My Sewing Project

A couple of weeks ago I decided to do a little sewing project. It's been years since I even held a needle in my hand, but I did a lot of hand sewing when I was younger (sewing on buttons and cross-stitch and candlewicking and that sort of thing), and it came back to me pretty quickly. I've never had much talent for sewing, but I can get the job done.

My daughters make little stuffed critters they call "talkies," and so I asked them to show me how to make one. I took pictures along the way so I can do it on my own next time. Here is the completed talkie:


To begin the project I used a football-shaped pattern (about 3.5 inches from one end to the other) and fleece material. Apparently it can matter, depending on the material being used, which way the cloth stretches. The material I used was a little stretchy, so my daughters told me to make sure it stretched side-to-side rather than lengthwise when I cut out the pattern (otherwise instead of making a round circle you can end up with a kind of "squished" ball):


I pinned the pattern to the material and then cut it out:


Then I cut out three more:


The results were a bit uneven (I did my best, but scissors were never my specialty). So I took all four pieces and trimmed them:


And made them all the same size:


Then I divided the four pieces into pairs and sewed each pair together on one side:


This is what they looked like after I sewed them together:


Then I put one inside the other:


And sewed them mostly together, leaving a whole big enough for stuffing. At this point I turned the circle inside out so that the seams wouldn't show on the finished product:


Then I added stuffing (not the Thanksgiving kind):


And finally I sewed the top closed:


I used this fabric glue:

And cut out eyes:

And glued them on my talkie:


Then I cut out "W" for the mouth:


And glued it on as well:


Unfortunately I accidentally reversed the eye color, so the result looked a little like Little Orphan Annie (without pupils), so I decided to make an addition:


The only thing that remained at this point was to make feet. I started with a tombstone-shaped pattern:


And cut out four of them (two for each foot):


Then I trimmed them so they would be the same size:



And divided them into pairs:



And sewed them together (all exception the bottom). The result looked like finger puppets (which I might want to make for a future sewing project):


I then stuffed each of the feet:



And sewed the top together:


My wife showed me a technique she uses to sew things together without a seam, and this was the end result:


I then attached the first foot to the talkie, sewing around the entire foot so it would stay attached (this was a bit difficult and I got a blister from pushing and pulling the needle):


Then I took a random picture of my cat sleeping next to me (don't skip this step!):


And finished sewing the foot on:


I then attached the other foot:


And here is the finished product (along with the talkie my daughter made for my birthday a few weeks ago):