Around the time that I was doing the coke lobster, I saw a reel of a woman who put a fish on her bunny hug. I was going to start with that project first because it was for me and I could get all my mistakes out and make a perfect one for my buddy. That did NOT happen.
It started by sourcing materials at Value Village.
Blue is for the top, orange is the eye, white with mandala for the bottom, stripey in the middle.
I really liked the blue fabric and how it played with the other two. What I didn’t like was that blue fabric frayed like frigging crazy. The dogs were walking around wearing threads. Threads ended up in my entire house. I had to re-cut it with pinking shears the second time around because it frayed so much. It was ridiculous. Also, my stupidly long monkey arms. Why are my arms so long? Do you know how hard it is to sew that much fabric in a straight line in a garment that’s already assembled?? VERY HARD. Also, sneak preview of another project I finished last weekend.
It was thiiiiiiiiiiis big
Good joke, right??
What’s hilarious about this is I expected to have all kinds of issues with the coke lobster. Turns out I had one single issue where the bobbin was too small and was bouncing around, screwing up the stitching. Otherwise it was absolutely smooth sailing. Whereas THIS mofo had ALLLLL the gee dee issues. I again had bobbin issues (user error, I hadn’t pulled the thread up properly), the fraying OMG the fraying. I also don’t really like how the tail fin came out, but whatever. It’s done and I’m happy with it and I make the joke every second I can.
I have a friend from Saskatchewan who is terrified of lobsters. I don’t really blame him, they are creepy sea-bugs. But it makes me send him a picture of a lobster every time I find one in the wild. And let me tell you, they find ME in abundance. If you look at our texting history, it’s all dark humour and lobsters. Anyway. I got this idea from a reel I saw back in January. While I’ve done a lot of sewing work in the past, I’ve never properly done applique, and for my very first try, I think this one came out amazing.
First step was to source materials. I knew I wanted it to have Saskatchewan on it, so we hit up two different Value Villages to see if I could find something suitable. I managed to find t-shirts and hoodies from every single province BUT SK, as well as many states and even the NWT. Ridics. The only thing I found that had SK on it at all was a Terry Fox t-shirt but the font was entirely too small. I managed to find this brand new shirt that said “Sometimes I feel ugly then I look at my brother and I am OK” which is funny on it’s own, but more importantly, held all the letters I needed but one – the C. Do you know how many letters are in the word Saskatchewan?? TWELVE. Anyway, it was a better option than buying 3 or 4 different shirts that had all the letters I needed. I ended up converting one of the Os to a C by cutting out the inside. I had to stitch around the C on a piece of black fabric so that it looked complete.
This pic is bad but 1. is the donor bunny hug (a hoodie without a zipper is called a bunny hug in SK and that’s the cutest thing EVAR). 2. was the shirt I got from VV. 3 is the fabric I already had on hand (I thought I’d craft my stash for this but I ended up buying most of the fabric. Sigh. Fabricland had a 55% off sale, so it would have been offensive NOT to). 4. is the new red fleece fabric. 5. is shiny fabric that looks like a mirror (confirmed by the Fabricland lady). 6. is Dr. Seuss fabric I’ve had on hand for at least 10+ years. Probably more like 15. 7. was new fabric I bought. 8. was new ribbons. Other things not listed: new buttons for eyes, fabric glue so I didn’t have to baste, and the wooden block to flatten seams. I used it more to flatten the fabric I glued down.
I free-handed the lobster, and cut out all my fabric and letters. I laid the gingham pattern down first, then sewed on most the lobstery bits. Then I sewed the mirror down, the antennae on top of that, then I made the razor blade out of the ribbon, and sewed the white fabric on the mirror and nose. I put a green straw in one claw because I couldn’t find any fabric with money printed on it. Last step was sewing the letters on. I wanted the stitching on the letters to look uneven and like a ransom note.
Looking at it now, I probably could have done a better job on the body (the second and third sections could probably have been bigger), but you’re your own worst critic and he loved it so I consider that a win.
