I’ve followed in my father’s footsteps in many ways. I think my love of photographing nature comes from him. My first photography love is flowers. My husband and children have endured hours and hours of me photographing flowers over the years. My second love is photographing animals in their natural habitat. I am especially talented at photographing their rear-ends.

Seriously though, I love animals!

When Kira was living in San Jose we took a trip to the Monterrey Bay Aquarium and I was naturally in awe of the jellyfish exhibit. They are just so stinking cool. I also fell in love with the seahorses. They had so many different kinds of seahorse. I particularly loved the leafy seadragons. They are just so cool looking and their ability to camouflage is just awesome. They look like little floating pieces of some sort of ocean plant. Watching seahorses is nearly as mesmerizing as watching jellyfish or a campfire.

When we went out to Denver at Christmas to spend time with Kira and her family we took a trip to the aquarium. I’ve wanted to make a new stuffed animal for a while now and this trip reminded me of my love of seahorses. My last stuffed animal pattern was the starfish stuffed animal, and before that it was Lenny the Lobster. A seahorse stuffed animal seemed like the perfect addition to my little sea creature club.

I did a little research as I designed my stuffed animal and I discovered a few things that made me love seahorses even more. Did you know they bond for life?! Also, the male carries the eggs in his pouch until the babies are born. Personally, I love that plan.

Seahorses are ‘vertical’ swimmers. They use their dorsal fin on their back to propel themselves forward. Then, they use their pectoral fins to try and steer. As a result, they have trouble with both speed and accuracy, which is why they hang out in the weeds and coral so much.

Another thing you may not know about me is that I love alliteration. (I figured I lay it out there incase the name of our business and the majority of our pattern names didn’t give you a hint.) This of course meant that my seahorse needed a name that started with an “S” and ideally it would work for both a boy and a girl. Enter: Sammy! Short for Samantha if it’s a girl or Samuel if it’s a boy. It’s up to you. Or, you could always name your seahorse whatever you want… but Sammy is a good name.

You can make one, or make two and have your own little bonded pair. The pattern has you make a little ‘pocket’ on the tummy for a baby, which naturally means the pattern also walks you through making a little baby seahorse too! Make sure you read the directions carefully when it comes to making the baby seahorse. It’s definitely a different method.

You can buy the new downloadable pattern right here buy just clicking on the “buy now” button:

Thank you so much for stopping by. And as always,
Happy Sewing!