Tilly, a rag doll for grown ups.

This is Tilly, she is a tall girl at 16 inches, she is dressed in an old quarter of quilting fabric and has recycled knickers, underskirt and stripy legs.  The dress fabric was a gift from an elderly lady who was shutting down her work room, I think it is from the 1980's but I am not sure. It made a pretty dress anyhow, the collar is from a tiny piece of cotton velvet I had left from a stumpwork piece of peas.  She is holding a little stripy bird and has shell buttons as an embellishment to her dress. This is the last of my stripy shirt fabric, it has been great and so versatile but sadly the rest of David's shirts are ok so I will have to wait. As always she has a hand painted, hand embroidered face and her hair is hand stitched wool tops.  I am loving this colour, its from a range of wool tops by Trimmits, it comes in a tiny bag and is not expensive but has a wonderful range of colours.  This candy pink is my favourite, I just can't get enough of it. It gives the dolls a wonderful warmth to their faces.

Ada and Ida

I would never normally show a customer order because not everyone wants their order on show but this little lady is for my Aunty Eileen and she won't mind.  A few months ago they bought Ida, the name of my grandma and Uncle Stan's mother.  He asked if I would make Ada, Aunty Eileen's mum to sit together with Ida.  This is Ada and she had to have glasses because Mrs Mawdesly always wore glasses her whole life. I wanted to share her with you because I just love the glasses.  After several abortive attemps of my own I asked my awfully clever daughter to help me out.  She just had a quick look at the doll and turned out a wonderful pair of silver glasses made of wire that just fit so well.   They show her eyes off and don't diminish them in any way and they provide such a neat solution, I am very happy and Aunty Eileen loves her.  She is going to sit with Ida in her bedroom. I used a complementary fabric range to the previous doll, using the very pretty Japanese rabbit print but decided to make a different pattern of doll to Ida again so that they complemented each other and didn't match.  I think they look quite good together.

Thora, Twyla and Tessa

Thora

I have been having a play with my patterns and using a mixture of fabrics both new and recycled I have made three new dolls of varying sizes. Thora, the first girl is my old pattern and is wearing an old print with cabbages, I think it was a a Rohan Fabric by the designer Martha Negley. All the girls are wearing this, it was a gift from a friend of my aunt when she was winding down her workroom.  Thora, Twyla and Tessa all have stripy legs thanks to one of David's shirt that gave out this summer and the pink blouses are from Aunty Irene's new summer blouse which she covered with fence paint.  It is a great fabric to work with and I would have liked more. A pyjama top of Becca's made Twyla's and Tessa's knickers and underskirts.  The girls sit well together and are nicely coordinated. Twyla is a very tall girl, she is 50cm and is the tallest girl I have made, when I elongated the pattern, it elongated her head quite considerably and I am not unhappy with the result.  She is stuffed soft and that gives a light cosy feel.  Overall I am quite happy with the long pattern but I am not sure I will make more.  Tessa or ten ton Tessa is an uber tuby maid, I played with the pattern and pulled her wide, she stands 40cm and a good 20cm at the waist.  I like her but I am not sure she will be a good seller but I am happy to make more if she is well liked.  It is interesting to play with patterns and see what you get, I wish I had more time to play but needs must as they say.  I am working on my wedding orders and starting to make a few pieces for Christmas but I need to explore my fairy tale girls and I am thoroughly looking forward to it. I hope everyone is enjoying the season, we are getting some lovely colours but the nights are starting to pull in here.  Best wishes to you all.

Twyla

Tessa

Autumn Birthday Doll Cards

I was asked to make a 21st Birthday Card for a customer to accompany a birthday doll in Autumn colours for an October birthday.  It had to be something doll based and I was a little at a loss to know where to start.  Then I found Julie Nutting's book on couture fashion paper dolls, that led me to her stamps by Prima Marketing and suddenly I have a whole new interest!  I can once more play with paper dolls.  This was an abiding passion of mine as a child, a new paper doll book kept me quiet a long time.  My Grandma Ida used to go into Chorley to an Aladdin's Cave of a Newsagents cum book shop cum card shop called Rigbye's on Eaves Lane.  This card shop was amazing, you had an occasion and they would have a card for it.  I once bought a special birthday card for my cat!  But they had all kinds of old fashioned notions and that included a regular supply of paper doll books.  One I remember was a collections of fifties outfits for a Connie Francis Paper Doll and this was in the seventies!  Why Connie Francis I don't know but it inspired me to revisit her paper doll collection during my City and Guilds, where I was exploring printing and made the papers all into doll outfits.  You could still find the original paper doll online.  Happy, happy days.  However, the stamps by Julie Nutting are just wonderful, there are so many, in so many styles and you really can make them individual.  It is just so much fun and you get to pick lovely papers and play with them. For once it is me who is raiding Becca's stash, rather than the other way round.  She is being very gracious about it and has even had a go at making an old fashioned victorian school boy, with black hair and cut out cat eyes.  I cannot recommend Julie Nutting's books for inspiration and so many pieces inspired by her stamps on Pinterest.   I enjoyed making these cards so much and they fit so well with my dolls that I think I will continue to make them and slowly add to my collection of Julie Nutting stamps.  This is my first foray into card making for anyone other than family and it is a whole new world of colour and pattern, I hope you like them.

Autumn Embroidery

 I have had such a busy summer, lots of lovely trips out in July and some serious hard work in August.  Lots and lots of lovely commissions, mostly for weddings but also some interesting ideas customers wanted.  Its been good, hard work but enjoyable.  I've had a few days to myself and to look around and our leaves are starting to change, the horse chestnut leaves have gone, the acers are going and the beech are starting to go.  We have had a nip of frost that has touched the geraniums and our glorious summer looks like it will be a lovely autumn.  This little piece of machine work was inspired by the delightful painting by Gustav Klimt of a grove of silver birch trees in all their autumn glory.  It is worked on a piece of wonderfully rich orange cotton velvet, machined, appliqued with fabric, silk, satin & synthetics, cut into tiny pieces, all in tonal colours and finally using romeo water soluble to create an edge of swirls and circles.  I have used a lighter to burn into the velvet to create a loose pattern of holes.  Here it is simply laid on a piece of black cotton velvet. Well, looking forward to a colourful autumn I am going to start work on some dolls for the shop and hopefully on a series of fairy tale girls, using the Rhoda doll pattern.  I have had a lovely few days working on an autumnal girl as a 21st birthday gift for a young lady in October and the customer has asked if I could make a birthday card to accompany the doll.  This is a first for me and such a great idea, that it has set me off rumaging in my stash and in my daughter's card stash.  I does you good to have a change, gets the creative juices flowing!