What's Up Doc?

I've been sidetracked once again from doing what I had planned. Remember I mentioned having all these gazillions of ideas in my head? Today I woke up and it felt like a good day for making carrots instead of pinning a quilt. So I got out my carrot-making stuff. Would you like to see how they're made?

First I cut a 16" square out of freezer paper. Then I drew a line from one corner to the opposite corner on the diagonal. This would give me two 45 degree templates for the bodies of the carrots. To give me a curved top edge for the carrots, I drew an arc using a 16" string tied to a pencil--the same idea as using a protractor, but I don't happen to have a 16" protractor, so that worked just fine. It doesn't have to be precise. It's not rocket science; just carrot science. Then I trimmed on the line of the arc and cut the two carrot "bodies" apart. In other words, each carrot body forms a 45 degree wedge with the top edge curved. Here's what one of my freezer paper templates looked like (see how that top edge is curved?):

Then, using the templates, I traced the pattern onto muslin and cut out six carrot shapes:

Next I sewed each shape closed at the seams, starting at the top and working down to the pointed tip of the carrot:

After I turned the carrots right side out, seam side in, I was ready to stuff them.

Amid all my crafty supplies, I found an old bag of batting and started stuffing. The nice thing about stuffing carrots is that you don't have to worry about lumps and such--lumpy carrots look just fine!

After I had them stuffed to a point that looked good to me--about 3" from the top edge--I gathered the top together and tied it with a scrap of muslin that I had cut about 1/2" wide. I wrapped the muslin tie around twice and tied a knot. Then I cut the tops about every 3/4", from the end to about 1/2" above the tie, all the way around to make a carrot top "fringe."

Carrots! Okay, white carrots. Now what?

Next I got out some craft acrylic paint. Using mostly an orange with a little bit of brown dotted in, I painted the carrots orange. Adding layers of slightly different shades of orange and brown will give your carrots a bit of texture and will make them look more real, but it's not really necessary.

After my orange carrots dried a bit, I got out the green paint. I added a little bit of water so it would soak into the fabric a little better and go a little further. Then I painted the carrot "fringe" tops. Voila! Carrots! All ready for the Easter bunny!