Surpise!

This past 4 weeks have been so busy, getting ready for Christmas, doing a doll course to make a present for my daughter's birthday and making sure I had all my presents together for my trips north and south.

and here she is, my interpretation of Cindee Moyer's The Fairy Catcher. Stephanie was most annoyed when I chose the Raven for the course she bought me for my birthday in September, little knowing I had booked both courses to make a surprise for her. She now has the doll and seems very pleased with it. It is not an easy doll to make and I had trouble with the face and extended arm. When I pushed a dowel rod through the arm to go into the body the sleeve split so I had to make the whole dress and arms again as I had used up all that particular fabric. Also the face ended up with two black eyes because I didn't spray it with hair spray to stop the ink leaking into the face fabric. However, it came together eventually and I got it into the post in time.

Bert was with me that week, but he was so anaemic and fragile he had to stay an extra 3 days before attempting the journey home (as if I minded!) and he spent another week recovering from the journey back too. However, he seems to be OK now and is more active. He gets very frustrated with himself when he feels so down and weak - just like all men - and it is hard to keep his spirits up.

I spent 10 days overall going to Plymouth to deliver Gareth and Ed's presents and then back 1 day then up to Cheshire to deliver Mother's presents. It has taken 2 days to recover myself and get going again at home. Now I have (hopefully) time to play with all the paints and papers that have been waiting for me to get to them and dive into the ideas I have been storing up in my brain. I wonder if other crafters find the same problem, time to concentrate just on the goodies piled on their worksurface?

Dormant

Unfortunately I learned this week that my Stitched Textile Group is going dormant for a while and as I had already done my piece for this month - MOTHS AND THE MOON - I thought it best to lodge it here so I don't lose it. This is the Lunar Moth and the background is made from painted ludrador, cut and shaped with a soldering iron to look like tree bark. The lutrador is painted with quink ink and lumier textile paints. The moth is made from pale green organza with trapped angelina between the layers. I made the body from a piece of cocoon stripping, stuffed and attached to the 5" wings (actual moth size).

This week I had a backlog of 6 waistcoats so I had to really go for it and achieved 5 of them, and I had two more orders yesterday so that will keep me busy next week.

Bert has finished his radium treatment but it has left him very tired and anaemic, so our plans for him to come down today had to be postponed until next week. He has to wait 6 weeks to clear the radium from his system then have a scan and see if the surgeon can operate on the tumours.

Doodling

This zentangling is quite addictive, here is my take on TREE for Inspire Me Thursday. I had to draw back and find out when enough is enough because I could have added and added and then it would have looked a mess. I also wanted to put colour on it, but I'm too new at this to attempt it...maybe next time.

Anyway, it is based on tree striations (is that how it is spelled?).

What a busy weekend

Now you can see what I've been up to this weekend whilst NOT making waistcoats! This pattern arrived last Thursday and I just had to make her, it's Coleen Babcock's latest pattern called 'Give us a kiss' and her mouth is all puckered up ready. I made it for a friend in the USA so I'm hoping she doesn't catch my blog before it arrives at her place. However I have been good today and made up a waistcoat and cut another before finishing the doll, so I'm on track, so to speak.

I would like to thank everyone for their really kind comments on my challenges, these are so welcome and appreciated.

Another challenge

Here is my latest challenge piece - a zentangle! The challenge word was FASHION and whilst doing a search I came across the title in the Times newspaper and I just had to use it! Then my copy of Cloth Paper Scissors came through the door with an article on Zentangles and my vision came together. So instead of cutting out waistcoats which I should have done, I watched TV and zentangled instead. I could get used to this type of art because there is no limit and no guidelines as such. I just watched a utube video for 7 minutes and away I went. I had no idea this was out there and that so many people were doing it. There is even challenges set up and some really beautiful artwork done. Next time I'll try it with a pen instead of a pencil (I thought I'd need to use a rubber but amazingly that was not needed).

Inspire Me Thursday challenge

I really started this challenge too late i.e. Wednesday afternoon (how late can you get???) so it's not quite what I wished to portray, but hey ho, must go with the muse.

As the inspiration was SPAIN, which to me means Salvador Dali, I based this picture loosely (how loose can you get) on his painting of 'Persistence of Memory' or the Melting Clocks. My picture has a runner racing the clock trying to catch a memory that has eluded him and hopefully a spanish looking background. I feel very much in tune with this runner as I'm always trying to remember what I should be doing next.

Woe, woe, thrice woe...

Woe is me, I've had so many orders since I last posted that there has been no time at all to do any challenges. However, today I have time and no excuse, so I'm getting down to it. I went through a really low time recently which did not help but that seems to have passed, plus a couple of visits from my sons were greatly appreciated.

I did complete this month's Stitched Textile challenge - Moths and the Moon - but I'm not showing it until end of the month. We also decided to pick up on the Cloth Paper Scissors challenge for an Earth Mother Art Doll, so I'm thinking about that too. My scrap club was cancelled yet again, so nothing there, in fact a rather boring month all told.

Watch this space...