Say Hello to Fre

Prototype felt teddy bear for Children in Syria

I don’t like wasting things – especially if I have put time and effort into them, not to mention money.

When my first teddy, Emba, didn’t turn out quite as I had hoped I didn’t want to discard the template I had created. OK, so it wasn’t terribly successful when made out of fleece, but I thought it might work in felt. That would be useful as I was given a bagful of fleece a little while ago which I could make quite a few teddies from. I don’t think it will matter that much of the fleece is in shades of blue… will it?

The fleece had been squashed in a bag at the back of the cupboard under the stairs which meant that the first thing I had to do was press it. (I must be committed to doing things for the Syrian people if I’m risking having an iron in my hand! I shall have to be careful or I might suddenly find myself doing h*******k!) I then pressed my freezer paper template onto a single thickness of felt and cut out the felt using pinking shears, leaving a generous 1/4 inch seam allowance all round. I repeated that process on a second piece of felt.

The next stage was to stitch the facial features. I should also have stitched the buttons at this stage… but I forgot. Oops! As my backstitch is not always neat, I decided to work a running stitch, twice, so that the effect is like backstitch. This was done on the right sides of the felt, partly as a feature but also to ensure that Fre would be a better shape than Emba and to stop the stuffing from escaping. After I had completed the stuffing and stitching, I stitched three buttons of different colours, just to add a bit of decoration. As with the pillowcase dresses that I have made for Dress A Girl Around The World, I hope to make all the teddies slightly different from each other so that every child’s teddy is unique.

I am pleased with how Fre [#] turned out and, if I can manage to stitch them on the sewing machine, I plan on making several more. I enjoy stitching by hand but sewing this was one labour-intensive teddy!

My ‘huggle’ of teddies and bunnies

I have added Fre to the ‘huggle’ of teddies and bunnies that I am collecting to be distributed by Hand in Hand For Syria. I think the word ‘huggle’ is the ideal description for this group that are going to children in hospital in Syria. After all, a huggle is the very least need or deserve.

Knitted and crocheted snuggle bunny

This lovely snuggle bunny was made by Sue who belongs to the Friendly ELKS group (part of Loving Hands). It is a small blanket combined with a toy. Cute, huh?

Snuggle bunny with blanket spread out

The two teddies below were knitted by Amy who is in the Red Bank Knitting Group. The pattern is an ideal way to use up scraps of yarn!

Teddies knitted by Amy

[#] I’m sure you can guess the reason for the name ‘Fre’… he’s blue with cold because he’s FREezing! Ha ha ha. Grooaaan.