Recently, I sewed a couple of custom girls dresses for a friend.  I turned her loose into the world of online fabric stores and she chose an adorable Flamingo print.  I posted a picture of the dresses on Instagram, and joked that I would like to nominate the flamingo as the new fox.

Can I get an amen?

This quirky, long-legged, pink-all-over giant bird has just completely won me over.  Flamingos are cool, man.  And I want more of them in my life!

My friend Virginia Lindsay of Gingercake came through for me at the right time.  She released this fantastic new book called Pretty Birds 18 simple projects to sew and love.  While I couldn’t participate in her actual book tour due to my head spinning from another certain project (eeek! STYLO called!), she offered to send me the book anyway and I could make a bird from it in my own time.  What a gal she is!  (Really, she is awesome.)

There are so many cute birds to sew in this book, and they all require small amounts of fabric- perfect for those sweet odds and ends that you’ve been holding on to.

I remember first flipping through the book and deciding that I’d sew this bird, no that bird, no this bird.  And then, towards the end, I happily found my flamingo.

I decided to keep my guy in all solids, but how cute would this be with the wings  or the belly made in a print?  I took some liberties here and decided to incorporate more wool felt into my bird- Virginia suggests you use wool felt for the face, beak, and feet, but I decided to use it for the wings and the legs as well.  I stitched it on using a blanket stitch- hand stitching is not my forte, but this was fast and fun!  I love working with felt and I think projects like these tend to get more fun as the project goes on and your creativity comes out and makes you move in a different direction that originally planned.

A friend of mine had a baby girl a few weeks ago and I’ve decided to give this to her.  Handmade stuffies are kind of a perfect baby gift. I think it’s so cute hanging out on that stack of baby books.  I made my bird’s legs extra long, and then the other day, I caught Coco swinging him around and pulling so hard on them that the felt stretched out even more. HA! (I can laugh now….) But, it didn’t matter.  The exaggerated long legs is I think what I love most!

Pretty Birds would be a great book for a sewing friend, a bird lover, or yourself!  It’s such a pretty book to look at too.

Thank you, Virginia!

I love having this book on my shelf.  Now, c’mon friends, have some more babies!

-Erin