Finally. For those who asked. Here’s my Thistle plush doll pattern with some tips too. Only body and hair. So sorry it took me so long because some parts of the patterns are missing & re-created some with what I can remember, I never thought someone would ask so I didn’t keep some, that’s including most of the outfit patterns. Sizes are in cm & they’re approximate. If the pictures aren’t clear enough, click for better resolution.
The body is in a permanent sitting position. Anyways let’s get started:
Heads up: the head may look round but to make it that round, clean, not wrinkly all stretched n plump look, I had to squeeze in a lot of fillings, but yeah it becomes kinda solid & less squishy because of that.
Make sure you fill the bottom torso properly too, so the head that already filled with that much fillings won’t feel too heavy in comparison.
This is how I did the face, I hand embroidered it, the paper is water soluble, so I can wash it away once I’m done with the face. Mine’s simple one with eyes closed no mouth.
But if you want complete face feature here is the tutorial.
Here’s a YT vid link on how to connect the plush body parts.
More about connecting parts, here’s a YT video link of how to do invisible sewing technique also known as ladder stitch.
Now let’s move to the hair. For the bangs, I made sure they have clean edges for better performance and here’s the YT vid tutorial for that.
Let me be transparent. Pros n cons of my plush. Pros: clean stitches, very shaped, & plump-looking. Cons: head & bottom are bit solid, harder to maintain because hand wash is preferable (you have to be strong enough but still careful to properly squeeze the water out during a full body wash, with that, you also have to make sure you have stitched the parts well so it doesn’t break after being squished, this one is depending on your stitching skills, how sturdy you stitched it).
Maintenance: hand wash. Use cold water to prevent the filling from shrinking. Use mild-gentle detergent (for babies clothing), brush with sponge when hand washing. Air dry/dryer with no heat. Perfumes/softener are optional but avoid spraying too much or the fluff will get mated, ok to spray a little and brush it with clean microfiber toothbrush to help soften.
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So that’s all about my Thistle plush patterns, tips, maintenance & all information I know about it. Apologies in advance if it’s confusing & messy. I only know how to make but very little skill of explaining. Have fun experimenting. Keep in mind that this is experimental, I’m open if you want to share better techniques/easier ways including the maintenance, either in the comments or reblogs.
Here’s more of my Thistle plush progress silly documentation pics.
DISCLAIMER: this pattern is designed with an 1/8 inch seam allowance because I sew by hand and the plush normally is SUPER tiny (about 5 in. tall). Scale the pattern up as much as you need for your process. To be clear this is not based off any of the makeship plushes.
Dotted lines are only for embroidery reference. All pattern pieces cut twice are mirrored.
If you actually make one of these PLEASE send pictures!
If you catch any mistakes or have any questions feel free to ask me!
Want to make your own little Tails Doll? I just converted my pattern to a printable digital format, free for all to use! My only request is to please not sell the pattern or use it to mass produce; though making this plush for yourself, your friends or commissions is all fine to me! (Credit is appreciated, too!) I'd consider this pattern intermediate, best suited for people with a bit of sewing experience. Instructions under the Read More.
Materials List:
Fabric in the following colours: Yellow, White, Red, Black. Fleece or Minky preferred. This pattern does not require a lot of fabric; half a meter of yellow, a quarter meter of white, and scraps or red and black should be more than enough.
Matching sewing thread
Embroidery floss in white or gray
One 25cm Zipper in silver or gray
Polyester Stuffing
One 6cm long Spring OR some 16g Aluminum wire
A 30cm sheet of plastic, such as Foam PVC or ABS (if making solid gem)
Red Car Vinyl OR Red paint (if making solid gem)
Hard Felt (Optional, any colour)
Tools:
Sewing needles (regular and large embroidery sizes)
Sewing pins and clips
Scissors
Hot Glue
Wire Cutters (for aluminum wire)
Utility or Hobby knife (for plastic sheet cutting)
Sewing Machine (Optional)
Fabric chalk or washable fabric pen (Optional)
Instructions:
Download the PDF Pattern on my website HERE. (Or save the individual pngs down at the end of this post.)
2. Print the pattern out. The pattern should fill the whole page with no margins! The PDF format is A4, though this pattern is easily adapted to US Letter format and may, at most, only slightly trim the pattern on a piece or two. This is easily fixed by re-adding the lines by hand. Make sure to remove any margins added by the printer software; if you don’t, the plush will turn out a little smaller.
