Thursday, October 21, 2010

The Hungry Caterpillar


Jonas loves to play with strings, threads, and any little bit of fuzz that he can find. Therefore, I decided I would make a caterpillar for his first birthday with lots of strings attached.

As you can see from my absence the last month, it took me a lot longer than I had anticipated. Between having my German in-laws stay with us for three weeks and morning sickness, I just didn't get as much done as I had hoped for. But, thankfully, I did finish just in time for Jonas's birthday on October 14.

How to:
I really wish I could give a how to on this one, but I think it is almost impossible. This was a work in progress from the beginning. It started out with some pretty material and the bottom dangly strings from an old curtain (which I washed and to my surprise came out nice and white and in really good condition).

1. First, I sewed the curtain by hand into a yellow hem ribbon so that only part of the curtain was hanging out. I cut this into five pieces.

2. Then, I cut out 12 circles of material, 6 green ones for the bottom of the caterpillar and 6 colored ones for the top. I then took the colored circles and cut them in half. The yellow ribbons (with curtain pieces) were then sewed into the middle of these halves. After that, I sewed the green circles to the colored ones, leaving spaces at both ribbon ends for stuffing.


3. The legs were by far the simplest of the whole project. I took red satin material, sewed together and stuffed 10 legs, and then sewed two legs each between two pieces of yellow hem ribbon.

4. Now the fun part, the face. I took pieces of felt and sewed on the eyes. The pupils of the eyes are black ribbons tied in knots. The mouth is a piece of red rickrack. The antennas were made by braiding a thin red shoelace. I figured, my son would also like chewing on them.

5. Finally, I had to sew the whole thing together. This was really really hard. I ended up having to sew the leg pieces into the body pieces by hand. If I were to do the project again, I think I would do it all differently, in order to make this end part easier. Nevertheless, I did get it finished and I was proud of my achievement.

Jonas loves his caterpillar. Just as I thought, he loves to suck on the curtain strings or the antennas. Since he is still cruising and needs both hands to walk, he puts the caterpillar in his mouth and then cruises along the table. It's nice to know that the work has paid off. Nothing is better than a happy child.