Valentine Owl Embroidery Design, Instant Download

Cute cartoon owl peeking out from the top of a red polkadot teacup, big shiny yellow eyes taking up half its face, soft cream feather chest and grey wings hugging the cup edges. On top of its head it wears a floral crown built from a red poinsettia bloom, kelly green holly leaves, khaki olive sprigs and a soft yellow ribbon bow tied off to the side. Two tiny red hearts float beside the cup, one on each side. The owl reads kinda kinda just adorable, really, in that kawaii sticker-style.

Ten colour stops, this is colour-heavy work, the most thread changes of any design in my owl series. Five sizes from 3.51 inch up to 7.51, with stitch counts running 23,366 small to a hefty 58,791 on the largest size. Density measures 1115 which is high, the cup and headpiece use packed satin fills to hold the bright colour and the owl chest uses a soft tatami so the cream area gets that fluffy-feather texture. I digitised it in professional tools and the layering order has the cup stitched first, then the body, then the eyes, then the floral headpiece on top so each element overlaps cleanly.

One customer wrote me last november saying she ordered the 5-inch version twice for a pair of christmas mug-themed throw pillows on her sofa, she sized one in the standard palette and customised the second by swapping the red cup for a sage green polkadot and the poinsettia for white. Took the same files, just re-coloured at her end before stitching.

Best fabrics, cotton canvas, kona quilters cotton in cream or sage, linen-cotton blend, fleece sweatshirt material. Avoid black or navy because the cream owl chest will be too close in tone to a dark ground and lose definition. Skip any open-weave fabric, the dense fills need solid ground or theyll pucker. Use medium-firm cutaway, water-soluble topping on textured fabric, and a sharp 75/11 needle. Pop a slow speed on the 7.51-inch version, 58k stitches at full machine speed will heat the needle.