3. Cut all pattern pieces out. Pay attention to the amount listed per pattern piece, if pieces should be mirrored, and the seam allowance marked on certain parts (marked in blue). Pay also close attention to the arrows denoting the fabric’s pile/nap and align accordingly. Select whether you want to make the diamond out of fabric or solid material and pick the matching pattern piece accordingly.
4. Pin down and sew all the darts on every piece, using the seam allowance and aligning with the dot at the end of each dart on the pattern. (These are present on the Head Front, Head Back, Body, Belly, Muzzle, Tail Tip, and Shoe pieces.)
5. Attach each Leg to a matching Sock part on side marked with A, right sides together. Fold each resulting piece lengthwise, right sides together, and sew the tube closed to complete the legs. Turn right side out and set aside.
6. Take each Arm piece and fold them lengthwise, right sides together. Sew the tubes closed and turn right side out and set aside.
7. Take two pieces of Hand, right sides together, and sew them closed, leaving the marked space open. Turn right side out and stuff it with polyester filling. Repeat with second hand. Set aside.
8. Take two pieces of Shoe, right sides together, and sew them closed along the heel and top, leaving a small opening between the heel dart and top (see pattern markings). Repeat for second shoe.
9. Take a Sole piece and pin in to an assembled Shoe piece, right sides together, aligning the tips of each pieces. Sew the Sole piece to complete the base shape of the shoe. Repeat for second shoe and turn them right side out. Add a small piece of hard felt inside the shoe if desired to straighten out the bottom (use the Sole pattern and trim as needed). Add stuffing to shoes.
10. Take each Shoe Strap piece and top stitch it on top of each Shoe, using the top of shoe dart as a guide to align the top of the shoe strap. Set the completed shoes aside.
11. Take two pieces of Ear, right sides together, and sew them along the curved top part. Repeat for second ear and turn both right side out and stuff lightly. Set ears aside.
12. Take a Tail Tip and sew it, right sides together, to its matching Tail Base part on the side marked with D. Repeat three other times with remaining pieces. Take the resulting tail pieces and pin a matching mirrored pair right sides together,and sew along the entire tail from tip to base, leaving the base open. Repeat for second tail. Turn each tail right side out and add stuffing. Set tails aside.
13. Take two Body pieces and pin them right sides together. Sew along one of the sides. Repeat for the second pair of body pieces. Take the two sphere halves and pin along one of the edges and sew together, leaving the last quart open. This will be the back opening where we fit the zipper on.
14. Take the Head Front Piece and pin, right sides together, the Head Back pieces along each side marked with E. sew both sides to the front piece, leaving a tiny opening at the top where all the pieces meet. We will be inserting the antenna through this hole later. Sew the back of the head alongside F from the top down to the “zipper top start” mark on the pattern.
15. Pin the head to the body along the neck, right sides together. Take care to align the front body seam to the center front dart of the head. Sew through to attach the head to the body. Turn piece right side out.
16. Pin the zipper to the head-body, starting at the zipper top start line on the head. Star by pinning one side of the zipper while keeping it closed to prevent misalignment. Once the zipper reach the bottom, pin alongside the opposite half, folding the seam allowance inwards as you pin. Once the zipper is pinned in place, begin sewing the zipper to the plush by hand, opening the zipper as needed to reach inside. (You can also lightly stuff the plush during this step if you need some help aligning the zipper.)
17. Once the zipper is securely attached, ladder stitch the remaining opening on the back under the zipper closed. Finish stuffing the plush now to desired level.
18. Topstitch the Nose to the muzzle, then, using a ladder stitch, add muzzle to the face.
19. Topstitch one Pupil to each Eye piece. Topstitch the completed eyes to the face.
20. Topstitch the Belly to the front of the body, using the belly darts and center body seam to help align it.
21. Pin each Hair to the forehead and sew by hand along the top line. Leave the other sides unsewn to let them flop.
22. Pin the Ears to the head, using the side seams to align. Ladder stitch the ears to the head.
23. Using embroidery floss (or your preferred alternative method), add all decorative stitches to the following parts; head side seams, the ears to head seams, the belly seam, the hands seams, the top of shoes seam, and the tail tip to tail base seam. Use a reference image if needed.
24. Take a shoe and hand sew it to a leg by the sock (C), aligning it to the shoe hole . Repeat with the other shoe to complete your set of legs. Leave the legs unstuffed. Set aside.
25. Take a hand a hand sew it to an arm (B), aligning it with the wrist hole. Repeat with the other hand to complete your set of arms. Leave the arms unstuffed. Set aside.
