Who doesn’t love an adorable squishy? Squishies are incredibly popular these days, and, even though some are rather expensive to buy, they aren’t very difficult to make. The trick is purchasing the right fabric and stuffing and adding special touches.
This easy set of three plush squishies includes the machine embroidery designs for constructing an in-the-hoop child-sized polar bear, an infant-sized polar bear, and a doll-sized polar bear squishy (suitable for several sizes of dolls). Each bear size features expressive eyes with eyebrows and a heart, a nose/mouth, a bow tie appliqué and a heart appliqué all perfectly sized and centered to be stitched in the hoop of your embroidery machine. What’s more, the back is applied in the hoop so that all you do is stuff and hand-stitch the opening closed.
The three squishy sizes include a doll-sized squishy measuring 5” tall,
an infant sized squishy measuring 7 ½” tall, and a child-sized squishy measuring 10” tall, depending on the stretch of the fabric and the stuffing you use.
All of these bears are designed to be cut primarily from 4-way stretch fleece, but suggestions are included for other fabrics that may work well, too.
All three bears are stuffed with polyester fiberfill craft-style stuffing. The extra silky style fiberfill is best for this project, even though other stuffed items may not need it. It helps to make the squishies extra soft and huggable.
Tip: inexpensive but extra soft bed pillow stuffing or stuffed throw pillow stuffing can be substituted for purchased polyester craft stuffing, and often costs less, too; just ensure it is very soft and plush. Pull apart stuffing into separate fluffy fibers rather than rolling before stuffing your bear.
Do you love this design but don't have an embroidery machine? Check out the PDF sewing pattern available to create these cute bears with your regular sewing machine.
*Be sure you are familiar with how to embroider on fabrics with a pile and choose the machine embroidery design with a laydown stitch for high pile fabrics before beginning to machine embroider.
Design Hoops and Sizes:
In the hoop 5” doll-sized bear: 4.97” x 5.57” for 6” x 10” or 8” x 8” hoops
5” doll-sized face only2.55” x 3.63” for 4” x 4” hoops
In the hoop 7 ½” infant-sized bear: 6.89” x 7.47” for 8” x 8” hoop
7 ½” infant-sized face design only: 3.49” x 4.67” for 5” x 7” hoops
In the hoop 10” child-sized bear: 8.99” x 9.95” for 11” x 14” hoop
* If you do not have a hoop this large, you can trace the pattern onto your fabric, stitching around the traced lines on the fabric, attaching it to the stabilizer, just as the embroidery machine would do, hooping the fabric and stabilizer using your template to guide you so that it is perfectly centered, and then stitching the face only design for the 10” bear. Print the first page of the embroidery design for the face placement pattern.
10” child-sized face design only: 4.22” x 6.07” for 5” x 7” hoops
Three Custom Made labels measuring .77” x 1.77” for 4” x 4” hoops or smaller*
Machine Formats:
DST, EXP, HUS, JEF, PCS, PEC, PES, SHV, VIP, VP3, XXX
Additional Supplies Needed:
Fabric:
• Up to 1/3 yd or a remnant (large enough for front and back of bear) of main fabric
• Small medium-weight fusible interfacing scraps for tie and heart back
• Small cuts of contrasting soft fabric such as satin or felt for tie, and heart appliqué for all bears
Notions:
• small bag (or equivalent) of ultra-fluff fine polyester stuffing
• High quality matching polyester or rayon 40wt machine embroidery thread, depending on fabric choice
• Washaway and tearaway stabilizer scraps for decorative elements
• New, sharp size 12 ball point, zigzag, stretch, or universal needle
• Small craft iron
Optional:
• Small ribbon scraps for taggies and swivel or lobster clip for charms
Not Required but Recommended:
• Small sharp embroidery scissors for trimming facial features and heart appliqué
• Turning tool for pushing out ears and extremities (I use a wooden chopstick)
What You Get: Nine embroidery machine digitized designs in 11 file formats. You will receive an instant download zipped file that contains a folder with each of the file formats listed above. Each file format is conveniently saved in its own separate folder for easy use. You need to be able to unzip the zipped file to use it. You must have an embroidery machine and know how to transfer the file to your machine in order to use this.
*Creating a customer account will ensure that you have the ability to access your purchased (and free) files at any time.
For detailed information and answers to the most common questions, be sure to read the Terms of Use and FAQ's related to the doll clothes patterns sold at Pixie Faire.
Pixie Faire and the designers featured are not affiliated with doll brands pictured. No endorsement is implied. Dolls are used to show the fit of the designed garments. The product and photography shown in this listing are original content, copyright of the pattern designer.
