more bonnie birds … an obsession in papier mache!

It’s funny how an idea can sprout wings and take-off (dreadful pun entirely intended), such as it has been with these bonnie birds.  It’s rather refreshing to have something I can make out of papier mache that doesn’t take forever and a day and that isn’t a bowl!  Aside from this pair I’m hatching three more and they should be fully fledged in the next few days (and yes, that was a couple more of dreadful puns that were entirely intended).

This pair seem to be diametrically opposed in terms of form, one’s short and fat and the other a bit leggy with a great fan of a tail, the tail’s something I can see me repeating and refining on future versions.

Of course, like all birds that flock, it doesn’t take long for them to catch-up with more of their own kind …

… I imagine this flock will be growing as they, ahem, get to know each other better … well, it is almost Spring!!

All of these birds are available for sale in our shop.

Valentine Fabric Finch

Hmm…wonder what these are

If I turn my back will they move?

Nope…but they did get shinier…you saw that, right?

Oh well, best be on my way now.

In the shop now

Papier mache wall art

It’s been commented on in the past that there are strange things going on in the dark recesses of my mind, that they seem to bleed out into the light through what I create … I think ‘they’ may have a point.

I seem to have a raft of canvasses lying around and despite repeated attempts to paint something of any worth on them I seem to fail and fail again.  The canvas here has been used so many times now that I can’t recall how many images lie beneath this final effort, perhaps it’s a furious amalgam of all that went before, a seething anger at the ineptitude slapped on the canvas below.

Whatever it is, using a canvas as a base for some wall art/sculpture is an avenue of interest to me and something I feel sure I will pursue further at some future point.  In the meantime I can think of at least two (more conventional) sculptures that deserve to be finished after well over a years worth of idling!

Handmade Christmas Wreath

Jolene and I spent a couple of hours last night collaborating on this Christmas Wreath for the front door last night, we’re fairly pleased with the end result even if I did get pricked so many times by the pine needles that my hands broke out in a mild allergic reaction that made it look like had small pox or some such … oh, what fun!

We actually collected the pine cones for these a couple of months ago and they have been sat in a bag waiting for us to do something with them since then, they were actually intended for the local playgroup but there were far too many and so we resolved to use them ourselves.

The cones themselves were initially sprayed silver, before a quick dash with the gold spray.  The berries are beads cut from a beaded Christmas tree decoration and the pine branches and Sitka Spruce from the garden (I was out cutting these in sub-zero temps last night.

We mounted the whole lot on willow branch (also from the garden) that we bent into a circle and twisted around itself, we used wire to secure the first layer of pine branches before using thread to secure the last couple of layers.  The pine cones were then threaded on, as were the ‘berries’.

I think if we do this again I’m going to find myself a pair of light gardening gloves!

Make Your Own Scandinavian Style Hanging Bird Ornament

You’ll need:

printer
paper
sharp needle
sharp scissors
6″ x 4″ piece of felt
36″ of 6 stranded embroidery thread
stuffing

Stitches used:

Blanket
Lazy Daisy

Instructions:

1. Click on the pattern below and print and cut it out.  It’s sized to A4 so you’ll need to make sure your page size is set to 210mm x 297mm so that the picture doesn’t distort.
2. Pin the template to your felt and cut two bird shapes.  You may find it easier to do this one shape at a time.
3. Separate two strands of thread by holding one end of the strand and gently pulling it from the group.
4. Using lazy daisy stitch, Sew three small flowers on each bird shape around about the belly of the bird.  Pay close attention to make sure you stitch on the right side of the bird shapes.
5. Separate another two strands of thread.  Using blanket stitch sew the two bird shapes together starting at the mid back and leaving about an inch of a gap for stuffing.
6. Stuff the bird quite tightly and sew the gap closed (with blanket stitch).  You might find at this stage a pencil or chopstick is useful for getting the stuffing into the corners but be careful you don’t poke it all the way through!  Secure your thread with a few small stitches.
7. Thread the last two strands through your needle and double them up to give you four strands.  Starting on the back of the bird, roughly where you started the blanket stitch, sew a few small stitches to secure your thread and then create a loop.  Sew some more small stitches to secure the loop.
8. If you wish you can sew a few loops onto the tail end of the bird to resemble feathers.
9. Hang from your tree/door handle/peg and marvel at the cuteness.

 Pattern:

The copyright of this work belongs to MadeStuff.  You may use this pattern to create as many ornaments as you wish for your own personal use and to give as gifts.   You may not use this pattern in any shape or form for commercial gain.

If you can’t be bothered going out to buy the materials you’ll need to make this lovely bird ornament, I have some kits for sale in the shop.  The kits contain the pattern, including instructions for the stitches, thread, felt and stuffing…enough for one ornament.

