Pea Pod Buddies

Yesterday I made these Pea Pod Buddies.

The kids had been asking me to make them ever since I got this book. I absolutely love this book.....its all about making dolls using gloves. There are all kinds of animals although I especially love the cat...fairies, snowmen. kimono girls, etc.

It is in Japanese but it has so many pictures that it is easy to follow along. I get my Japanese craft books from Saucy Louise as I find the postage to Canada very reasonable.

My kids also love this book which has over 100 little felt characters for them to make all about 3 inches tall.

They have learned how to transfer the pattern, cut out the felt and sew them together...all the small parts are glued on.

Check out the frog my 6yr old made yesterday.

Back to the Pea Pods....in the book they call them beans.....which is probably botanically correct as they are white but we call them peas.

You need some cotton gloves.....I hit the jackpot at Wal Mart. In the hardware section they sell a pack of 12 pairs for $5.00.

I have also used the mini gloves from the dollar store....you know the one size fits all ones.

Cut off the finger tips......you need them to be about 2.5 inches long.

Thread a needle and make a running stitch around the cut edge.

Stuff with some wool or stuffing to make a nice sized pea.

Pull the thread tight....add some stitches to try and flatten the bunched end and knot off.

Make as many as you want....next you have to add the faces. Thread a needle with some embroidery thread. I'm using 3 strands. I choose green but you can do it in any color.

Coming in from the back of the pea make the nose with a few stitches.

Add the eyes and mouth and put in some eyebrows... the eyebrows help to add different expressions....happy, sleepy, mad.

Use a red crayon to add some blush to the cheeks....you need to circle around a few times before the color transfers.

Now you need to cut out the pods.

For the open pods I used 2 different fabrics. One for the inside and one for the outside.

I used cotton quilting fabric and wool felt.

Make a pod pattern....you can click on this picture to make larger. The pod is 4.5 inches long and 1.5 inches wide at the middle. You can also make smaller pods if you wish.

The stem end is in a star shape approx. 1.5 inches wide from one point to another.

Cut your pod shape out on the fold....they should look like this when you are done.

I used the wool felt for the stem end.




Put 2 pod shapes right sides together and stitch leaving about 2 inches open for turning. I'm at the cabin so I hand stitched all mine but I'm sure the machine would be much faster!!

Turn and hand stitch the opening closed.

You can press them if you wish at this point.

You then have to add a little seam down the back of the pod.

Insert a pea and sew a pocket with a few stitches. The first one I made I actually sewed the peas in place but the kids wanted to be able to take the peas out to play with them....so from then on I just sewed in the pocket.

If you are making one where some of the pod is closed you can add some stuffing to keep that pod shape.

Add a stem end with a few stitches and you are done.

I made some plain pods, stuffed and with only 1 piece of fabric. I think they make a nice addition to the pea buddies.

I also left one pea free....the kids used him as the buddy knocking on the door to ask if the other peas could come out and play.

They also came up with names for all the peas based on their expressions.


So give it a try and sew up some pea pod buddies for your kids or get them to give it a go.

see you next time

gail