26. Take the tails and attach them to the lower back, right under where the zipper ends. Ladder stitch to body by hand.
27. Pin the arms and legs to the body and ladder stitch them by hand. The plush elements are now complete.
28. If building the antenna gem out of fabric, simply sew two mirrored Diamond piece, base to base, to create four pieces. Pin and sew them lengthwise, right side together, leaving a small opening at the end to turn it right side out, stuff, and then ladder stitch it closed, leaving a small hole at one point of the diamond gem.
29. If building the antenna gem out of plastic or another solid material, take four pieces and glue them, side to side, to build a square pyramid. Repeat the process to create a second pyramid. Take the two pyramids and glue them, base to base, to create the base shape of the gem. Cut a small hole on one hand using your knife. Colour your solid gem using your preferred method, such as covering with adhesive vinyl or paint.
30. Take your spring or aluminum wire and create a small flat base on one end of the antenna, approx 3cm in diameter. You may use whatever scraps you have on hand, such as plastic or cardboard, and glue it down.
31. Take the plush, open the back zipper, and thread the antenna from the inside so that it sticks out the top of the head. The base should prevent the antenna from slipping out of the head. Close the zipper.
32. Add hot glue to the end of the antenna and insert it into the gem’s hole adding some extra glue along the edge to secure it in place.
And with that, you're done! One little spooky guy added to your home, just in time for Halloween.
This is my first time writing down my (admittedly chaotic) process into a set of instructions to follow, so please excuse any weirdness and enjoy making your own Tails Doll!
i made a pattern and tutorial for making my most recent favorite sewing projects— the Nose Beasts!!! I also made a youtube video if you prefer video instructions over text/pictures!!
If you decide to make any of these little creatures yourself, please tag me so I can see them!!!!! I wanna see more little Nose Beasts in the world!!
hi there! i love your blog and seeing all of the plushies :333 i was wondering, what do you use to customize the markings on them? sometimes I use alcohol markers but eventually they bleed or fade into a weird color even if they haven't been put through the wash. no pressure to answer if youd prefer to keep it a secret or something ^w^
here's a picture of one of my plushies cus i like showing ppl
thank you thats all!!
Hiya, thank you sm!! I'm glad you like seeing my plushie pals :3
Your little guy looks very sweet! Tell them I say hello ^^
As for my customs I'm happy to share my process. However, I'm not sure how much help I'll be since I also use alcohol markers (ᵕ ´ᗜ`)
But I'll go though what I do regardless
I guess a good place to start is with colors. Inks can be deceiving. I think the best example of this would be black ink. Rarely is black ink truly black, typically it's made using a very dark purple or blue. As such when it fades it tends to revert to a blue or purple tone. I've noticed the same sometimes happens with greys. As seen in the first pic below, one of my customs now has a purple hue. The same thing can happen for other colors, such as the browns I used on Kipper. One has faded into a brighter orange and the other has a more red tone to it now.
To avoid this I like to use very dark browns in place of black. They can be built up to look black and if they fade they'll do so into a lighter brown which helps with a more natural/realistic fur look.
Swatching before hand definitely also helps. But sometimes you sorta have to guess what colors were used to make certain inks. A color picker can be helpful. This is just a quick example I did so it's not perfect but you can see this color sorta leans into a reddish orange tone. So it may fade into a more orange color overtime. Again it is kinda guess work and doesn't always end up being true. But it can sometimes prove to be helpful.
As for a plush example, Delgado has faded some.
The lighting is different in the photos so that doesn't really help TvT but the photos on the left are from a couple months ago and the right are the one from a couple days ago.
The very first one is the most saturated. It was taken right after I customized him. I've noticed alcohol markers lighten a bit as they "dry". (Not actually sure this is the reason. But it's what I refer to it as.) It seems to take about a day for the colors to look they way they truly do.
He also hasn't been put through the wash and he's gently handled so this has probably helped his markings stay pretty intact.
Certain furs do seem to handle markers better than others. Delgado fur is a bit more rough and it took to the markers pretty well. Softer plushies I've worked with quickly get a weird texture and I've had a harder time building up colors on them.
(I am considering doing a wash and swatch test at some point so there may be a more in detail post in regards to this if anyone is interested)
As for how I actually draw on the fur I draw, wipe, brush, repeat.
I work in small sections and draw a little bit at a time. After a patch of fur is colored I wipe it down with a wet wipe/cloth to remove some of the excess ink. I then brush the area with a slicker brush to again remove excess ink. It can also help a bit with blending. And I do this until I'm happy with the coloration. I will do another round of brushing when I'm completely done customizing the plush. It does also help a bit with texture but I just like to really try and get rid of extra ink.
