Autumn plushie harvest

An extremely dangerous shark from George's (5) drawing.

Custom stuffed sharks are just as dangerous as the real ones - so be careful!

A purple, white and Coca Cola red bird by Laura. Laura is not a kid, she's the mom of a little boy, but it's not only kids whose drawings are allowed to be turned into soft toys! ;-)

Hey, grown-ups, you can create your own toys, too! Don't be shy!

A very special drawing into a custom plushie: Justin's self-doodle has a story, so if you are interested in it, please read this article.

My custom stuffed skateboarder plush in its home with the designer

"Mad Mommy" doll by Sydney (4)

A handmade mad mom doll

Girl in pink and white - the drawing was made when Melanie's daughter was a little girl, and this is given to her for her 16th birthday.

Best birthday gift idea: your own drawing turned into a doll

Two softies for a sister and brother, No1. "Self-portrait with butterflies" by Emily (4.5)

Even the most complicated drawing can be turned into a custom pillow :-)

No2. Callie, the tricolor cat by Mitchell (7)

Cats are the most popular custom stuffed animals, no doubt!

Reinhold and his friendly Yeti by Sandy.

Could you create your own toys, too? ;-)

And Raffaella's (6) Fairy Princess, who uses her wand to make the sun and moon rise - let's be grateful to Raffaella! :)

One of the most graceful drawings I ever turned into a custom doll

Ricario plushie becomes a media personality

When your custom plushie monster is published in The Wall Street Journal! :-) Many thanks, Maria, it was a pleasure to turn Ricario drawing into a soft toy!

Ricario plushie in the middle - still with my old business name, DoodlieSoftie

I created my own soft toy, too... my smiling cuddly toy with Ricario, the famous custom plushie

Summer Soft Toys 2014 - Vol.3

Vol.3 = it is so difficult to classify plushies... well, here you can see mainly monsters, a unicorn, a special 3-in-1 creature and my first vehicle softies. The rotor of the helicopter can turn around!

Have I told you, it is fun to follow kids' imagination and to help them create their own soft toys...? ;-)

3 softies in 1 by Lykke, 4

Mrs and Baby Budino turned into soft toys from Sofia's drawing - poor Mrs Budino...

Golden unicorn plush designed by Beth, 6

A special home-leaving plushie for Elliot, 17

"Happy monster" drawn by Erin, sewn by me

Koby's (5) mom is a helicopter pilot in Australia!

"Bubbles" is the nickname of a beloved auntie - yes, it's another birthday plushie!

Summer Soft Toys 2014, Vol.2

Vol.2 = plushies from animal drawings: cat with a hat, small cat, large cat and non-cats.

This tiger was designed by Kenzie for her vet mom in Texas- until the time she starts curing real tigers ;-)

Pretty tiger design by Mackenzie, 6

Eli-Birgitte's Hat Cat softie - the drawing that calls for a plushie!

Custom stuffed animals make perfect "first-day-at-school" gift :-)

Girlish soft dog toy inspired by Alice's drawing - with some extra pics:)

The mom said it was a dog, but I always thought of him as a pink (and orange) panther...:)

Pünktchen the centipede - soft toy birthday present for a 30-year-old daughter

 Custom plushie "The Purple Octopus" by Brett, a big kid:) He works for Warner Brothers - not a surprise at all, is it? :-)

Remake of a lost plushie - big joy of a little girl somewhere in Australia

Summer Soft Toys 2014, Vol.1

Vol.1 = drawings about humans reborn as plushies. At least more or less human...:)

Best birthday gift? A custom stuffed doll from your childhood drawing :-)

Jack and his plush sister holding hands forever

Bronte is only 3, but she already cretaed her own toy to play with

A bit confused - it even can happen to soft toys...

 

 

 

 

 

Plumber softie with all the necessary equipment

The Mumbai Pigeon Plushie

I loved everything about this soft toy: the drawing (the title of which was given by the parents), the story, and the mom, who told me the story. And I looked forward to starting sewing it so much. But big loves are not always easy... When turning kids' drawings into custom stuffed anilmals or dolls, there can be so many things to solve: now the colours were my problem, I simply couldn't find the shades I imagined. Finally I found the green for the spots, a green that had never been available in the shops here before. But the greys... First I wanted to make the spots black, later we chose some dark grey, but as I was sewing the dark grey spots on the body, I did not like them at all, they were not harmonious together with the grey of the body. So I searched through my scraps. And I found a small piece of light grey!! It looked good together with the body. So I started to remove the dark grey spots. As I was doing it, all of a sudden I realized that the best way would have been to use just a few dark grey spots with lots of light grey ones! Do you know the feeling when every little bits fall into place? That's what I was feeling then:)

Mumbai Pigeon Plushie

The artist, who created his own toy is Ptolemy, who was 4 and a half last summer, when he went on holiday to Mumbai with his parents. He drew the pigeon one morning before his parents woke up, after watching all the pigeons on the hotel window grill. I was not surprised at all that this drawing became so special for the whole family.

And this is Ptolemy actually looking out of the hotel window in Mumbai at the pigeons, the day before he drew "The Mumbai Pigeon":

A rajz Mumbai-ban (régi nevén Bombay) készült tavaly nyáron, és a firkagalamb most Tasmániába repült.

