Dr. Quackers is a cuddly, striped duck. He was inspired by a rather disastrous outing, when we introduced my daughter to “Santa” at the Yankee Candle store in Deerfield, MA, and she promptly burst into tears. To make her feel better, I allowed her to play with a plush duck toy that was on sale while we walked around the store. She loved the duck so much that I wanted to buy it for her, but my stingy husband said it was too expensive. So, I decided to make her a duck based on the one she had befriended that day.

Dr. Quackers is now my daughter’s favorite toy, and sleeps in her crib every night. The striped texture is great for little babies to touch, but he’s still soft enough to cuddle at night (or to calm one’s nerves after the trauma of meeting Santa). Ironically, the yarn for the many attempts at designing Dr. Quackers cost more than the original plush toy; my husband should have just let me buy the stupid duck!