Felt Minion

Felt Minion

• Source: Lady Joyceley’s Felt Minion
• Materials Used:
  • Sheets of Standard felt in yellow, light gray, black and blue
  • Two plastic googly eyes
  • Embroidery thread in black and ecru
• Dimensions:
• Helpful tutorials:
  • How to do a blanket stitch
  • How to do a back stitch

My nephew was recently introduced to a new iPad game called Minion Rush and has since become really into all things minion related. (Ironically, he has not seen either of the Despicable Me movies nor does he want to.) While perusing Pinterest, I found an adorable pattern for a felt Minion pincushion by Lady Joyceley. I’ve been doing a lot of machine sewing so I thought this would be a good way to practice my hand sewing. It didn’t look hard and I thought I could easily get this done in one evening.

Mistake #1: Thinking an project that requires skills I do not have is easy

Mistake #2: Thinking it would be a quick project.

I was sewing and googling videos/instructions on different types of stitches far into the night and through the next day. The only major modification to the original design was I re-cut the arm pieces bigger and sewed it into a loop with a running stitch, instead of a blanket stitch, because the thread I had wasn’t the same color as the felt and I didn’t want it to show that much. I would also recommend embroidering on a mouth BEFORE stuffing the minion, which I did not. I ended up having to buy a curved repair needle in order to complete the mouth.

I think if I were to make this again, I would use a higher quality felt. Perhaps if this was being used just as a pincushion, the felt wouldn’t pill so much, but because this was being schlepped around by a kid, it is beginning to show some wear. I would also perhaps use a thinner thread on the parts where the seams shouldn’t be noticeable. The embroidery thread is totally fine, but it peeks through in some spots. My nephew was also quick to point out that minions had hair (which is what the pins are supposed to simulate) but I told him this was going to be a special bald minion. So, future renditions would probably include hair as well. I was super enamored with the end result that I started to make the smaller version of the minion to use as an actual pincushion. Unfortunately, it wasn’t coming out as clean as it’s bigger predecessor so I nixed it. If I get inspired, I might try to make another big one for my craft room. Back in the crafting queue it goes…