Some doodling with pencils and fairy seat

I started this with inktense pencils and since I have no experience with them I decided to do several of them. I like the third one the best. The colours are a bit more transparent and light in that . The last one I did with Water colour pencils and water colour just to see if I could do it differently. Perhaps the last one would make a good greeting card :-)

This is a seat I made for my fairy named Harmony. Believe it or not it is made out of butternut gourd. Long time back I wanted to make a gourd doll but I could not do so because we do not get the hard skinned  gourds here in the UK and we cannot import anything like that due to restrictions. However I was determined to make one and not knowing that the hard skin gourds were the ideal gourds I thought I could dry any  gourd so off I marched to the market to purchase the beautifully shaped butternut. Brought one and put it up for drying. After a few week or so I checked and eek it had all gone soggy and aweful looking and splash it dropped from my butter fingers :-). However I persevered and let it dry. It did not dry the way I had anticipated instead it had gone all wrinkly and the outer skin was not as hard as I thought it would become. However I rather liked the shape of it even though I could not use it to make a doll. Thought it might come in use sometime in the future. So here at last has come the future. I was looking for an ideal seat for Harmony and decided to use the dried squash as a seat. The height was ideal and so was the shape. All it needed was some roots to surround it and some paint and wallah you have a fairy woodland seat.

As for the doll I ended up making one out of fabric in the shape of a butternut squash. I even gave out a free pattern in my old blog, here is the link if you want to see it and use the pattern. I don't know what size it will print out but you are welcome to enlarge it if you want.

http://moonbeamsartdolls.blogspot.co.uk/2006_03_01_archive.html

Lost Mr. G

I searched and searched for my friend Mr G and his mate but they have not made an appearance. Looks like Mr Ssssnake got them or they got scared and ran away. A few weeks ago we were told a snake was spotted in our compound. Thank goodness I was not here or else I would have freaked :-) 

I did not think we would get snakes in such a built up area but I was wrong! It may not have been a poisonous snake but it was a snake and that is enough to give me nightmares :-)

I planted some morning glories last time when I was here and they are happily blooming now. Love the vivid purple colour. Sad though it does not bloom right through the day.

Doll done

So here she is at last! I was quite pleased with her wings how they turned out. Also they were so easy to make. As you know from my previous post that I dyed the stocking. I also dyed some vintage silk buttons which I had found in Paris during one of my visits. I used them on her arms. I could have used them on her cap too but I guess my brain stopped working and I ended up doing the little fruits on her cap the hard way:-). Now she needs a name. I was thinking of Blue Moon but it doesn't seem very suitable. Anybody got any suggestions?

I made the wings by first laying down Soluweb and then on top of it a thin layer of Angelina fusible fibre and then on top of that my silk fibres and then another thin layer of angelina fusible fibres and then on top a layer of Soluweb. I then machine stitched it randomly making sure the whole fabric was covered. Those who are into free motion embroidery know this technique very well in fact all textile artists know this and create wonderful art with it. You can do free motion stitches on it and create designs. I am not good at it so I just straight stitched it. Once I had stitched it several times I washed away the Soluweb.

Again for those who don't know what Soluweb is it is exactly what the name suggests. A web like material used to stabilise fine fabric while embroidering . Once you finish embroidering you can wash away the Soluweb in cold water.

I then shaped the wings with wire, applied glue on one side of the wire and lay it on the fabric. Once the glue was dry I cut around the wire shape leaving a little bit of fabric around the wire shape as you would do while cutting around a pattern leaving some seam allowance. I then put glue on the wire which was visible and folded the fabric over it making sure it stuck onto the wire. I did make a few cuts all around the fabric so that folding over was easy and you could put glue in stages on the wire. Also it did not get messy. That's it it was very easy which is what I like :-)