NEW! lil' bear hugs pattern

lil' bear hugs PDF pattern

During these times of social distancing, Zoom meetings and a whole lot of virtual everything, what's most needed right about now is a good bear hug! Everyone we know could use a good bear hug.

And to help bring some sweetness to those we may be missing more than ever, I have created my new little comfort bear: Lil' Bear Hugs. It is my newest knit and felt pattern. In designing this bear, I turned to the process of felting because of the great texture of felted wool, and I wanted the little bear to be sturdy for continual hug ability over time. The felted bear measures about 7.5-inch/19-cm tall, not including the ears.

The pattern uses worsted weight yarn in two colors: the body color (76 yd/69.5-m) and the muzzle color (3 yd/2.74-m). The needle size is 10.5/6.5-mm double points. The bear's body is knit as one continuous piece. No sewing required! The pattern begins with knitting each leg separately then continuing up the body towards the head. The bear's muzzle, ears, arms and tail are each individually picked up and knit onto the body. Once felted, the face and paws are embellished using simple embroidery and needle felting. A hand-stitched ruffled-collar is created using a length of decorative ribbon.

bear with 5-mm glass eyes

The bear's paws consists of two parts: the yarn-paw lines and a craft-felt heart. The little heart is needle felted to the paw's underside. It is a perfect way to add a little extra loving to each bear hug! The bear eyes can be either glass or yarn. Because of the danger of swallowing, do not use glass eyes for bears of younger children. 

NOTE: For those interested in the glass eyes, they are 5-mm black glass eyes on wire pins and I sell them in sets in my Etsy store. 

Although, no one ever tires of a traditional brown-colored bear; its fun to play with a variety of yarn colors for each bear. Yarns with alpaca or mohair in them create fuzzy felted bears especially after being brushed with a nap riser brush.

My goal for early Autumn is to create a felted rabbit about the same size as the bear. Once published, I will begin designing clothes and accessories for both the rabbit and bear that will be interchangeable. 

For this pattern's recipe, I have included my most favorite blueberry muffin recipe. I have been playing with this recipe for some time and am happy with the final result. Hope you will too!

Once your little bear is finished, it is ready for gift giving! Box it up and mail him/her off to the next person on your list of special loved ones. What a surprise to receive a box of sweet bear hugs in the mail! Hugs to you!

Happy knitting!