The Tale of Schwabbie!

Schwabbie is a pillow monster I made in the summer, with long floppy arms and sweet green ears. Schwabbie went for sale online with no luck, and traveled with me to some craft shows to see many smiles. But he got his biggest smile this week!

A few weeks ago I had plush work accepted to a Christmas show at the Tampa Artist Emporium, a local indie gallery. I dropped off some holiday inspired plushies as well as ornaments. The week after, for Thanksgiving, my parents flew in so I took them to the gallery to see my work. While there the owner remembered my work and asked me to bring in more plushies, some un-holiday inspired and more weird designs. I decided to take my big pillow monsters since at craft shows they gain attention, but didn't ever sell.

This week Jay and I went to the gallery to drop off Schwabbie and some friends of his. Shelby, the gallery owner, loved him and his friends. They were setting up for an event this Friday, the Winter Wonderland, and one of the volunteers that was helping setup saw Schwabbie and fell in love! She put him aside immediately and bought him for her niece. So after all this time Schwabbie found a home! And I may have found a new niche to sell! :) If you're in the area, the Winter Wonderland event is this Friday evening, but the show is going on all month.

I told a friend this story and he suggested that I post some of my progress work of my plushies. So as a treat, I have below some skecthes I came up with when I originally created Schwabbie. In the sketches you can also see Huggie the Hippie, who sold online a long time ago!