Page 1 - a snail of a time

With each of these pages my aim is to add some interest to what is really a very simple thing.

I started by working on the most difficult and most interesting part of the design - the snail's shell. As the design often shifts from design to reality I often start with the bit that forms the central part of the design and which, if it moves, the rest of the design can move around.

I traced the outside of the shell onto interfacing.  The interfacing is multipurpose. I wanted the flap of the shell to be a bit stiff and also as with the page, the interfacing gives me a way to trace the design onto the reverse of the fabric.

 

 When placement of the lettering is extra important I will often sew it from the back in running stitch as you can see here. In this part I have to be careful where the letters go so that they fit in a small space.

 

I then go back and fill in the gaps from the front as you can see

 

After that I started on the spiral.

 

As you can see in my discussion of the book's design, I always planned to have an actual little house inside the snail's shell.

However, as I started work I decided it was no fun to have absolutely nothing on the inside of the flap and added in some more details to that part. I thought I'd put in an aga oven and some other bits.

I had planned to use some applique but it was just far too small so there is very little applique in the design. Just the pillow and the main part of the bed and the aga.

 

Once these parts were all done, I sewed the back and the front of the flap together and turned it inside out and finished it off.

Then I sewed down the inside of the shell on the page, followed by the snail body.

 

Despite carefully tracing and cutting out the snail's body and shell the same size as my design, there's been some shift in size. You can see this from the back. Fortunately I'm really not picky about this so long as it doesn't look too awful. It's also not a big shift.

 

I then sewed the flap onto the page and we're done.

This is the completed page with the snail shell closed. The page text reads "Die schneke hat ein haus" - the snail has a house.

 

Here you can see the inside of the shell with the flap open. The completed aga, a little hand towel and some kitchen implements hanging up.

I've actually completed quite a few pages so I'm going to separate each page into a separate blog post just to avoid picture overload. I may add in a few more making of photos when I'm back at home.

It's been a long time, we shouldn't of left you

...without a dope beat to step to...

It appears I have not blogged since October. Good grief!

I'm going to throw you a few pics of some plushies I did  a while back.

These two dolls are the school uniform of the children at the school a friend of mine who is a newly qualified teacher. Apart from aiming to get the details right, I decided early on, one of the girls would be black because most of my characters are white and there are plenty of kids at that school who aren't, also she was a sort of homage to one of my friend's daughters who is cute and adorable. I wanted the smile to be clear and her mouth disappeared for some reason with black thread on brown even though her eyes didn't so I gave it a small white line to make it stand out

My friend was very pleased so I'm glad they came out alright. She gave me a book token and some chocolate. Bless.

I also made a Furiosa doll for a friend. The tricky bit was the arm, which I made out of pipe cleaner. I'm not very patient so rather than going out to get the right colour I coloured in with felt pens the yellow pipe cleaner to make it dark metal grey.

Similarly for her oil slicked shorn head, I coloured in for a looong time the pink fabric for her head. I really wished I'd used embroider but that would have been equally long.

The basic doll was made first then I sewed on her metal arm.

My friend and customer was very happy.

I have got some update on the Nursery rhyme book. WITH PICTURES, of actual sewing done. But I'm too sleepy to do it now.

Here we go!

I have shelved the car plushie for various reasons including lack of grey felt. I also was dying to start on the nursery rhyme book.

I showed you the designs a little while back for a book based on a German nursery rhyme that my Omi (grandmother) taught me as a child. It is a gift for my niece (good grief that was December last year).

Recently I started choosing background colours and then today I bought the interfacing to put the designs onto on the back which I use as a guide.

I have to trace it two ways, one the right way and one on the reverse as that is the side that will remain visible once it's attached to the base fabric for the page.

I'd previously spent some time choosing the fabric colours for each page and the fabrics I was going to use. This was a joint decision based on what was going on the page (e.g I wanted green for the snail to be in the garden) and what fabrics I had in the right size pieces. I wouldn't entirely be guided by the size of the pieces if I really wanted something I'd sew some bits together but it's a lot easier not to. I was also guided by making sure the same colour didn't repeat too much and if possible I'd have preferred no repeating colours but I have repeated yellow (two shades, one more orange) and green (one more yellow one more blue).

Once I'd traced the designs I then ironed the base fabric and ironed on the interfacing...except for page one where I'd accidentally traced the design on the wrong side - whoops. That one is just pinned in place.

This my friends is the only ironing I enjoy because it's quick and actually interesting...

And there's the pile of completed.

I love the reuse aspect of what this involves or any of my projects really. I love that the sky is made up of the same fabric as a Khaleesi costume, or that the butterfly's background is made up of an old duvet or sheet cover from home, or that the purple is left overs from making a picture cover for my Dad. I look forward to more reuse of fabric as I work on each page.

