Nice Matters, it really does!

Thanks to Shashi, Sewing with Moonbeams and Connie, Cloth Matters for this award.



I should nominate five more recipients, but I really can't, there are just too many. So I want to say thank you to all you bloggers out there for reading my blog and for inspiring me by publishing yours.

My first mermaid...........

I live near the sea, so I really thought I ought!


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She's made from hand coloured polyester suede fabric with a knitted wig and her 'clothes' and fin are made from silk run through the embellisher. She has a needle-sculpted flat face. Her 'clothes' are decorated with resin shell beads and she wears a 'coral' bracelet and a necklace of 'coral' beads. She's quite poseable, but contains no wire. In the first photo she is sitting with her 'knees' bent.

Here, her tail is stretched out behind her:


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and here it is stretched out in front:


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I didn't want to wire that tail because my little grandaughter will want to play with this one, but I had the devil's own job getting that tail the way I wanted it. I made three or four before I got it right, but it was worth it, because now I have another pattern and it's easy when you know how!

Trying out a new pattern.

I wanted to make some older child dolls, so I have adapted the pattern I made for the 'twins'.

Here's a quick pic.


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A boy and a girl. I tried two different hands, and two different legs.


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I like both hand patterns, these legs and these feet.


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The girl's legs are a bit too thin, but that's OK because the fabric has a slight oneway stretch, so instead of drawing a new pattern, I can just turn it around on the fabric. And I will use the 'separate toe' template I have made for the feet.

I changed the faces, but I wanted them to still have a similar look to the 'twins'. I've spent a lot of time at the beach over the last week because The Boss is on holiday and I'm thinking of dressing the boy in 'surfer' gear. The girl will have to have leggings, to make her legs look a bit less skinny.

I would like to try making these with stiffer legs so that they can stand, but I don't want to use wire, because they are for children to play with and if I use the teddy bear joints, will they both stand and sit...............

Hmmmm......