Spring Holidays: Stuff Stuff! (My Patterns can Help)

Here in the relentless sunshine of Los Angeles, it's hard to determine the month. January? August? Looking out the window provides no clues. 

The only way to know for certain is to study supermarket shelves. And according to my shelves, it's been Easter and Passover since Valentine's Day, when heart-shaped candy disappeared overnight, replaced with bunny-shaped candy, and (just as sweet and cheap), Maneshewitz wine.

For stitchers, that means it's time to make stuffed things, and I'm not talking about turkeys or hams, because I don't know how to cook those. It's time to sew high-fiber stuffed Easter and/or Passover toys/table props!

First, if you celebrate Passover, may I suggest a tossable, lightweight, extra-dry, inedible matzoh ball. 

Yes, that describes my cooking, but it's also a fabric truncated octahedron,  easier than it sounds - baste fabric to 8 cardstock hexagons, and 6 cardstock squares, then sew them together. 

(For step-by-step directions, see my book "Stitch-a-hedron: English Paper Pieced Polyhedron Gifts and Accessories to Sew," in print at Amazon  or PDF download at Etsy.)

Similar to a polyhedron is a yarmulke, a small hat, with only four sides, also easy to make from matzoh fabric, using the patterns in my book, "The Uncommon Yarmulke" (sold in print or PDF on Etsy).

I don't sell matzoh fabric, but a vendor who does is Lauree Feigenbaum at 1-800-dreidel.com. Her trompe l'oeil matzoh fabric is extra-wide - a yard is more than enough to make multiple balls, hats, earrings, table runners, baby bibs, aprons, and of course, matzoh covers! (So your covered matzoh looks uncovered!?) 

If you or your friends celebrate Easter, speaking of sweet bunnies, you may need to make a zero-calorie gift rabbit from your fabric scraps. My stuffed animal method is fast, intuitive, and addictive. I just finished writing it up in a new 39-page booklet, "Spontaneous Stuffies: Small Improvised Animals from Precuts, Scraps and Jeans." The PDF (on Etsy) includes 20+ patterns, including the following small (about 4") and large bunnies.

Lambs are appropriate for Passover as well as Easter, so here are three. First, a snub-nosed lamb (or ram?):  

Next, a little lamb made from denim jeans.....

...and yet another lamb/ram from an cotton print - the tail is braided scraps. 

All are about 5" across. If you'd rather make something flat, here are some more matzoh covers, to get your wheels turning. (This one is Pokemon-themed.)

Detail:

The next one, made in 2004 (at the dawn of digital photography), is Exodus-themed: 

Want more spring quilty ideas?

- Send a fiber art greeting card. I stitched a bunch of Spring green egg-themed postcards, here. 

-  Find Passover and Easter baby bibs here.  

- Twenty more ideas for matzoh fabric, including quilted items, are on my blog here.