Dog: Free Sewing Pattern

November 03, 2021

Dog: Free Sewing Pattern

As promised, here is the tutorial & FREE sewing pattern for Dog, Sweet Tooth's stuffed toy, made for him by Pubba as one of his birthday presents.

It becomes such a source of comfort for him that it ends up going with him everywhere. A pivotal scene in the series, involves the loss & recovery of this very special Emotional Support "Animal".

For a list & links to all the materials used in this project, see my previous post here.

Instructions:

1. Print each of the pattern pages below on standard 8.5" x 11" paper @ 100% scale & cut out from the various fabrics as indicated on pattern. (If you plan to personalize as I did in step 12, do not cut ear piece out before you embroider the fabric.) All pattern pieces are placed on the right side of the fabric. Seam allowance is included except where stated otherwise. *This is my first attempt ever to publish a pattern & have no idea what I'm doing, hence why it took me so long & the best I can do for now.

2. I placed a ruler at about a 2" angle from the heel/top of head.

3. I cut along this "line" using a rotary cutter. We now have the head & bottom of our dog. Also cut off the gathered cuff of the top of the sock.

4. Cut along the fold of the top of the sock until you reach about 2" from the toe seam.

5. When opened, it should now look something like this. The width of the neck of the sock is about 8" & was used in calculating pattern piece sizes.

6. My sweater fabric is VERY thin, so I needed to reinforce it, to prevent teeth tears & give a good base for stitching. I covered the back of the square of red sweater material with a lightweight iron-on stabilizer. I had some scraps I wanted to use up, so this is why there is a slight gap.

7. Stitch the red sweater material to the red plaid, forming a tube. From my first attempt, I realized how flimsy my previous stitches were & decided to go extra strength this time. I used embroidery thread (6 strand) instead of regular sewing thread (1 strand). I wanted the stitches to be extra strong as that was noted as a particular weakness the first go around. I didn't want the "decorative" stitches to be the only thing holding it together this time as well, so I did a straight line of backstiches at each seam & then placed the "decorative" stitches on top.

Reference photo: White stitching

8. Stitch the cuff of the sock (lower abdomen top side) to the dark denim (lower abdomen underside). Then stitch lower abdomen tube to the grey felt bum circle. Again, I used black embroidery thread for strength for my "aggressive chewer".

I then used 3 strand embroidery floss to tack down the seams.

Reference photo: Bum circle

9. Sew the tail pieces together with a running stitch using white embroidery thread.

Reference photo: Tail white stitching

10. Stuff & then attach the tail with 3 strands of white embroidery floss.

11. Stitch the pieced legs together using seam allowance as marked on pattern. I just used regular thread for this.

Reference photo: Pieced legs/right side.

Reference photo: regular legs/left side.

The front 2 legs should both have red plaid on the underside & the 2 back legs are yellow plaid.

Reference photo: Back legs - yellow plaid

The legs on the right side of his body should have both the pieced legs. So you should have 1 pieced leg in red plaid & 1 regular leg in red plaid. Similarly, 1 pieced leg in yellow plaid, & 1 regular leg in yellow plaid as shown below.

As you can see from the photos, I used black embroidery thread to stitch the legs together, as the one in the series has this stitching as seen below.

Reference photo: Black stitching on legs

12. The ears consist of grey felt on the tops, with one underside in brown paisley/swirly fabric & the other underside, some type of yellow.

Reference photo: Brown fabric

Reference photo: Yellow fabric

I decided this time around, I wanted to personalize his toy, in case we take it to doggy daycare to identify it as most definitely his. I found the most wonderful thing for embroidering onto fabric.

Rather than the old school method of using iron on transfer pencils, etc. This is a water soluble (dissolves in water) plant based printable/sticky webbing called "Stick 'n Stitch. I printed out Boogie's name in a font I liked on the sheet, then peeled back the webbing on the page & then cut only the sticky portion I needed. Leaving the page backing intact allowing me to print on the remaining webbing another time.

Once I completed the stitching over top of the sticky webbing, I ran it under warm water & it just dissolved away. Once it was dry, I then attached the under sides of the ears to the top sides (grey felt) using a single crochet stitch. I had to first make a hole with a large needle (an awl would work as well), so I could insert the crochet hook through both fabrics for each stitch.

Reference photo: Blue stitching on ears.

If you are going to add squeakers, place them inside the ear opening. The ears are very floppy & do not require stuffing.

13. Join the triangular gap of the nose & stitch.

When you turn it over, it should look like a cone, like shown below.

With a knotted length of thread push the needle through the tip of the point from the back. Fold down the cone point & then pull the cone tip down with the length of thread, until it looks like the picture below.Insert thread through the seam & secure it on the back with stitching.

Attach nose to sock toe with white stitching.

Reference photo: Nose white stitching

14. The eyes are not stitched on, but held on by the buttons themselves. I used 3 strand embroidery floss to attach them.

15. If you haven't already, insert the small squeakers & then attach the ears. I wanted it to be less noticeable but still strong, so I used 3 strand embroidery floss.

16. Attach the head to the body tube. I did a backstitch with white embroidery thread to join them together & then stitched down the seam allowance. I then added the stuffing & larger squeakers.

17. Pin bum tube to torso, leaving a small opening to stuff & add squeaker to bum. Pin opening closed & stitch as done in previous steps. *I missed taking a photo at this step, sorry.

18. Place small squeakers & stuffing into legs. Place & sew on legs as shown below.