My homage to Grumpy Cat – DIY Plush

Nope

Grumpy Cat is the latest fav meme, right? Or am I a year or so late with that one like I was with the Angry Birds thing?

My younger begat saw a Grumpy Cat plushie at Michael’s last week and was all over it! Knowing my plushie making skillz, he asked me to make one for him. I told him the Grumpy Cat was going to look more cartoony if I made one and not like the one at Michaels. That notion didn’t phase him. As soon as the older begat heard I was making his little brother one, he had to have one, too. And oh, please make one for the cousin, so she doesn’t get left out.

I’m surrounded by nincompoops.

On a side note, in a prior post I mentioned that I am not good at conjuring up something from nothing. That isn’t entirely true. I misspoke. But it’s not like I’m the President, or Ben Bernanke or Kanye.  I mean really, what I say won’t change immigration laws, sway the economy or trend on twitter.  So dare I restate that I CAN conjure something from nothing sometimes? I do. However, I feel more comfortable if there is a pattern or something I can use as an example in order for my project to come to fruition. A lot of my creations are inspirations from others and I’ve put my own flair or adjusted them to suit me.

Out of my comfort zone I went! With that being said, this is how I put together this little grumpy critter!

I used this fox pattern from Stitched by Crystal. This gal knows her shtuff. Check her out.

And then I mocked up my own Grumpy Cat face.

I used cream, brown and heather gray fleece for the body and face. I used brown for the tail.

To make the face, I traced the pattern face and drew my rendition.  Then I appliqued each piece. Here’s the Grumpy Cat Applique in PDF form if you want to make your own. I haven’t appliqued many things in the past, so I improvised. I’m not sure if this is the proper or the right way to applique fleece, but it was a winner for me! I cut out my pattern and pinned it directly on to the wrong side of the face while simultaneously pinning the applique fabric to the right side of the face.

I started with the gray part of the face first. I sewed directly on the paper. If you are proficient with free motion stitching – have at it! Not so for me, though. Just go slow, set your needle in the down position and pivot a lot.

Trim as close to the stitch line as you can.

Then I followed it with the brown spots over the eyes (they remind me of Bono’s sunglasses). Then I appliqued the nose and the blue part of the eyes.

I used 2 plies of unraveled worsted weight gray yarn for the mouth and two plies of unraveled worsted weight black yarn for the eyes and embroidered them on. Then I finished the rest of the body as per the tutorial.

All three of them made in a day!

What are your favorite memes?