#protruding

[opening image description: a fluffy sock sheep plush with round brown horns, small black eyes and stitched nose/mouth, and blushed-on pink cheeks. The sheep is round, kawaii-style, and fluffy, with small light pink cloth legs sticking out from the toy where arms and legs would sit on a conventional doll or bear. The toy sits on a white paper doily resting on a brown woodgrain table; text beside the toy reads “cute and simple sheep plushie” in white, pink and brown type. The word “medium” in white type sits in the viewer’s lower right-hand corner.]

Video Tutorial - Sheep Sock Plush, Maqaroon

No pattern cutting is required, just the drawing of basic shapes. I'd recommend using chalk instead of concealer to make the lines visible.

Again, it would be easy to replace the stuffing in the body (but not the head, arms or ears to keep the toy’s shape) with poly pellets, dried rice or grains, etc, or stuffing the toy with a mix of stuffing and dried lavender heads for scent.

Back stitch, ladder stitch and over or blanket stitch are used; some ability to keep stitches small and tight is needed for the sewing of the toy's face and arms.

Components:

Pink and White socks (pink plain and white fluffy)

Needle and thread

Stuffing/cotton wool/polyfill

Black felt

Brown needle felting wool (can be omitted for a hornless sheep) and felting needle

Glue

[opening image description: still image of a light pink unicorn plush made from a fluffy sock against a flat purple background. The unicorn has rounded ears, a white spiral horn wrapped in silver thread, felt eyes--almond-shaped pieces of felt with black lashes attached to the bottom edge, to resemble eyes closed in sleep--and a rounded, more human-like face resting on its front legs. Blue and pink wool roving or felting wool forms its mane and has been wrapped around the horn, trailing over its back and side. The tail and back of the unicorn isn’t visible. White text beside the unicorn reads “sleepy unicorn Pencil Case!” in all caps and handwritten type.]

Video Tutorial - DIY Unicorn Pencil Case, 2 Cats & 1 Doll

The idea behind this is the making of a round pencil case from felt and a zipper, covering it with the sock and stuffing to form a body, and then adding head, tail and limbs to give the case the shape of a fluffy unicorn plush--or a very stimmy pencil case. This video is quite good at showing how the pieces are put together, but basic sewing stitches and some competency in how to sew around a 3D object are required.

It would also be possible to use this tutorial as a base for a non-pencil case unicorn plush or weighted plush.

Components:

One pair of fluffy socks

Wool roving or felting wool

Zipper

A sheet of felt for the pencil case body

Small felt pieces for eyes and horn

Fabric or hot glue

Thread and needle

Glitter thread for wrapping around horn

Scissors

Stuffing or cotton wool

Vanishing fabric marker for tracing out limbs on sock pieces

Pencil, knitting needle or long and thin object for stuffing ears and limbs

Nail scissors for cutting eyelashes

This eBay listing has a range of fluffy socks in several colours from $1.09 USD with free international shipping. I also find them in dollar shops and at local markets.

[image description: two photos of a clear jelly stress ball filled with rainbow orbeez/water beads inside a black mesh bag, the ends covered with a black plastic cap. First photo shows the ball with a close up on the water beads inside the clear gel-like ball; second photo shows a white person’s hand squeezing the ball, with multiple protrusions of three or four coloured balls inside the clear jelly ball being pushed through the mesh, forming a wild cluster of rainbow water bead “florets”. Both photos are taken on a red watermelon slice pillow background.]

Orbeez Mesh Stress Ball - Mostly $2, $3.50 AUD.

It’s a mesh stress ball containing water beads. If that doesn’t sell it, I don’t know what does.

Please note that like most of the mesh stress balls I’ve found in my local dollar shops, this has quite a strong chemical-plastic odour. The clear jelly-like ball is also, like most of the same mesh stress balls, slightly tacky to the touch, although it doesn’t leave residue on my hands. These are best stored in a plastic container where they cannot attract dust and only brought out when in use.

But, oh, it is fabulous. I mean, look at the second photo. Look! How awesome is the effect of the coloured water beads being pushed into clusters or florets through the mesh? Each time you squish the beads come up in different colour arrangements, making it very hard to stop squishing this. It’s a fabulous combination of manipulative and visual stim, and I am absolutely in love.

It’s hard to find these on eBay because they’re not listed as “orbeez mesh stress balls”. I found a few listings under the generic “mesh stress ball” search, but a lot of listings had photos of these and regular mesh stress balls, making it impossible to know what you’re actually ordering.

I’ve found a few listings that have only pictures of orbeez stress balls in their listings or actually specify that their balls contain water beads or coloured spheres, which I’ll link below:

[opening image description: two handmade popsicle/ice cream squishies sitting on a white tabletop. The squishy on the viewer’s left is a pink ice cream witha black kawaii-style face and white icing or chocolate on the top third, covered with rainbow sprinkles. A bite has been taken out of the top right corner. The squishy on the viewer’s right is a brown/chocolate ice cream with a white kawaii-style face and a drizzle of white chocolate/icing on the top. This squishy is housed in a clear plastic bag with a handdrawn cardboard swing tag featuring a picture of the squishy and the text “squiggle the chocolate popsicle”. Text underneath the squishies reads “kawaii popsicle squishy” on a pink background decorated with icing, two vector images of popsicle ice creams and coloured squishies. White text in a brown circle on the top left corner reads “DIY”.]

Video Tutorial - Kawaii Popsicle Squishy, Mishcrafts

This is a pretty simple tutorial for making DIY squishies, although the shaping of the foam may be difficult for those of us who struggle with fine motor control.

Components:

White puffy fabric paint

Acrylic paints in chosen colours

Paintbrushes in various sizes

Popsicle sticks

Scissors and cutting tools

Carwash sponges

Clay sprinkles (optional)

[opening image description: two photos split by a green stripe. The photo on the viewer’s left, taken against a yellow background, shows a crystal clear glass-like slime forming a rough circle, cradled in a light brown-skinned hand with long pink-painted nails. The photo on the right, taken against a white background, shows a range of colourful bendy plastic straws--red, green, yellow, pink, blue, purple, orange--filled in a clear glass jar. A red arrow points to an aqua circle drawn around the bendy part of a yellow, pink and orange straw at the front of the jar.]

Video Tutorial - Crunchy Straw Slime, Karina Garcia

This is a tutorial that basically involves making any kind of slime and adding chopped-up plastic straws to it for the crunch--more an idea than a tutorial!

I believe any sticky-leaning (in order to hold the straw pieces) slime will work for this, so folks might want to check out our tutorial master pages for other slime recipes: [one] | [two] | [three].

Video has moderate background music and auto-generated closed captions in English. There is also a small picture in the background of the video that reads “y’all need Jesus”, in case there’s stimmers who would prefer to avoid this in their stim tutorials.