Monster Teddy

Hi,

a while ago I started to make these strange monster teddies, and their charisma comes from them being a whole bunch of oddballs. This makes this a perfect project for someone like me, who isn't the most accurate guy when it comes to sewing. Here I will show you how to make one with three stalked eyes and a big mouth, the principle is the same for all others. What you need is:

fleece in different colors

thread, needle, sewing machine

scissors for paper and one for fabric or a fabric knife

buttons, fill material

strong paper and a sharpy

Fold your paper in half and draw an outline. Folding the paper will help to make the whole monster more symmetric. As it turns out, it is more important that the overall shape works out, that it is the details that need to fit.

I added three eye patches and a mouth circle. Go wild with your outline, you want a strange little fellow. I found that a mouth at an awkward place and angle is probably the best choice.

You now need to cut your fabric. I used a dark green one for the back and a light green for the front. I think this is a general principle, things that are more important like the face or what you look at should be bright, the rest can be dark. Make sure your colors look good together.

I put the fronts of the fabrics (that is the side of the fabric that is furry and thus the outside of the teddy) together, so I cut from the back. I use a rolling knife, you can use whatever you want. Make sure that your fabric scissor is never cutting something else, otherwise, it will dull and rip the fabric.

I cut out three extra eye patches with the bright gray. I sew them on instead of the original green eyes. The excess fabric is trimmed.

You need to cut the mouth, but make sure it is a bit bigger than your template. In addition, you need triangles for the teeth. I made six, but honestly, the more the better. I used dark gray fleece that has a darker meandering thread in it. Cavities maybe? They can be a bit crooked and different, again the charm comes from these guys having imperfections. Fold the triangles inside out and sew the long side together.

Flip them inside out, I use a chopstick for that.

Arrange the teeth in the mouth. I paired teeth that are similar to each other, again symmetry is more important that detail.

Then you sew everything to the mouth. You should do this close to the brim of the mouth fabric.

Cut out a circle in the front piece but a bit smaller than your original circle. What comes now is a bit finicky. You need to fixate the mouth with needles so you can sew the whole thing in the circle. I start from the top to make sure the midline of the mouth aligns with the midline of the body. You will see later that I failed that a bit in this case - so what. You now sew around once with the machine, which will result in a rather bumpy result. You can trim the excess fabric down, but I kept it. If your mouth part with the teeth ends up being larger than the hole you cut out, the teeth will point outwards later. Otherwise, the teeth will point inwards.

Put the outside of the fabrics on top of each other. Sew around the outline. This is the important step where you need to be smooth with your lines. Avoid sharp corners! The seem you put down, will define the outline of the monster. Excess fabric should be removed, and I cut relieves into the fabric where there are curves. Leave one place open, this will be needed to flip the monster inside out.

Fill the monster with stuffing material. I use polyester wadding, but there are other options. Close the last part of the outline, and add buttons in the middle of the eye patches. Done!

Make your own strange shapes and add teeth, ears, wings, tentacles, and eyes in weird places! If you have a long tentacle, either use an elastic stitch on your machine or better add a stiffening ribbon around the seem, otherwise pulling tentacles will just rip the seems.

Enjoy!