Beatrice Bumble

A couple of weeks ago my friend Janet at the local tea shop called to say she had sold a doll for me. But then she said “now I have an empty spot, what can you fill it with”… Alrighty then, let me think about it. She gave me some colour choices and off I went to make that decision. Then it came to me, HAH! I’ll fix her.

She keeps getting me to make those decisions, so I’ll just turn that around. I snagged a pile of patterns and went to see her. I handed them over to her and said “you decide”. She was pretty happy with that until she had to figure out what she wanted… This is what she decided. She has a display of honey themed products, including honey, tea cosies, honey pots etc. and needed something to go with that.

I’m happy to say that Janet will probably bust out in a big cheeky grin when I stop in today. I finished the last of the touches this morning. This is Beatrice a design by Cindee Moyer. I'm pretty stoked myself how she turned out.

I wasn’t sure what I would use for the fuzzy black part of her, then the light came on, you know that light of AHA! I know, that is in all of us. I have some black Minky fabric, perfect for a bumblebee. The yellow is dupioni silk.

The yellow paper roses are so pretty. I got them from Joggles, and I got all the colours that Barb has. They are so sweet, only about 3/4” wide, the leaves are also from Joggles. The black rose is actually a black rose button. I cut the shank off the back to make it fit more flush to the body.

The wings are made with a slim wired cord, doubled and twisted, then painted black. I pushed them into her back and just to finish off that spot, I again used black rose buttons with the shank cut off. It just seemed to finish it off cleanly. This morning I spread glue over the wings and sprinkled them with fine black glass glitter to give them a bit of sparkle like Cindee’s.

Although you can’t see it in the picture below, there is a sparkly black trim and a black slightly fluffy gimp trim around her face and one of my favourite black metal roses from ARTchix on the top of that to finish off. I had to tip her back a bit to see her face as she’s looking down. She has a very gentle look as though she’s pondering all of Mother Natures beauty.

Oh poor Beatrice, I almost forgot her antennae. Just added and now she's really done.

Ebony and Ivory with a splash of red

Have you been waiting to see the Jester finished, well wait no more. The one thing I did have to adapt was the head pattern piece. I tried it twice as it is, and it still wouldn’t work. I kept ending up with the nose pointing skyward and the neck opening would have had to be at the top and that still wouldn’t make the face look right. I’m going to write to the designer and see if it’s something I did wrong. However all is well. I just made a slight adjustment to the pattern and made it work.

This happy couple are meant to hang on the wall. I used mostly black and white materials, expect for a bit of silver around the neck for a ruffle, donated by my friend, thanks Andrea, and one point of each hat is red. I was once to told that if you include some red in artwork, it draws people to it. As far as I’m concerned, dolls qualify as artwork.

The only other colours come from the embellishments, including these cute little metal red roses that I got from ARTchix. They are the perfect little touches to any project be it paper, doll or any other form of creativity. I used them on the back of the Marotte’s head and again on the cuffs of the Jester.

The shoe trims are stacks of buttons with a red cabochon for contrast. Because the Marotte doesn’t have a body, I used the same button stack and red cabochon on his head to tie the two looks together. They each have buttons on the neck and the Jester has one on his tummy. Buttons are a great way to embellish and there are so many ways to use them. Ever tried painting buttons to match your project, a tip from a friend. Thanks Cathy..

The other trims are metallic trims I have in my stash. The black and white polka dot ruffle at their necks, were made with a scarf donated by a friend. Thanks Gwen. ;o))))  Don’t you love friends who don’t make dolls but think of you with all their little treasures and ideas.

And here they are. First the Marotte front and back.

The Jester in all his glory with his pal.

And with thanks to Paul McCartney for his wonderful song writing.

Ebony And Ivory live together in perfect harmony
Side by side on my piano keyboard oh lord why don’t we?
We all know that people are the same where ever you go
There is good and bad in everyone,
We learn to live, we learn to give
Each other what we need to survive together alive.

Black and White Jester

I don’t know what name this Jester will have yet, but I guess he or she will tell me when he or she is done. This will be a wall doll when it’s done and it is a design by Lynne Butcher and her name for the doll, is simply “The Jester”.

I have a number of projects I wanted to do in the black/white theme. You know how you get those things that stay with you and won’t go away until you have dealt with them, well this is mine at this point in time.

I’m quite enjoying making this doll. It will have 10 different fabrics in total. Almost all black and white with just a little twist in a couple of places. Stay tuned for the finale to come in a few days..

Raven

I finished this doll last night. She is a design by Cindee Moyer, actually an online class I signed up for last fall but only just now finally got it made. The original name for her is “The Raven”, but I’ve shortened that to Raven.

She is going to be part of my display at the gallery show in September. The book she’s holding fits in with my Marie Antoinette theme, it’s images I found online of past and present Marie. Present Marie being Kristen Dunst and the movie she did in 2006 of Marie Antoinette. I reduced the images and made a little book from them. My thinking is that’s it’s mean to be a book that everyone attending the Masked Ball receives from Marie.

Although they are hard to see with all the black, there are small metal black roses on either side of the mask, those are from Artchix. I’ve also attached black ribbon roses to the back of her head and the front of her headpiece, at her waist and small rose buttons on her cuffs. Marie Antoinette apparently loved roses.

I hope you like her, she is quite stunning up close and personal…

 

Elk Lake Part 2

Well true to our word, we went back to the lake. We intended to head to the right side, walk a while, have a bit of lunch at a bench somewhere along the way and come back….HAH!!!! NOT !!!!  We walked to an area where we could have our lunch and then got the bright idea to see how far the trail would take us… At the start of our walk, we got a send off with a flock of Canada Geese. I had hoped to get a picture while they were on land, but people came along with a young dog who took great delight in chasing them into the water.

There were lots of families of ducks, some hiding amongst the swamp grasses along the waterline, others seemed to be on training missions with mom and dad. There were other ducks as well that were just enjoying a nice day. One in particular was unusual, at least to me. I don’t recall seeing black and white ducks in this area but as a friend pointed out, there are hybrids everywhere, so perhaps that’s what happened to this one.

While having lunch I walked over to where a loan duck was sitting and gave him some crust from my bread. He must have liked that because he followed me back to our table so who am I to deny him more. He came right up to our table within a foot of hubby, so I’m guessing they are used to being around we human beings.

Off we went to explore the trail. It’s a beautiful spot but just to darn busy for us. We prefer to be able to walk and not have to constantly step aside for joggers, guys with fishing gear, people with dogs on the run and other people on horseback. Not sure what these little fishing things are called, but the lake was speckled with people fishing from them.

And even skunk cabbage is beautiful to see. It may be stinky up close, but when it flowers those bright yellow blooms really make a statement in the darkness of a forest. These weren’t blooming  but they are flourishing with the rain we’ve been having. These are somewhere between 4 – 5 ft tall.

Working around the final leg of the walk we came across this little guy crossing the path. Apparently this is the time they are making busy and you need to watch out for them. Poor guy made me feel ashamed for complaining about my sore tootsies and crappy footwear. Given how long it’s going to take him/her to get where they’re going, I can only admire their determination.  He/she was approx. 10” across the width, and it pulled it’s head in when I went around the front to take a picture. I waited and it bravely poked it’s head out to take a look around.

So, after an unplanned marathon walk of 2 1/2 hours and 10 kms later we returned to the truck. What’s not to like, it was a gorgeous day, not to hot and a bit of a breeze and this kind of scenery.. It’s all good….