Circus bears

yesterday was a good day for finishing off a few bears. I'm happy with the way they turned out. But now that I've made a few bears some with my own pattern and some using other peoples patterns I'm realizing more and more how much I love making them and have started to work seriously on making more of my own patterns...so stay tuned...oh and I have some dogs playing around in my head..and maybe a Tassie devil to!!
I made these bears out of a recycled coat made from camel hair..kindly donated to me by a friend. The bears have been individually coffee stained..I don't like staining the fabric before I use it I much prefer to brush it into the doll/bear once they have been all assembled.

 Oh and Ned...just look at him...poor little guy just loves being rugged up in my stripy shawl...this cat just loves anything knitted..even a ball of wall...and no he doesn't play with it he pats it down and purrs like crazy as he does it! Ned has to wait another week before his stitches come out...till then he's my little Frankenstein cat!

Better get back to the studio....cheerio!!

hand and machine stitched brooches

Hi, phew what a day...just listed a few of these hot off the sewing machine brooches in my etsy shop..go have a look lots more detailed photo's there.

Thank you to my partners gorgeous niece for doing a spot of modeling for me this morning

And......

Meet Little Bones...the final doll in ADO's Traveling Doll Project...Little Bones was made by Kailee of SophiaLaLa..LB then traveled to Susie Mcmahon in North West Tasmania..Susie painted her face, hands and feet plus gave her an awesome hair do! LB then traveled to me where I made her snazzy outfit!...LB is now heading back to Kailee's place in Western Australia...what a journey...and remember you can read more about the Traveling Doll Project here!

Oh and I've been making bears and dolls too...

Not finished yet some still need their coffee! Made from a friend old camel hair coat!
The pattern is by Sweet Meadow Farm I adjusted the legs and arms to curve a bit more and made the legs button jointed...I'm working at my own bear patterns too!

 Plasticine models waiting for their paper mache layer...which I just might do right now...cheerio !

Bear with no name!

Hi, here is my 6th bear. The last in this style for a while. I've been reading so much about making bears, bear artists, vintage bears and joining bear makers groups . There is so much I didn't know before making these 6 bears, although I think I made them very well there are some tricks of the trade which I will add to my new bears. I'm also going to include with each bears a date of "birth", edition number and a personalized signed signature. Something I wish I had dome for my other critters although this could still be a possibility with my new work and even for my old work as I still have all that information in my record books. May just have to advertise on my Etsy page if anyone would like a copy to get in touch with me and I could send one out to them. See how I go.

Alex Bear

Just listed another bear on Etsy, he is my favorite so far!

Tony is finally out and about!!

My first of many more bears is for sale today in my ETSY Shop
Tony, named after my own very first panda bear my mum gave me when I was 5, (yes I still have him). tony is my first of a series of 6 bears that I'm currently working on.
All are made from calico, distressed using coffee and wax,
Sailors collars are a real favourite of mine, I love making them and I think they look pretty cool.
The sailor hat I designed my self. After trying to find a free pattern on the net I decided to see if I could wing it. I'm pretty happy with the end result. the hat is anchored down by a few stitches to Tony's head.
I was hoping to write a little story for him but drew a complete blank!:(
Go take a look