I love handmade gifts. Maybe it’s just because I’m a crafter, but there’s just something special about opening a gift that’s been planned out and lovingly worked on well before the day it was opened.
When I designed Paddy the Penguin, I wanted to create a pattern to make a thoughtful, handmade gift that was simple enough to make up during a busy holiday schedule. Paddy’s eyes, beak and wings are sewn on before assembling the body, allowing the seamstress to sew them on with her sewing machine to speed the project along. His body pieces are simple shapes to work with, and placement guides are marked right on the pattern pieces so you don’t have to spend extra time wondering where to sew on the eyes or wings. As a result, we’ve got an adorable penguin that is small enough to be super cheap to make, and took the majority of my pattern testers about an hour to complete. What could be better than that?!
As usual, my pattern testers did an amazing job getting this pattern ready to sell. Check out all the fun things they did with the pattern! He had hats, bow ties and hair bows made. There were experiments in making him up in lots of different fabrics from fleece to long fur (check out that puff ball on the bottom right!) to terry cloth (that guy was stuffed with a big sponge to use as a bath toy- how fun!). And one of our testers even made up a baby version that connected to the Daddy penguin with a magnetic snap, so the baby could ride around on his feet. I’m in love with them all!
You can find our brand new Paddy the Penguin pattern over on our website by clicking here.
