Vampire Bat Softie Tutorial :: Tutorial Tuesday

Skill Level: Beginner

Time: Less than 1 hour

Repost from 10/27/09 - Halloween is rapidly approaching and since we're not doing crazy costumes this year (past years have included a Fortune Telling Machine, Lego People complete with cylinder heads and Pan with furry goat pants) I really wanted to do some stuff to get into the spirit. Inspired by this fantastic knitting pattern (seriously, if you're a knitter, check out the adorable patterns) over at Mochimochi (which I vow to do one day when I don't have 3 other knitting projects on the needles - I am such a slow knitter) I decided to sew up a bat softie for my kiddo.

Here's what you'll need:
My pattern
Scissors
Scrap fabric
Thread
Needle (or sewing machine)
Buttons for eyes
Small strip of velcro (could use any fastener - snap, button, etc.)

Step 1: Cut out all of your pieces. If you're not using buttons you can cut out circles from a fabric that contrasts with your body fabric. You can use all one fabric or mix and match like I did, just make sure you have enough of each piece. A note on fabric - I used a medium weight tweed and a light weight quilting cotton. I'd recommend using all lightweight wovens if you're a beginner then you don't have to worry about fraying and over-locking your edges.

Step 2: Sew on your embellishments - eyes, fangs, etc. And don't get over excited and forget to sew your velcro to the inside wing at this time. If you don't you have to sew it on after the wing is but together, which is not easy to do, particularly on the machine. Save the other half of the velcro for after you stuff the bat.

Step 3: Put your fabric pieces for the wings, ears, feet right sides (side with the print) together and do a straight stitch around the outside edges - leave the side that will attach to the body open. If you use a fabric that frays easily, you'll want to finish the seam somehow. I over-locked it below. Trim the points as close to the seam as you can get them and cut a slit in the top of the curves along the bottom of the wings. If you don't do this you'll get bunching like you see at the top of the wave in the photo above. Also if you want crisp edges now's the time to iron your pieces.

Step 4: Turn pieces inside out and push out the corners.

Step 5: Put down the front of your main body piece and line up your wings and ears (leave your feet out as we're going to leave the bottom open) around the outside of the body. Then take each piece and fold it over on top of the front piece and pin into place. It helps to fold your wings in half so that they don't get in the way of the seam on the other side. Also, if you want your wings and ears to be a certain color in front and back like min, make sure you have your front sides facing the front of the body. Now place the body back on top with the right side down and pin all the way around.

Step 6: Sew around the outside of the body leaving the bottom open.

Step 7: Turn the bat inside out and stuff. I used leftover stuffing that came with a few pairs of baby shoes we had gotten for gifts. There are a lot of options for stuffing, so re-use when you can (though if you use fabric scrap, beware that the toy will be heavy and hard - learned that the hard way) and consider the recipient of your softie when choosing a filling.

Step 8: Turn the extra fabric at the bottom inward, fold your feet in half and pin the raw edges inside the fabric. Hand stitch along the bottom to seal up the hole.

Step 9: Fold your wings over with the velcro wing on top to line up where you want to put your bottom velcro piece. Hand sew this into place. If you're careful you can sew it to the outer layer without the stitches showing inside the wings.

Step 10: Give your little bat a name. Mine's Alistair and he's a little shy.

I hope you have fun creating your little bat friends. I'd love to see what you come up with and as always let me know if you have questions or anything seems unclear. Feel free to share this, just please include a link back to my blog. Thanks!