Joey, the custom stuffed Robot

... and Jo, the Dog. Both of them are birthday soft toys for 30-year-old Simonie from her mom and her brother. The drawings were made when Simonie was a child - the Robot does "everything" for her: he has a toothbrush and toothpaste tube plus a comb for brushing her teeth and hair, he has an ice cream for endless supply, and in his tummy he has an endless supply of money. Simonie's mom asked me to make a see through pocket and she undertook to provide real dollars in it. (I told her I hoped she could find an endless source of money:-)) Oh, and the Robot has a heart for best friendship!

As for Jo, it was not only a drawing, Simonie also created a story book about her dog. Her mom kept it, and gave her daughter the little republished story book together with the plushie. Twist in the story: Simonie herself is a mom now, whose little daughter loves cuddly toys and also loves books - guess what happened with these two birthday gifts? :-)

Joey, the useful custom stuffed robot

Jo - a childhood drawing turned into a softie version

Yes, a plush battery...

Jo, what are you doing?!

Szülinapi ajándékok egy harmincévesnek a hétévesen rajzolt kutyájából és robotjából.

Cat & Bug - The war of custom plushies

Quite a strange couple... Soft toys designed by an Italian boy, whose mom sent me the most fantastic feedback I think I've ever had. You know I made a little stamp from the original drawing and first of all the boy was surprised to see it on the envelope. And when he opened it, he was speechless, he couldn't believe his eyes, he had no idea how it was possible to see his drawings turned into softies, and later he was happy to realize he was the only person in the world to own these softies:)

Create your own toys and...

(I have readers who have sharp eyes for the details:) FYI: I was asked to make the cat's limbs thicker but not to make the navel!)

.... you can create stories with them :-)

I have a few questions in connections with these plushies though:

- how did the cat and bug meet?
- are they friends or enemies?
- why does the cat need a swatter? does he want to use it to kill the bug?!
- what kind of flag is in the bug's hand? (by the way, is it a hand...?)

Picture of a tiny little soft toy - just to give you and idea of size

Kérdéseket felvető macska és bogár. Légycsapó és zászló. Ja, a macska hajában két fölzselézett tincs. A bogár meg tud fintorogni.

Big Blue Supercat Softie

Mattia wanted a 1-meter-tall custom cat plushie first...:) I managed to convince him it would be toooooo big! But even though it is a nice, giant, chubby kitty. And a superhero! 

Facts: definitely the biggest custom stuffed animal I've ever made. Maybe the longest time I spent with turning a drawing into a 3D cuddly toy (errrr, it's not easy to cuddle this kitty...). And a pretty lot of time spent together. I felt the flat was empty without him when I arrived home from the post office...

The biggest custom stuffed animal I've ever sewn

Even its hairs on the top of his head were sewn one by one

Big crazy cat plushie for a big kid

Bonus pic entitled "Behind every successful man giant cat there is a woman":

Me and the giant cat plushie - sorry for the moustache... its fixable :-)

Óriás macska, aki olaszul fog nyávogni Londonban. Pláne, ha a bajsza így össze van kuszálódva.

It's a squirrel plush (not a cat:-))

The remark in the title was unnecessary of course, everybody can see it IS a squirrel! :-) But Joris is a thorough young man, as you can see from his other comments in the drawing as well.

A drawing turned into a custom plushie with a little help from the designer

This squirrel is really special to Joris. It was the first character he started to draw when he was a kid. He wanted to teach himself to draw and saw this cartoon called "Screwball Squirrel" on TV, and since then he has been drawing the same squirrel again and again. He is 28 now, and when he gets a bit distracted or simply starts daydreaming, he still draws the squirrel unconsciously. These hundreds of squirrel drawings were turned into a one and only custom plushie.

I usually get nice reactions from my customers on seeing their designs made into soft toys, but the words from Joris made me really happy: "Wooooowwwww!!! It's so amazing, I can't describe how much I like it, it's much much much better than I ever could imagine. Emese, I can't thank you enough, you've made me so incredibly happy :) I'm blown away.....this squirrel I've drawn for so many years has now stepped of the paper and become something real. Thank you again!"

Spring plushies

First of all a custom stuffed doll for Maia - when the softie arrived, her mom overheard Maia walking around with the doll saying "I love my doll, I love my doll.":-))))

I love copying the details of a drawing as precisely as possible

This commission was placed by a friend of Maia's family from Luxemburg, but the doll was delivered to the US. The lady in Luxemburg was quite sad about the fact that she wouldn't be able to see the doll in flesh.... So I decided to make a little compensation for her: a greeting card with Maia's drawing.

This time the drawing was turned not only into a custom plushie but into a unique card as well

And the next soft toy is a giraffe to Hong Kong. I counted the exclamation marks in the email about the plushie's arrival - there were 8 of them...:)

Josephine's drawing was not a simple one - but even the most complicated drawing can be turned into a plush version! :-)

Some little extras:

A soft toy's way from the beginning to the end

Finally Lilly's custom stuffed doll, the Austrian princess softie and her plush doggie Swiffer:

Lilly Princess softie and her soft companion