.
4. Make the tree
Take your tree-shaped fleece and play around with your baubles to figure out where you want them to go.
Pin the soft side of the velcro in place. (I used the soft side of the velcro on the pillow rather than on the baubles as I figured it would be less scratchy if the kids happen to cuddle up with it withouth the baubles attached.)
Sew the velcro in place!
Then put the two fleece pieces together right side facing each other. Close all seams – but again leave a (generous!) hole for turning and stuffing!

 

Then turn inside out and it should look like in the photo above.
Stuff the tree and close the hole. I did this by hand. At first I wanted to topstitch the whole tree but decided against it in the end.
Now you can admire your Christmastree pillow and play around with the baubles. ;-)

Have fun!
And I would love to know if you make one! :-)


P.S. This pattern is for personal use only. Thank you.
More Inspiration via email for you?


 

Quick Advent calendar tutorial

So today was the day when my daughter was allowed to open the first door of her Advent calender. Or rather the first sock. ;-)
 
If some of you are REALLY late with their calendar – well, here is one that you can do in almost no time! At least if you do have enough socks around. :-)
 
 
You need:

 
– 24 socks
Preferably sock that are too small for your kids – otherwise someone might be searching for them ;-)
Babysocks look REALLY cute!

– 24 wooden cloths pegs

– some type of cord or string
– optional: number stickers or paper, to write numbers on

I guess you know what to do now?! It is really esay :-)

Fill the socks with whatever you want and put them on the string/ cord with the pegs. Add some numbers if you want to. Done.

For the numbers I simply cut out stars with a hole punch and wrote the numbers on the stars.
(You can not see that in the pic above as I took the photo BEFORE I finished the numbers.)
I just added another photo below WITH the numbers …
I added the stars to the sock and cliped it all together with the cloths peg.
You can leave off the numbers if it does not matter in which order the socks are emptied.

My kids are not getting any chocolate or candy in their calender. Each sock holds a paper slip which has one activity on it. My daughter loves it! Last year’s favourite was
“Have hot chocolate with whipped cream”
:-)

Today the slip read “Write down a wishlist for Santa Claus”
You know what my daughter said after hearing that?

“I can not write that list today. First I have to finish looking through all the toy catalogues!”

Well, that much about making an informed decision … :-D

If you need some ideas what to write on your paper slips there is a whole lot out there in blogland. If you are interested I can also post the list I have accumulated …
Just let me know.

Wishing you a great 1st of December!

 

 
More Inspiration via email for you?