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5/18/23

Trevor's Moler Bear

Recently, Trevor sewed a mole-shaped polar bear stuffed animal as a homework assignment. If that's not weird enough, the assignment was in Chemistry.  


As you may remember from your high school days, a mole is approximately 6 x 1023 and is known as Avogadro's number. It is called a mole based on an abbreviation of the German word for molecule (moleküi) and not for any relation to the subterranean mammal. 

Trevor's Chemistry teacher apparently loves mole puns, so anyone who was earning at least 95% in the class could opt to make a punny mole stuffed animal instead of taking the final exam. She provided a mole pattern, then it was up to the student to sew up something clever. She gave example the example of making a green mole and calling it Guaca-mole. You could also dress up your mole like a super mole-del. 

I don't think Trevor has used the sewing machine since 2014 and he has no experience using patterns, so I was surprised that he chose to make the mole instead of just taking the test that he would surely ace. But I'm all for creative projects and glad he opted to give it a try. He chose to make a moler bear (polar bear + mole). 

He cut out the pattern pieces from white felt...


... and sewed them together, leaving a small opening.  


He turned the fabric right side out, added stuffing, and hand-sewed the opening closed. He sewed on a black felt nose, then glued on googly eyes and little white ears. He did a great job and his moler bear is really cute. More importantly, he learned how to read a pattern, how to thread the sewing machine, how to sew something that isn't just a straight line, and so much more than he would have learned taking a test on a subject he's already mastered. I approve. 


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