And that's about it :]
Sorry it is a bit of a long explanation. And it doesn't help much with the fading problem -_-"
I am interested in testing out different fabric markers or paints at some point to see how they hold up in comparison. If I ever get around to it I'll def make a post about it.
Thank you for the ask! Sorry again this is so long waa TvT
Can I ask how you made Breakdown's helmet such an accurate shape? I've been wanting to make my own Breakdown plushies and I know it says foam on the post but how do you put it together? Sorry if this is worded weirdly I'm very tired
Oh yeah, of course!
I know I didn't really get into it in much detail in the plush post, I'll be happy to give you the run-down here ^v^
So firstly, here are the two types of foam I used:
For the back of the head and the brim of the cap, I used these thin foam sheets (I'm pretty sure it's acrylic foam), they tend to be about a millimetre thick. They're pretty easy to find at your local craft/dollar store.
For the sides of the helmet, I carved the pieces out of upholstery foam. Upholstery foam can be quite pricey, especially if you're buying large amounts of it, so it'll be worthwhile to scour a thrift store for anything with some decent foam in it if you're just using a smaller amount.
(Small note: the two upholstery foam pieces in the picture were spares from the project. The foam I had was a too thick so I had to cut it in half, and the halves ended up being slightly different thicknesses. I just cut the helmet pieces out of both since I didn't know which thickness would work better until the sewing was done)
For the top of the head, I just filled the middle piece with polyfill. This distorted the shape a bit, so I ended up putting some thread tension between the sides of helmet at the base
As for general construction, I ended up putting the majority of the helmet together externally using a ladder stitch. This might not have been the best method seen as there were a lot of little crevices and corners which were very finicky and difficult to get around, but it's the method I'm personally used to so I stuck with it.
(Plus I just couldn't think of a better method that would allow me to put the foam pieces in)
I did at least think to snap a picture of the helmet in a half-assembled state:
I had the cap brim fixed to the top of the face, and I also gave the face a bit of a backing to make it a bit easier to manage. I was planning on sewing the face to the helmet the entire way around, but in the end I just fixed the cap brim around the top with a ladder stitch and the back of the head to the base at the bottom with a whipstitch.
(Key: Blue line shows the shape of the head base, Red line shows the stitches)
At this point I might be going a bit further than what you were asking, but I'll also run through attaching the head to the body:
Once again I used a ladder stitch for this part, but I'll note that I didn't actually sew all the way around. Instead I pretty much just got the parts I could reach and left it at that.
Important note:
I'd recommend sewing the chin to the body before the helmet, you'll need to lift the sides of the helmet in order to reach the chin.
And just another general sewing tip:
If you use a lot of ladder stitches to attach external features, it's a good idea to go over the seam at least two or three times to both strengthen it and smooth it out. The stitches can look a bit jagged otherwise.
Well, I hope this helps!
Good luck with your plush project endeavours, and have a good day :D
4. Sew the ends together with the feet facing inwards
5. Flip it over, then sew the part of the head piece to the base piece
6. Sew the top left end of the body piece to the top left base piece
7. Flip the head piece through the hole created
8. Sew the head piece to the rim of the body piece
9. Finish sewing the rest of the body piece to the base piece, adding matching feet facing inwards
10. Sew back piece 2 to the edge of the body piece that matches
11. Sew back piece 1 edge to back piece 2
12. Sew back piece 1 edge to rim of body leaving an opening on the bottom left
13. Pull fabric from bottom left hole to inside-out the duck (no photo included)
14. Fill duck with stuffing and sew up hole
15. To create beak, get two semi-circle felt pieces and a small triangular tongue, then line them up and sew them all together
16. While keeping the thread attached, sew the beak to the low center of the face
17. During this time, add any details, for instance with Huey, a hat, collar, and hair (seen in photos)
18. To sew on the eyes, start with the left and put line the needle up where the center of the eye will be and make a short stitch
19. Loop the thread around the area you want the eye to be continuously until it is the appropriate size
20. Pull thread under face and repeat the same process with the other eye
21. Sew a fluffy tail to the back
22. Tada! You now have a miniature duck friend!
This pattern can be altered to suit any animal, not just ducks and other birds. If there are any other specific tutorials that are wanted, such as Darkwing Duck’s hat or Boyd’s bowtie, please message me or reply to this post.
My advice for adding details is to start with a semi-circle or a long rectangle, and adjust it to suit specific needs.
For the literal stitches used, I use the running stitch for all but steps 10, 12, and 16, where I use a whip stitch.
