Two Brown Birds: Pocket Rabbit

Pocket Rabbit

20cm x 10 cm piece brown wool felt
Scrap white felt
5cm square cotton fabric for tummy
Small amount of stuffing
Machine sewing thread to match felt and cotton fabrics
Stranded embroidery floss in dark grey and pale orange

Print out and cut out the pattern Pocket Rabbit pattern. Place the tummy pattern piece on the wrong side of the cotton fabric, and pin in place. Cut around the paper pattern piece so that you have one fabric tummy piece.

Place the pattern pieces for the body, ears, arm and leg on the brown felt. Cut out around each pattern piece. Repeat this process so that you have two felt bodies, two ear, two arms and two legs.

Place the pattern piece for the tail onto the white scrap of felt. Cut out around the pattern piece so that you have one white felt tail.

Using the photos as a guide, pin the tail in place. Using a zig zag stitch with a length of 1.5 and a width of 3.3 and coordinating thread, machine stitch the tail in place. Change the thread to coordinate with the cotton fabric for the tummy. Using the photo as a guide, pin the tummy in place on one of the body pieces of felt. Zig zag into place.

Thread a hand-sewing needle with thread. Pin the arms, leg and ears in place between both body pieces, and baste into place.

Note – when placing the ears, fold the bottom corners of the ears in towards the middle so that they overlap, as per the photo. That gives the finished ears a nice shape.

Using machine sewing thread to match the felt, zig-zag stitch around the bunny’s body, securing the arms, legs and ears in place. Make sure to leave the opening as indicated by the pattern. Remove the bunny from the machine, and lightly stuff, using a chop-stick or stuffing tool. Return the bunny to the sewing machine to zig-zag stitch the opening shut.

Bunny’s Face. Using the pattern as a guide, transfer the face onto the felt (I like to use a 4B pencil for this) Thread a hand-sewing needle with six strands of dark grey embroidery floss, and tie a knot in the end. Insert the needle in the seam behind the bunny’s ear (this will hide the knot nicely), and bring the needle out at one of the eye positions. Make a two=wrap French knot for one eye. Bring the needle up at the other eye positions and repeat the process. Re-thread the needle with three stands of the dark grey embroidery floss. Insert the needle in the seam behind the other ear (to hide the knot), and bring it up at the mouth position. Make three small straight stitches for the three mouth lines. Re-thread the needle with six strands of embroidery floss. Take the needle through the seam behind one ear again, and out at the nose position. Make two small straight stitches for the nose.