knitting soft toys

I don't remember ever having knitted a soft toys before (unless you include some trousers I knitted for my Sindy doll when I was about 10 - they started off as trousers but I got bored and they ended up as Bermuda shorts. Very impractical, woollen shorts!)
Anyway, with the first grandchild expected at the start of 2019 I bought a pattern for a very sweet knitted rabbit and began to knit a pile of small strangely shaped pieces. Now I'm at the stage of joining them together but the knitting pattern is woefully inadequate. It just says things like 'Sew up the head, stuff and attach to the body' but it doesn't say how. It did suggest looking at the photo on the front for help, but the rabbit is dressed so you can't see the construction of the body at all. I've found a few youtube clips which have helped a bit, but I hadn't expected (as a reasonably experienced knitter) to find soft toys so difficult. Has anyone else done this before? have you any advice?

First off, congratulations on the little Grandelion, best wishes for a safe arrival !

I have no help for your sewing up problens, but if need arises, I do have the official knitting pattern for a Clanger

Maybe if you can post pictures of the completed pieces and what the finished rabbit should look like, the experienced knitters on here (not me!) may be able to help. I have made fabric soft toys before, so may be able to help anyway.

I was expecting my rabbit to look as amateurish as the second cake in this photo, but I think I'm learning as I go along... I will post a picture when the rabbit has some clothes (which will hide any rough seams!!)

I love 'grandelion' BTW!!!

Well done on 'cracking it', Dandelion. And congrats on the soon to be Grandelion

I am an experienced knitter and have some practice at knitting and assembling soft toys so do shout if you end up with one spare leg and no ears - or whatever!

Thank you FloBear. I think my problem was having a collection of small stuffed components which looked like a pile of little potatoes, and just being told to join one to another. Where? How? I've winged it - I found a tutorial on mattress stitch, which seems to be the golden stitch for joining things, but trying to join 3D objects is probably a bad way to learn this. I'm realising that knitting soft toys is an almost totally different occupation to knitting clothes, and it hasn't been the quick easy process I expected it to be. I will attempt more (particularly as the wool for the bunny I knitted was 'Buy Two Get One Free', and having finished the rabbit's body I still have two and a half balls left!!) but I may have to make something straightforward first!

I think the difficulty with sewing up small knitted toy components is getting a neat seam especially if the bits are garter stitch - sewing up big knitting parts is hard enough to do tiidily.  A fairly tight tension and stuffing firmly are also good.  I've actually knitted very few soft toys (but have done lots of fur ones in the past) as I really can't be bothered with sewing lots of tiny bits together and as for knitted cakes - what is the point!
It sound as though you've got it sorted, I hope a picture is forthcoming.
Great news about the grandelion, I hope all progresses smoothly.

Knitted cakes, indeed! Hilarious and pointless. As are Very Large knitted toys. Or very large toys anyway, in my opinion.

When I was teaching I use to make little hand-sized toys for the annual Green Club Sale and they were always very popular. I would see them peeking out of pockets for the rest of the day!

Hooray for YouTube, Dandelion. I accidentally learned an improved method of casting on when I was searching for something else knitting-related.

Rabbit is still only half decent, with shorts but no jumper. Hopefully with heavy rain forecast tomorrow I'll get onto it!

There will be a picture won't there?

Oh yes, but I couldn't possibly post a photo of a naked bunny!!!!

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Finished at last!! (I didn't knit the chair...)

Oh, Dandelion, he is lovely, great knitting too. I can't get any idea of scale though. I presume the chair isn't a full scale one.

Thank you. I think he's about 14 inches from the top of his head to his toes. The chair was something my mother used to display her old dolls on!!

Aw, it is lovely.

I could make the chair ! The legs look just like a mini version of what we make in Bodgers "log to leg" races.

Chilli-head wrote:Aw, it is lovely.

I could make the chair ! The legs look just like a mini version of what we make in Bodgers "log to leg" races.

I would offer to go into business together, but knitting this one rabbit was such a faff, I can't see myself doing it again!!

He's terrific, Dandelion. Perfect for that chair, too!

Thank you!