Mushroom bowls in red ~ the final set

This is the final set of mushroom inspired paper pottery bowls, the other sets can be seen here and here.

All three sets were made using the same set of moulds, although despite this I think they are all quite different in terms of shape, of course the variation in colour also helps to accentuate the differences.  Personally my favourite set is the brown/tan version, although I really like the this final set too for which I used a different varnish that has a subtle lilac hue to it which works really well with the reddy colour.

I’ll be making some more sets of bowls in due course, although I think I’ll aim for something quite different from these sets, maybe something a little larger, although equally as organic in feel … but more of that later. 

Coming in the more immediate future we have a sample or two from Jolene’s newly created ‘make-it-yourself’ bird hanger set which will be available at the forthcoming fairs we’re attending and we also have some more of her Sock Creatures.

Sock Creatures

These fun chaps were supposed to be sock monsters but they just aren’t at all scary.  In fact, they are so cute it hurts me to look at them so I think they must be banished to the sock drawer from wence they came!  (They didn’t really, they are brand new non-smelly socks).

This is something of a brand new obsession for me and I can’t seem to stop making them, which is unfortunate because I should really be making up a stock of birds for the upcoming craft fairs.  There are so many possibilities and since making these two at the start of the week, I’ve made a further two that are entirely different despite being fashioned from the other sock in each of the pairs.  It’s so much fun seeing your creation come to life, it’s a bit addictive.

This happy chap is known to his other sock friends as Ben the Bovine.  His peculiarly dimpled lips make him look somewhat like a cow and he is teased daily for this unfortunate feature.  In reality he is a sheep (or at least that’s what our three year old thinks) and he needs a loving home where he can be supported in the pursuit of baa-ing.

Sergeant Slim here at your service…stiff upper lip and no messing around.  See the thin yet ever so carefully crafted moustache?  He spends hours every morning grooming his facial hair.  Those who know him better, see a twinkle in his eye though and we all know that when no-one’s looking he’s as batty as the rest of the sock creatures.

These and the other sock creatures I create will be on sale at the craft fairs we’re attending this winter…details soon.

Paper pottery – a little red bowl

It’s been quite some time since I did any paper pottery and it was something i was pleased to get back to a two or three weeks ago when I decided I needed a rest from the ‘plant pokes’ I’d been working on.  The piece shown here is the first of nine pieces I’ve been working on, this one is the most individual of the set and I’ll presenting a couple of simple ’spring bowls’ in a few days time as well and two sets of three ‘mushroom bowls’ … those however are for later.

I’m relatively pleased with the way this has turned out, especially since it is the first I’ve done in some time, the simple colour scheme is probably borne of an abstract ‘ladybird bowl’ that sits in our window sill and was one of the first pieces I made a few years ago.  I suspect though that a more immediate influence has been the scenes of autumn that have been surrounding us for the last month or so, lots of reds, oranges, yellows and browns this year.  Very nice.

… and a couple of fun photo’s …

… obviously when i say, ‘fun’, I mean it in the, ‘I need to get out more’ sense!

In terms of uses for such a bowl, well it is largely decorative, although we use bowls like this for keeping nick-nacks and keys in and so on

pocket pillows – boys and bears

It seems that pocket pillows are becoming a favourite of mine.  So called because they are pocket sized rather than them having a pocket, although occasionally they have a pocket too.  They’re just the right size for little hands and are perfect even for pin cushions for those with grown up sized hands.

The two I’ve been working on this weekend are a boy in green and blue (I can’t remember where I got this pattern from) and the love bear from Andrea Zuill.

These are so easy to make.  All you have to do is embroider your design of choice onto your fabric of choice – my favourite is brushed cotton for softness.  Put your embroidery and backing fabric wrong sides together and draw a line round the embroidery (about 1/2″ from the sewing).  Sew round the line (I use back-stitch) leaving an opening for turning and stuffing.  Turn and stuff quite tightly, and sew up the opening with whip stitch.  I use invisible thread for this but that’s my personal choice.

For the red bear (shown below) I upcycled a dress that had a rather fetching pocket for whatever trinkets little girls like to carry around.

These are so simple to make and a really nice way to display embroidery – go on have a go, you know you want to.

Commissions – mobile phone cosy

As promised here are the two mobile phone cosies I made for a commission.

I’m not sure which was more challenging – embroidery on black fabric or getting a semi-decent photograph of it.

Hopefully, you can just about see the matryoshka doll embroidery on this one.  The fabric is red wool.

I just couldn’t get a good enough individual picture of the dragon on the black fabric.  Any photography tips would really be appreciated.

These phone cosies are not available for sale but I will be making a range of iPhone and Blackberry cases for the Christmas Craft Fairs we are attending…more on that later.