Project : Blue Fuzzy Cube Monster

Project : Blue Fuzzy Cube Monster
Date : Off and on through May and June
Materials : Fake black feathers, blue fake fur fabric, blue checkered fabric, pipe cleaners, wire, blue yarn, orange embroidery floss, beads, Styrofoam foam, stuffing, thread, magnet
Tools : Needle (straight & curved), sewing machine, pliers
Finished Product:

Given to a co-worker to adorn his cube.

Process: A wedge of Styrofoam for the head, a structure of pipe cleaners, and a bit of stuffing for the torso. The wings were sewn separately as one long continuous piece- though fingers and feathers added after the joining. The fingers consist of a looped wire and two separate sleeves of patchwork blue to cover it, both sewn to the wing. The tail was wrapped in yarn before a separate piece of fur fabric was added to cover the joint. What fabulous thing this fake fur is, it hides every stitch so that segments join nearly seamlessly!

The magnet is tucked behind the the wings where they connect to the breast. After construction, some basic blue beads were sewn into the rump for flare. The eye sockets embroidered with orange (after a failed attempt at gold spots embroidered on the torso) were topped off with white bead eyes. Down the neck there are five little "spines". These consisted of a long bead topped with a small blue bead to allow the thread to loop back inside the long bead for a very clean look.


Thoughts :
There is too much blue and not enough detail. The fur, while fantastic for joining of parts, is too think and irregular to support embroidered patterns. This saddens me though I wonder if it's a matter of scale. The creature is small in order to stay light enough for the magnet. The pose-able fingers, wing, and tail please me greatly. The important thing is that my coworker likes it. The original idea was to have a thicket of pins protruding from the fabric on the rump like spines on a porcupine. The creature softened as they always do during construction and came out almost cute.

C - new owner of creature, S - female coworker, R - me
... the monster is examined ...
S : What is its gender?
C : I don't know...
S : I checked and you can't tell
R : You never can, with birdlike things
... time passes, monster is played with ...
R : Oh! Oh! Put it against the wall, it'll stay
S : It doesn't seem to be staying...
R : Rotate it forward, its got a magnet in its chest
S : Ah, that worked. A magnetic chest?
R : Indeed! Ah! I guess we know the gender now
[R leans forward and stares most obviously at S's chest]