Where do we go from here?

I realised I never posted any pics of Babydoll mark 2

There aren't many pics but here it is!

She was a second version for the same person who wanted one for herself and one for her partner.

Anyway as mentioned previously I have been asked to make

• Imperator Furiosa
• 2 kids in a school  uniform
• Delorean - still no idea when I'll do that one
• I think I may have promised a Harley Quinn and possibly Rogue and possibly Scarlet Witch...

That's where we are on projects anyway

Doctor no 11....yes again

So glancing back at my previous posts forever ago I'm sure you're thinking where's my darn delorean, where's my nursery rhyme book for the niece?

And the answer would be I don't know I got distracted. Instead I've been asked for the straightforward kind of plushies and I've finally made one of them - the 11th Doctor. This is not my first outing with the 11th Doctor. The last time I made one for a friend's daughter.

I have just realised I left something out of my plushie this time - the braces! Ooops. Never mind can add those on top. Done it before.

Anyway, on my second outing I was thinking about what fabric I had to hand in the more or less right colours.

I don't use a lot of felt really in my plushies despite the fact that it doesn't fray and is therefore easy to use. I guess because I don't have a lot generally and I have a looooooooot of other bits of cloth. I was slightly excited this time to get a chance to use a fat square I'd bought ages ago on holiday that was faintly reminiscent of tweed but cotton for the jacket.

I confess I did some cursory colour research but then I just got stuck in. I had to slightly make use of some scraps creatively to create the hair as I didn't have enough of the fabric I wanted.

I probably should have taken more care of the lining up of the pattern of the fabric of the jacket but I like the way it looks.

The requestor had asked for a fez, which I hadn't done the last time.

The last stage involved me realising I'd mised out the braces, I sadly didn't photograph them but they were the same material as the bow tie which was a fun touch.

So there we are, he's done. I like some aspects of this one better than the previous version. Admittedly the previous plushie was much earlier into my odyssey into plushie making. I currently appear to have made well over 20 of the darn things!

I've got to the stage now where I quite like that things aren't perfect, that the legs and other parts aren't even and the fabrics vary so much. I like the challenges that each one brings, even when I make the same plushie again.

I've got a toughie coming up - someone asked me for Imperator Furiosa and I'm thinking about how I can make that arm. Sadly I don't have any more grey pipe cleaners. But maybe I can cover some ones I have of another colour.

Bigger projects

A few years ago, I made a cloth book out of the poem "By a babe unborn" by GK Chesterton for my then unborn nephew. I gave it to him and his family when he was two weeks old and we visited. At some point I will blog and post pictures of what it ended up looking like.

He's now 2 1/2 and has a baby sister who is nearly half a year old. Although we were all very excited by this second arrival it was not so hyper exciting as baby number 1 and I think I was just distracted so instead of making a book before she's born (a bit late now) I am now planning a book when she's already here. I've mentioned this cloth book project before but I'm now a bit further on.

Before I share some drawings I think I should mention that this is a simpler project than either the Chesterton poem book or even the G[r]eek Alphabet. The imagery is not too complex but I'm determined to have some fun along the way with it.

The snail has a house/Die schneke hat ein haus

The snail's shell is its house but I don't just want a picture of a snail. The shell will be a flap that can be lifted to see inside a sort of single room dolls house. Although I drew the inside on a separate piece of paper, in fact it's the shell that will be separate and the inside of the shell will be part of the page.

You may be able to see in my sketch pad that the words have been altered slightly. This is because when I made my first plans in the sketch book I had to look up the exact words because I don't speak German and memorised this nursery rhyme some time back. I wanted to get it right. Unfortunately as with many nursery rhymes, there are slight variations on nursery rhymes, and when I was showing my drawings to my Mum she said those weren't the words my Omi used, so as I drew my full scale drawings I went through "correcting" the words to match the typed up words my Mum has for the nursery rhyme from my grandmother. Here the variation is small. The version I found online said "ihr haus" - her house, Omi said "ein haus" - a house

Ein fellchen hat die maus/A fur coat has the mouse

To play a bit more with the fur coat on the mouse I decided the mouse would be wearing a separate fur coat. And then I decided that there had to be a reason, so the mouse was to be going to the opera, to see "Die fledermaus" because reasons. The tiara is a late addition.

The sparrow has fine feathers/Der sperling hat feine federlein

This is another place where the words I found online varied from those written down by my mother. Internet said "die federn fein", Omi's words said "feine federlein". Anyway again I wanted to have some fun with the idea and thought that I would like to have the sparrow flying a biplane. I may try and make the propeller something that can spin.

