suspenders and succulents

Lately, I've been thinking of different ways to sew some of my plush dolls.  I love the basic shape and parts of my typically boy plush design, but wanted a little something extra to set him apart.  Hats?  Glasses? Super hero cape? Spacesuit?  Pretzel in hand? 

I recently finished one of the ideas I had in mind.  The newly worn item.......suspenders!

I especially am loving the buckles! 

Here's Hendrik:

And here's Hansel:

Both are available in my shop.  Look for more fellows with suspenders coming soon!  (As well as some other new accessories/parts for the dolls.)

Also, just listed a mere 30 minutes ago:

A fabric soft sculpture succulent plant!  Comes in the vintage tea cup shown, but can be moved in another similar sized vessel/cup if you prefer.  I've been working on these for a while and am so happy with the results.  Look for more fabric sculpture plants soon!

hello alligator!

I've been playing around with the idea for an alligator plush in my head ever since Kinsey and I went to South Carolina a few months ago.  Kinsey really wanted to see a "real life" alligator in the wild and we were almost finished with our trip and had yet to see one.  We even headed to one of the state parks that I had seen some at during a prior visit or two, but none were to be found.

We were visiting my grandparents and went out to dinner at the Chestnut Hill Restaurant that was right on a small lake and known to be a place to see gators.  (If you go here, get the homemade chips!  Mmmm!)  We had a window table and saw all kinds of turtles swimming right by us.  This was nice enough, but Kinsey wanted to see a gator.   The staff periodically throws bread out in the water to attract the alligators and during our visit one was hiding out right below the restaurant deck's not wanting to come out.  My grandfather being the wonderful and helpful host of the "bed and breakfast" we were staying at and wanting to make his guests happy, made sure that Kinsey would get his wish.  Sure enough, the alligator appeared right in front of where we were eating and hung out for a while.  Mission accomplished!  Kinsey now believes that there are alligators in South Carolina. 

The great thing about this gator (and completely unintentional when I designed it) is that it's legs can support the body so it stands up on its own.   It's wonderful to have sitting around and fun for playing!  I have a few other alligators I made with different fabrics, but this is probably my favorite.  I love the bright green color and how it looks against the yellow back spikes.  These are now available in my shop and will be available at the Summerfair show this Saturday.  

progress and working...

I've been pretty busy working on a variety of different projects as well as restocking more of my plush designs for online and craft shows coming up.  Our soonest craft show will be SummerFair in Carlisle, PA.  We've never been to this show before, but have heard from other people it's worth it.  It will be the largest space we've ever had...20'x20'!  Kinsey and I will be sharing a space, so we'll each have plenty of room for our things.  If you're local to Carlisle, please come out and say hello!  The show is Saturday, July 7th!

Below are some partially finished boy heads (sounds rather disturbing, don't you think?).  After I embroider the facial features, sew everything up, and right before I turn them right side out, I always like to stop and take a look.  I really like how the embroidery looks from the backside with the faces.  You can clearly see the facial details, but it's kind of in a skewed way.  It reminds me a lot of vintage embroidered dolls and how the stitches have begun to fade and warp slightly.  

The next picture (sorry it's a little fuzzy) is of a massive pile of half finished pieces and well, body parts of dolls and animals.  (See the random arms?)  I have a lot of pieces like this around my work space.  I'm starting to try to get it a little more under control and have cleared this pile down significantly.  

This last picture I wanted to share, does NOT include random arms or heads removed from their body.   This is Thomas the Sailor.  He's the newest plush doll in my shop.  I finished him today and not to play favorites, but I like him a lot!   Instead of my usual felt buttons I sew on the shirts, I opted for a hand embroidered anchor emblem.  The colors really pop beautifully!  I actually have done this anchor emblem before on a handful of plushes, but have only sold those at craft shows or at brick and mortar shops.  

What kinds of projects have you been up to lately?

published in stuffed magazine summer 2012!

Back in this post in February, I talked about sending my box of plush toys to Stuffed Magazine to be considered for an issue.  Well, the Summer 2012 issue is finally out!    

Near the beginning of the magazine (pages 14 and 15 to be exact) are Olive and Ethan.  These two were my first ever "good" attempts at making plush people.  I literally made these two days before I sent off my package.  I wanted to try out a doll, but was having a hard time getting it perfect and finding a good fabric for the faces.  I hand embroidered the facial features and need a fabric that can handle being poked with a needle and doesn't show through.  I actually have since making these two, changed to a different face fabric.  Very similar in color, but the new fabric is much softer and easier to work with.  (FYI: All the plush people in my shop are made with the newer fabric.)

When your work is chosen for publication in Stuffed, you are responsible for writing everything in your article.  This was really fun and gave me a chance to really personalize Olive and Ethan.  My article about them was centered around the coast of Maine (surprise, surprise) and even mentioned one of Kinsey's favorite treats we had in Maine: honey brioche doughnuts! (We get them at the best bakery in the entire world, Morning Glory Bakery in Bar Harbor. )  

A little further back in the magazine, are my plush elephants.  This story was about Eben and Ella (husband and wife, of course) and included all kinds of things I like: a house in the woods, gardening, drinking tea, reading, making furniture, and drinking lemonade with your husband.

