Amy Cornwell Designs: Tuesday Tutorial: Owl Door Stop

We've been using an old vacuum to hold open our laundry room door and since we got the Dyson a while back we've decided to finally get rid of the old, broken vacuum. Hence the need for a door stop. Hubby reminded me last Tuesday (when we had an "ice day" off of work) that I still needed to make the door stop and I had a plan in my head and decided to see if I could bring it to fruition. I was pleasantly surprised and here's how I did it:

Fold your fabric so that the right sides are together. Take a large bowl and draw a circle. Draw a straight line going down the two sides and the bottom. Draw some ears coming in and cut around, using the 3rd picture above as a guide.

Cut out some circles for the eyes. I did mine freehand (and it shows). I like the messy look for this one. I used scrap fabric and felt for the eyes and nose. Sew on the nose and eyes to one of the pieces you just cut. When you're done sewing the face, put the two body pieces right sides together. Starting at the bottom of the right ear, sew all the way around, stopping at the bottom of the left ear. This will leave room to turn it inside out and stuff.

This is the tricky part to explain. We're making a gusseted bottom so you'll line up the bottom and side seam and then sew a triangle. Do this on both corners of the bottom so that it'll lie flat. Cut off the excess fabric and you can see how it makes the bottom lie flat. Fill it with rice, beans or anything heavy. You don't need to fill it completely with that, just until it's as heavy as you want it to be.

Fill it the rest of the way with Poly-fil. Remember to pop out the ears and try to stuff them as well. I stuffed mine as much as it could be stuffed. The last step is to hand stitch the seam closed at the top. This was a quick and easy project!

My friend Courtney J. saw my Twitpic the other day of the owl and made her own Mr. Owl. It's SO cute!! Don't you love it? I think she did a great job!