Fiber Monday 213: Kitty Finished!

That's right, folks, we have a 100% completed feline today! And boy was that a journey. Seven weeks from the first stitch to the last snip.

I both am and am not going to miss working on this wall-eyed little guy, since he was one of the most complicated dolls I've ever made, but it was quite the learning experience!

Here's the photos I took while finishing him!

Here, I'm trying to stuff the head one-handed. Don't do this.

Make sure to mush your stuffing in really well, otherwise you'll have a lumpy potato kitty.
Not that there's anything wrong with lumpy potato kitties...

Ugh. The mouth was the hardest part.

See, I thought I could just fill in some of the gaps and then sew it on...

And it almost worked, too, except for one problem...

I realized at this point that I was sewing his mouth to the top of his head!

There we go. It may look torturous, but those extra yarn needles made sure his mouth stayed in the right spot...

More or less.

If you're wondering what kinds of stitches I used to secure the muzzle, it's the same ones I used everywhere else - whatever I could make work and look more or less good. I just ran the yarn needle (I'm using one by Clover that I bought at my local sewing shop) through the pieces until they stuck together alright.

I don't own enough or heavy enough straight pins, so I had to kludge with bulb pins.
2/10 do not recommend for this work.
They don't secure the pieces together enough, since they're prone to wobbling.

I'm trying to show that I've run the needle through the end-stitches on the ears and then into the head.
I don't know how well that comes across, but it looks neat!

When I was done with the sewing on the muzzle & ears,
I just used the needle to pull the tails (which I did tie off)
down through the neck hole...
The overall effect was, frankly, creeptacular.
10/10 would recommend.

Here we see our lumpy milk bottle body.
It's cute. I like the swirls. It's also empty. Let's fix that.

That is a big ol' handful of stuffing. Look how much stuffing is in my hand!
You can't even see my hand!

That's how much of the body that big handful filled. I needed a second one to finish the body!

I totally forgot to show how I stitched the head on.
It's basically me just desperately using the yarn tail from the head and the yarn tail from the body
to hastily, yet securely, fasten the head to the body.

I am going to stress this here: I have 0 formal training on hand sewing. It shows, I know, but if I can randomly jam thread or yarn through a piece of a stuffed animal and make it stay where I want, you can too! There are infinite places on the internet to look for lessons/videos/etc on how to do this properly, and if you are going to make things to sell, then I very much suggest looking those videos up and learning the right way to do things. If you're just doing it for fun (or if you're sewing illiterate like me) then the random approach will work.

At least Yarn needles aren't sharp...

Here we see a lumpy foot. This lumpy foot needs to have just the pink part stuffed.
Why? Because he's a noodly little cat!

I've jammed a good pinch of stuffing into the opening here, but my stubby, chubby fingers won't send it to the toe...

I got some help from my crochet hooks! I used the bottom of a 6.5mm hook here, but I had to switch to a 10mm hook later.
6.5 just wasn't firm enough, I guess. Also, my 10mm hook has a round bottom, but the 6.5 has a pointy one...

You should just be able to see the fluff.

Weighted toes! I also did the same thing to the arms/hands, which means he has long noodle arms with little club paws!

Look how cute!
And yes, I know we didn't stuff the tail.
His tail is a noodle.

I had to remove the bulb pins (note to self: buy more straight pins...)
And then I had to hold the leg carefully in place while I sewed it on.

I'm trying to show you how I send the needle through both layers of the leg and through one stitch on the body.

Another closeup on my sewing attempts.

This is an arm, I believe, which got sewn on the same way as the leg.

By the time I reached his tail, I was through with bulb pins.
They're great for holding things to cloth.
They're awful for tails. I switched to my silvery yarn needle and it went great.

It took a lot of trial and error for sewing on the limbs and tail, since I've never really done this before. I like how it turned out, though:

He's so flippin cute!

Here's where things get weird. I decided to "embroider" (air quotes since I'm sure this will make a person with embroidery experience cringe) a nose & mouth onto our kitty. I did this using some leftover sport-weight yarn and free-handed it onto the face. I don't know how to embroider, so I basically just... put the yarn through the needle, didn't knot it, left a pair of long tails, and free-handed the nose & mouth until they looked good. I'm pretty sure I used a real stitch for the mouth, but I don't know what it's called. Next time, I'd love to film the whole process for you guys. It'd be a long, boring video, but it could be informative and I could get yelled at for my awful technique :P

Brb, squeeing forever!

If you'd like to name this fella, feel free to give suggestions in the comments!

The pattern is here.

Now Go Enjoy Something!!!
FC