Since my husband is a librarian, my daughter and I love visiting our local library during the week for storytime and to use the children’s play area. There’s one section of that space they change out frequently with different themed toys, and once I saw what a big hit the Pizzeria Stand was, I knew I had to make something similar for the kiddos in my life!
I made three identical pizza toys for my daughter, niece, and nephew for Christmas.
Supplies:
-Card stock/cardboard/sturdy paper for making your template
-Tan felt for the pizza pie
-White & red felt sheets for the sauce and cheese
-Felt sheets or scraps in a variety of colors for the toppings. (I used scraps in black, red, green, white, and brown from my stash)
-Polyfill stuffing
– Needle/thread/scissors
*optional*
For the pizza pie:
Step one: Cut out your pizza slice template from your sturdy paper. Since the pizza box I used is 10″x10″, I knew I wanted my whole pizza to be about 9″ in diameter. I traced a container lid that I had in the same size to create the pizza shape on a scrap piece of cardboard. Then I quartered my pizza to get the triangle shape for individual slices.
Step two: Cut the pizza slices out of felt. Since you’ll be sewing 2 pieces together to form one slice, you’ll need to cut 8 pieces total using your template.
Step 3: Start making the “crust”. Do this by sewing your slices together at the curved top, making sure to leave a small hole for stuffing. I began by sewing along the top edge of the fabric first, turning the slice to make 4 stitches down the side, then turning the slice again to make a parallel line for the crust shape.
Step 4: Stuff your crust. The Polyfill I used came with a small dowel which was great to help smoosh the stuffing all the way down the small opening.
Step 5: Sew the remaining parts of the slice together, making sure to close the hole in the crust. Trim all loose threads and uneven fabric pieces.
Step 6: Make your sauce and cheese. Using your template, cut 4 pieces each from the red and white felt. I chose to cut the tops in sort of a wavy pattern to make it look more like these toppings had been spread on, but you can finish them however you like!
That’s it! Now you can enjoy your cheese pizza!
For the toppings:
This is where you can get as creative as you want. I chose to make a sort of “supreme pizza” and opted for pepperoni, sausage, green peppers, mushrooms, and black olive. You can do what I did and leave them “as-is” (meaning cut them out of felt and put them directly on your pizza) or you could decorate them with fabric paint or use a blanket stitch to sew to pieces together for sturdier toppings. I think it would also be fun to cut up pink felt squares for ham or yellow triangles for pineapple. The options are really endless here!
Pepperoni: Cut circles out of burgundy felt. I used a large thread spool as my template, but you can make these any size (or different sizes) you’d like. I made 8 pepperonis in total.
Sausage: Using brown felt scraps, I traced a quarter for size, then cut misshapen and squiggly circles to represent the lumpy sausage balls I usually get on my pizza, making 4 total
Black Olive: I used a quarter again as my template to cut out the circle, then cut out the inside by folding the felt circle in half, and making a snip in the center. Then, I cut along the inside border of my piece to achieve the hole in the center of the “olive”. I made 6 total.
Green Pepper: Using a small mason jar as my template, I traced four circles in a square formation, making a sort of clover shape. I then cut the clover out of felt, and cut out the inside along the border to create a pepper shape. You could leave the piece whole, or cut them in half like I did. I ended up with 3 pepper pieces each.
Mushroom: I decided to draw my template freehand, but you could easily print off a mushroom shape template to trace if you’d prefer. Then I cut out 5 pieces from my beige felt.
All that’s left now is to arrange your slices into a full pizza pie in the box and enjoy!
I love playing Pizzeria with my daughter and watching her make so many different combinations for me to “try”. Her current specialty is stacking all the pieces on top of each other like a huge pizza sandwich, and smothering it with as many toppings that will fit! YUM!
-XOXO-
C
