Handmade Animal Dolls: 20 Simple Sewing Patterns for Stylish Toys

I’m so glad I finally got this book! I love making dolls for my daughter (and adults!) and she loves picking out the colors and styles she wants and helping on her little sewing machine! I have felted a bit before (I make Waldorf style dolls too) and I think I know where the problem is happening for some folks. If you’re a Type A person who wants to be in full control and have everything laid-out in painstaking detail, then this book is more like a Hybrid between the typical American craft book (written for the Type As) and a Japanese craft book (very simple, straightforward instructions that leave some things to the imagination). The thing is, when the author of this book has that one paragraph on felting at the beginning where she says you’re basically just stabbing a pinch of wool felt onto your doll over and over with a barbed needle...? Yeah. That’s literally all it is! She’s not leaving out crucial details. She tells you what kind of needle she recommends, where she likes to purchase them, recommends the foam block and other safety tips and yeah. That’s it. Then in the doll instructions, she’ll tell you to grab a pinch of whatever color wool roving and felt it to the side of the head (with photo for placement) to make the black part of the eye. It’s super straightforward. So my advice, if you’re thinking of getting this book, is to think about what kind of crafter you are. If you like to have every single thing laid out in painstaking detail, with close-up video, pages and pages of written instructions for every step....then this is not the book for you.If, however, you’re a creative type, then you will LOVE this book! Like another reviewer said, if you don’t have wool roving and/or don’t want to felt, you can use buttons, wool fabric cut out and sewn on, you can embroider the eyes. The sky’s the limit! I personally prefer embroidered eyes, so that’s what I’ll probably do! I also like to play around with safety eyes with eyelids (gives the dolls so much life to have eyelids!)!The animals in the book are adorable and the instructions are great!

I absolutely adore this book! I had never sewn, not even a little bit and one day I decided I wanted to start making my own animal dolls! My heart's desire was to create primitive dolls but I knew I couldn't possibly start there so I went out and purchased a sewing machine and a few basic sewing tools then I ordered this book. The very first thing I created was the raccoon. I'm the kind of person who likes to jump into the deep end of the pooI right off the bat! I found the directions to be very precise and easy to follow. Some have made a huge deal of roving the felt eyes and nose onto the doll but you literally take a small amount of the fuzzy wool and stab it into a circle for the eye, then stab it onto the head, absolutely nothing difficult about that unless you don't know how to create the shape of a circle! Again let me remind you I had Never sewn anything before in my entire life and had absolutely no clue how to even turn on a sewing machine when I made these dolls. Of course some of the sewing terms were very foreign to me but with a quick Google search all was revealed. I didn't know what a ladder stitch was to close the doll but a quick utube video solved that issue! Literally anyone can sew these dolls up! I think it's absolut hogwash that others have reviewed it to be for intermediate or advanced sewers. These dolls make up so incredibly well and your fabric choices will dictate how your doll will look, you can make them up in muted florals, swiss dots or any variety of patterns! I love them so much because no two dolls are alike when there are endless possibilities in the fabric's you can select for the clothing! I love that the little vest jacket on the fox is made from an old knitted sweater as is the scarf for the raccoon, two very clever no sew options! I purchased this book 2 years ago and have since taken master classes in doll making and am now onto airbrushing, shading where much more technique and finer details are required to create my artist dolls and have also fully mastered the art of making primitive dolls but this book holds a very special place in my heart because it is where my journey started and where my passion took root! Please do yourself a favor and buy this full size pattern book you never know what you can do until you try and this book is the very best place to start! Before you know it you will be felting and airbrushing all the little details that make a doll come to life and you will have the confidence to create things you never imagined you could! Trust me if I can make these dolls with absolutely no shred of ability or knowledge of the sewing world you can as well! Happy sewing friends!

These are sooooo much fun to make!! Very easy pattern for beginners or intermediate sewers. I have 25 years of sewing experience so these were very easy patterns for me. One piece of advice I have is to definitely add interfacing to your body pieces, (arms, legs, torso and hips) especially if your fabrics are fairly flimsy in contrast to the felt.My 3yo daughter absolutely LOVES her new stuffies and has had many opened ended play adventures with them already. I can’t wait to make the whole cast of characters. I made the brown one for a friend from church. I plan on making many more as gifts.

My 10- and 13-year-olds both love this book. Both kids have taken sewing classes before and know the basics. The instructions were easy enough for them to sew from the book on their own. They made several animals from this book with pretty much no help from me and all their animals are absolutely adorable. The bear in the photo is what my 10-year old made with just minimal help (I helped with turning legs and arms and felted -- yes, the dreaded felting! -- his eyes). BTW, when they work on their own, they usually use buttons for eyes or just cut out felt circles and sew them on. There are plenty of possibilites for those who don't know how to or don't want to felt. Only saying this because it came up in the comments several times. All in all, we are very happy with this book and can see it being used over and over again in the future.

Adorable patterns, cutest out there imo. I'm a beginner, and would've appreciated a bit more pictures to guide me along with more detailed instructions. I had several seam ripping snafus I think could've been avoided with more pictures showing more steps. Otherwise, very happy with results!Also, love the felting, not sure why people dislike it so much. I found it fun!