I love how they posed Eben and Ella in this shot! 

Here's Ella (very similiar to the one featured in Stuffed- same name but slightly different clothes) checking out her relatives in the magazine.

I'm thrilled to be included (twice!) in this issue and am looking forward to submitting again!  If you have any interest in soft toys or plush sculpture, this is a wonderful magazine to check out!  

(I'll be posting the small stories for each I wrote in the next few days.)

if you're in Virginia...

Chester, Va to be exact- stop by Handmade Happiness Boutique!  It's a brand new store filled with all kinds of handmade jewelry, art, plush, paper goods, and more.

And it's the new (temporary until they meet a good family!) home of some of my plush elephants, boys, and rocket ships!

I unfortunately have not yet been able to go myself to check out the goodies.  They just opened a few weeks ago.  This store is run by the amazing jewelry designer MaryEllen from Twist Style. 

(Photos by TwistStyle)

a wardrobe change for the owls...

Aside from making up a few for my last craft show, I really haven't been sewing many owls lately.  And the owls I had been sewing were really out of the same 4 or 5 fabrics.  I decided to give the owls a little shopping spree for new summer clothes.  

I'm big into bright colors and bold patterns when it comes to making soft toys.  So I knew I wanted the owls to pop a little more than they have in the past.  The results:

Exactly what I was going for.  Eye catching, fun, and attractive.  The back of all the owls feature a wonderfully soft and cozy brown fleece.  I love these owls so much and am thinking of keeping a few for myself.....seriously, pick one up and feel the soft fleece on the back and you're see why.  

I love this fabric so much!  Kinsey got it for me for Christmas this past year and I have been saving it.  For what, I'm not sure.  But I figured that I shouldn't let it just sit around forever.  It's by Julia Rothman and is 100%  organic cotton.

Another fabric favorite!  Not sure of the specifics of this fabric, but I purchased it at Jo-Ann.  The yellow flowers on the gray background are so beautiful!

Look for these owl guys (and owl girls!) in the shop over the next few days.  Some are there now!

that's a lot of boys....and elephants

I spent the better part of last week working on filling some orders for a few new stores.  I sold almost all of the boys, elephants, and rockets at my last craft show, so I needed to make more.  A lot more.
These pictures are just a small fraction of what all I made (and don't even show many elephants or the new rocket ships!), but it gets the idea across.
Luckily, I made some extras for my shop which I started to list new things in yesterday and today.  

Yesterday,  Kinsey and I dropped off some of my plushes at a shop in Reading, PA called Hello Bluebird.  I had known about the store for some time, but never was in it before.  I would highly recommend stopping in if you're ever in the area.  They have some really beautiful and fun things for sale.  I think we could have bought half the shop if we were able to afford it!  Also, some of my plushes will be for sale at the Hello Bluebird table at this weekend's Art Star Craft Bazaar.  This is a wonderful show and I hope to someday be a vendor here.  We're planning on stopping by one of the days and are looking forward to all the awesome things we'll see!

my soft toys are going to be published!

Remember not too long ago when I talked about sending my box of soft toys off to Stuffed magazine?

I just found out today that my elephants and twin boys will be published in the upcoming issue!  The elephants will featured in one article and the boys in a second article!  I'm so excited about seeing them in print!  It will be a little while though...the next issue won't be out until July 1st.

Can't wait!

In the meantime, I've been working on getting my craft room in order and finally had time to make a few new elephants.  Here's the first one that I just listed in the shop.

off they go to stuffed!

I don't think I've ever mentioned before on the blog about Stuffed Magazine.  If you're not familiar with Stuffed and you're a fan of soft toys, you really should check it out.  

I found it (well, actually Kinsey found it) at my local Jo-Anns in the late summer of 2011.  I was just getting into making more soft toys and it seemed interesting, although I wasn't sure at first.  It was $14.99 which I usually feel is a little high for a magazine and I wasn't a fan of everything featured, but Kinsey persuaded me to get it anyway.   It wasn't a cheaply, thin made magazine, but had some volume to its size.  Once getting the issue home and looking through it, I immediately was very inspired to try all kinds of soft toys.  The photography in the magazine is wonderful and they list websites for the artists included in the magazine.  I spent a lot of time looking at the work of new plush artists I discovered through Stuffed.  

This past week, I did two major things revolving around this magazine.  The first thing was I purchased the last remaining issue I didn't own through Ebay.  So in just about 6 months since discovering it, I own all 7 issues of Stuffed (they publish twice a year).  

The second thing was I submitted some of my own plush toys for possible publication in the next issue! They take open submissions and the deadline for the summer 2012 was just a few days ago.  I have no idea if my plush toys will get chosen to be in the magazine, but I'm so excited to see what happens!  It will be while until I know anything, but I'm happy I gave it a shot.  This was my box of plush I sent:

As you can see, I sent 2 elephants, 1 rocket ship, and 2 boys.  The boy plush are my newest design and I'm really excited about how they turned out.  The only bad part was that these were my first two I made and I had to ship them out right after I finished making them!  Here's a closer shot of them:

The good news is, I just listed a new plush boy in my shop!  Meet Ethan here!