Taking shape

Ever since Sid came on the scene, closely followed by Jack, I’ve had a little stash of bear materials by my worktable and it was only a matter of time before another bear was planned.

I’d completed a couple of projects, had a meeting-free week ahead and thought I’d make a start. I decided to use the same pattern from which I’d made Sid. I liked his proportions and the method used to construct him was more straightforward than the process of making Jack.

Cutting out is a lengthy process, even with articulated scissors. It’s important to cut the backing and not the pile of the fur and it’s easier to cut against the pile than across it.

A few hours later I had a pile of pieces and a furry sweater.

It was a couple of days before I began to sew. Ears first - easy to stitch around two flat pieces and turn inside out. A good place to begin.

Sewing the arm and the leg pieces wasn’t bad either. Again, they are flat pieces and just need a simple quarter inch seam. I was pleased with my choice of fur - it’s a Hembold Mohair from Christie Bears.

I had remembered sewing the foot pad in place as being the difficult bit. The first time I tried, I recognised it as a fine example of unconscious incompetence - ignorance is bliss! I had no idea what I was doing but I gave it my best shot and it was ok in the end. My second go was most certainly conscious incompetence; the next stage in my favourite theory of learning and I tackled that stage of the construction with trepidation.

Even though I get two goes at getting it right (two paw pads to fit) I still found it tricky. I tacked the edges together first by hand, gently easing the two edges to fit. I then sewed them together using a large stitch on my machine and checked before going back and sewing them together securely. Where the seams meet, there’s a huge lump of fur to sew through and I was thankful for my reliable machine!

It’s this business of sewing in three dimensions - stitching a horizontal piece to a vertical one - that’s tricky. I’m sure it gets easier with practice but I’ve got a long way to go before I feel confident on that bit.

It was getting close to lunchtime now, but I thought I’d keep going and complete the machine sewing, so I tacked the head pieces together, feeling thankful that, for the most part they were flat. I’d forgotten about the head gusset and the nose…

I’d got my mojo by now though, and if not quite plain sailing, I got it right first time.

There’s a rather creepy assortment of limbs on my worktable, then, topped with an earless head. I couldn’t wait to stuff the head to see what he was looking like and placed the eyes in position simply so I wouldn’t lose the mark. As I looked at his face though, I noticed his right eyebrow…

Looking at Sid, it seems as though that might be something that runs in the family.