Monster Love: Some Monsters are Different

Our 2 year old is spending a good bit of time in “pretend play” mode, hosting tea parties with her dolls and dinosaurs, cooking us dinner in her toy kitchen, and just a slew of other fun.

We borrowed a neat book from the library and it’s spurred a new interest for our 2 year old: monsters.

After reading the book, Elise said, “I have no monster friend.”

Well you do now, kiddo!

Click on “Read More” to see these little cuties in action!


I am good at few things, and sewing isn’t one of them. So here’s a message to all those who are reading this and can actually sew… 

Please disregard how this little cutie is put together! 

You’ll see that I sewed it “correctly” for most of the monster, but I stopped at the legs. Why? 

‘Cuz I wanted to. No, I’m kidding – I couldn’t figure out how to turn it if I kept going! It just kept getting stuck! 

Now, if I’d have reviewed some YouTube videos about this, I’m sure I could have pulled it off. Also, I’m certain it would have yielded a much cleaner looking monster.

But this is supposed to be a “different” monster to go with our book theme. 

A little about the book: 

Some Monsters Are Different by David Milgrim (partner link) has some of the neatest illustrations. 

The drawings are detailed but large and clean enough so that our 2 year old can point to features she finds fun.

It was a good starting point to begin our discussion of embracing the differences in others. She seemed to be receptive, however I have no doubt that most of it went right over her head. 

After reading the book a few times, Elise asked what monsters were. 

Yep, you can imagine this was a bit tricky for me because I most definitely didn’t want to associate them with being scary. I’ve had some friends tell me that when kids turn 3 or 4, they start coming up with their own monsters: under the bed, in the closet, in all dark spaces, etc. 

In order to keep it light and fun, I decided to make her a monster friend (or two). I have a good bit of fabric, fun ribbons and an incredibly large stash of craft felt, so I knew I could pull it off. 

After making up a drawing with the help of Elise, pulling some coordinating fabrics together, and relocating the sewing machine from my craft cabinet to the dining room table (yep, you read that right), I started to create a new monster friend for Elise. 

Now listen… There is no way I’m going to write up a sewing tutorial when I’m so bad at it, but here are a list of supplies to help get you started. If you have all of this on hand, Google a tutorial on how to put a plush doll together – there are some good ones I’ve used in the past. 

The supplies list is very simple: fabric, felt, ribbon, polyfill, sewing machine (can be done by hand), needle and thread.  

I also used some interfacing to give it some weight, but that is definitely not required! 

Look at this little cutie and our little cutie couldn’t love it more! 

She even had to take it on our walk. I couldn’t take the cuteness and the use of the ribbon hanger is just awesome, isn’t it? 

Let us know in the comments section that you stopped by to play with us. We love to hear from you! 

Ruffles and Rain Boots, toddler crafts, toddler activities, fun crafts for kids, rainy day activities, sarcastic mom

 

  
Ruffles and Rain Boots, toddler crafts, toddler activities, fun crafts for kids, rainy day activities, sarcastic mom
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This post contains a link to Amazon.com for the book we are discussing. To read our full partner release, please click here. Thank you for helping to support our family! 

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