Narwhals – Page 3 – Fluffyland Craft & Sewing Blog

June 28, 2011

narwhals 2.0!

Here is the result of all my scheming and assembly line work: the brand new, re-imagined Plush Narwhals 2.0!

The little guys are made from the softest gray fleece in the world. I don’t know what it is about heather gray, but it even looks softer than all the other fleece colors. I love working with it, and I love how the little guys are coming out.

But my favorite part of the new narwhals, by far, is the striped tusk. Could it be any cuter? I’m in doubt.

Redesigning the narwhals has been a fun process for me. They’ve been the same for so long, and I was never quite thrilled with them, because I didn’t feel they conveyed my personality. As a maker of things, I like my things to reflect who I am… and the tan & cream just wasn’t doing it for me. I think they’re cute, yes, but I knew that they could be better. And that was the hardest hurdle to get over – why change your best-selling product? Why risk ruining a good thing? But I finally took the challenge, and now I feel I’ve perfected the stuffed narwhal, and it makes me very happy.

I know I built up a lot of suspense, and I apologize for not having this be a completely earth-shattering new creation :) But I think they’re pretty cute! And I’m excited to make lots of them now.

May 30, 2011

working the assembly line

I love working assembly-line style.

I love cutting out piles of pieces, stacking them ever higher, envisioning the army of plush these flat shapes will become.

I love plowing through the fabric, breaking down its giant, foldable self into useful elements.

I love the confidence it takes to start a project of this magnitude.
I love thinking about the work ahead of me, realizing how many more hours it will take to turn these into their 3D selves.

It’s just so fun to start out on something brand new.

And I can’t wait to share them with you.

January 19, 2011

why, hello there!

I hope your 2011 has been going along nicely. Mine, so far, has started slowly. This January, for me, has been a month of observing.

I’m typically a do-er, a producer. I sew and photograph and blog. But in these last couple weeks, I’ve been listening, reading, and observing instead; I’ve been quieting myself down a bit so I can hear what’s going on in the outside world. All of it has been a nice respite from the pre-Christmas narwhal frenzy… even though I’m still making plenty.

But I don’t want to sit in my quiet little world forever. And now that Christmas gift-time is over, I can share some pictures of the custom narwhals that were requested over the holidays.

giant stuffed narwhal
A double-size narwhal! These were requested by multiple separate people, which I found interesting… maybe they should become a permanent Fluffyland fixture? They were definitely fun to make… it felt awesome to be making such large plush.

blue stuffed narwhal
A blue narwhal! I’ve considered adding an option to choose narwhals in other colors, but for now it’s by request only. It would make inventory considerably more difficult with a rainbow palette… so we’ll see how that looks in the future.

stuffed narwhal with a purple heart
And a stuffed narwhal with a little purple heart! I much prefer applique to embroidery. I didn’t have time to do any name embroideries this Christmas, plus they’re really not something I like to do. But every once in awhile, a narwhal just needs a little extra something and I understand that.

That certainly wasn’t all the special Christmas sewing I did… there were also the more exciting, out-of-the-box, completely narwhal-unrelated projects that I took on. I’ll post pictures of those tomorrow!