Das schmetterling bunte flugelein/The butterfly has beautiful wings

Another set of word variations. Internet said "der falter seine flugelein", Omi's words "das schmetterling bunte flugelein". Not sure what the difference is. Anyway. I think I will make the wings flaps. Having varied the word placement they will probably go as they do in the bottom left, on the wings themselves in a mirror pattern. I haven't decided if there will be other decorative details.

Die eltern / Nun sage mir, was hast den du? / My dear child what have then you?

Although my grandmother's version didn't have this phrase /Die eltern and das kind for each of the verses, I like the idea that one verse is the adult's or older person's and the other is the child's. I decided that as there wasn't much to put on this page from the words I would put a little old lady sort of in the style of my Omi. My niece and nephew's grandmothers don't look anything like this. On one side, red hair long and straightened with a fringe, on the other side (my Mum) short curly blond hair, both are slim.

Das Kind / Ich habe kleider und auch shuh / I have clothes and shoes

I am debating having a way to allow the child to be dressable and for the shoes to be able to be put on but still attached maybe by a cord. Maybe if the velcro is pink? I don't know I'll have a think.

Father and mother, love and life / Vater und mutter, lust und leben

I had thought of putting "lust und leben " on a separate page, but I couldn't think of anything so it's ended up on this page. The main idea for the is design was a sort of family portrait (ish). The extra words also save me from drawing careful legs....

Das hat mir der liebe Gott gegeben / This has good God given me

This is basically a decorative design based on the cross. I decided that I wanted to use a form of the cross that I met when I went to World youth day in Madrid. It's a Dehonian cross from the Dehonian order who hosted my group while we were there.

Conveniently this brings me to 8 pages, although due to my style of page construction, I just need pages to go in pairs as the front and back are separate and sewn together.

This is probably all you will see of this project for a bit as I've got about 3 plushies (one of which is the car) to do first. Unless I get bored and mix them all up together... not into one project but not do them consecutively I mean.

A long time ago on on the internet

(title to be sung to the tune of  'Long time ago in Bethlehem')
....lwell it IS still Christmas, until the 6th January darn it!

Anyhoo a while back I offered to cheer someone up with a plushie of their choice....they asked for an inanimate object. I um....only make people but I said I'd think about it. They had asked for the Delorean from Back to the future. Ummm yeah. I can do that? I think?



That's um going to be interesting

So it's Christmas, right, I'm at my parents for a long winter's hibernation. The last time I had a long stretch at my parents with not much to do it was before my nephew and I spent the time working on a special cloth book for him so this year I thought I could start some work on my more complicated projects.

Planning in paper

I don't do a lot of this with ordinary people plushies. I do sketch a bit, specially if they are complicated but often most of it is just remembering minor details of the clothing and colour of the cloth or how many separate bits there are.

As you can see from the dalek, even with complicated things, if I think I can work it out without an advance plan I often don't bother much. This time I was going to need to plan seriously as the shape was significantly more fiddly with a lot of decisions.

One of my first decisions was whether to try and make it hollow and able to accommodate the Marty and Doc Brown. This sadly was almost immediately abandoned as (a) I didn't have a plushie to hand to work out the sizing and (b) it would just be too big and I didn't have the patience.

I then tried to make a rough pattern in paper. for the main shape. If I were really trying to make a paper delorean I would have put tabs but what I wanted to create was a pattern for the cloth so I just taped the parts together.




Essentially my plan is two side pieces and a long piece wrapping round the outside, with the wheels as added extras sticking out.

One of the things I can see from constructing the model is that it needs to be wider. The long winding piece will need to be probably twice as wide. I can also see that the door is wrong, and looking at reference pictures I can see what's gone wrong, the door doesn't flap up from the frame of the car, it flaps up from a bit that runs through the middle of the roof.

I think there will be an internal space with seats but the bonnet and boot blocked in and stuffed. but I haven't worked out how to deal with the windscreen - opaque piece of fabric in "blue", clear plastic (NB where would I get that, how would I sew it in place?), or just empty space.

I will probably also be using some pipe cleaners to create some stronger framework, probably not throughout but just around the empty space of the ?cockpit? drivers area? WHATEVER that space is called. And will probably need some interfacing throughout to give it some way to be less curvy and more blocky like a car.

The seats are definitely going to be added in afterwards created separately.

When, when, when, little hen will you make me a d'lorean for my tea

Well I know I've put this off for a while but there are two little people plushies I owe really before I get to the Delorean. Namely:

• Another Babydoll from Suckerpunch
• Another 11th Doctor this time with fez

But I think that after that I will be able to get on to the Delorean probably. Another factor that will slow me down is I don't have an awful lot of grey fabric. I did have for ages but it got used up making the dalek so I'll need to buy some. Plus some significant amount of interfacing. I also want some for another project so that's not going to be a problem.