White Raven - 2021

I am so in love with this doll… This is my second doll from designs by Carmen Alana Tibbets of Agosia Arts. The first one is from March 18 2020. I did two rabbits, named Licorice Allsorts and Oliver. If you put one of those name in the search bar on the right, you can zoom right over to see them.

The design I’m calling White Raven. Alana’s version is in grey tones. Click here for her site on Etsy. This is my version, a homage to an area up island from here where there are actual White Raven’s. Raven’s are beautiful and smart already, but now the added feature of being a rare version of them.

I had to give her a crown, of course. She is comprised of leather, upholstery fabric, felt and I quilted a piece of silk with batting to make her slippers and gloves. The front of her jacket is beaded on a piece of lace cutaway from the design, here and there are sprinkles of embellishments. She is jointed like her other designs.

Nerissa (Sea Nymph)

Long time between posts…. wow… Last month I made this mermaid. She is from an Arley Berryhill pattern by the name of Minerva. I made her larger, about 6” or so. She measures 24” tall.

 

For her body I made a muslin base for the bottom, then covered that with upholstery fabric .She also has upholstery fabric for the bodice and randomly on her arms.

I think the colours are quite earthy. I used purple and green organza for her tail and fins as well to resemble sea weed. There are spots where I have attached mussel shell beads to resemble scales. It looks great (at least I think so ;o)  and,  I added a minimum of seed beads.

The upper body is made from a flesh toned batik fabric. To finish, I have this textured fiber that looks like a fish net. It is made of string and somehow coated in a pulpy paper mix. I don’t know the process but it certainly worked for this project.

Ms. Downey

Presenting Ms. Downey. she is my own original design. She is my version of the Downey woodpecker native to this area. Usually the males of the species are the beautiful ones with all their bold colours. I decided it was time for the lady of the species to take that lead, at least in this case.

The females lack those wonderful bursts of red against the black and white. So with this in mind she is all kinds of red bursts of colour.

The fabric is a hounds tooth in a small print, perfect for my projects. There are red feathers tucked into the tail and her hat.

Her hat, oh my her hat. She is ready for the Easter parade of hats.

Her under belly is Minky, her beak and feet are clay and round her upper legs, I’ve trimmed with red felt and gold beads.

Licorice Allsorts

And here is Oliver’s special lady, Licorice Allsort's. She is also made with upholstery fabric. for the body overall. Her ears and boots are leather.

Her shorts and vest are made of silk, the vest being lined with satin. To complete the look, I’ve trimmed her cuffs and shorts with a polka dot ruffled organza trim. 

Along the front of the vest, I added a row of beads on either side, then threaded silk ribbon through the beads and tied with a bow.

The front side of her ears is a faux leather and a co-ordinated pair of roses as the finishing touch. Like Oliver she is jointed to allow for posing.

Licorice’s boots are tied on the side with silk ribbon. The last picture is Oliver and Licorice together. Aren’t they cute. ;o) Enjoy…

Oliver

I’m working in another medium for a change of pace. That’s not to say I won’t go back and forth between clay and the usual fabrics I use, but this is a nice diversion for now.

This rabbit is made from upholstery fabrics and a few simple embellishments. While I made a bit of a sewing boo boo making the vest, it turned into a happy boo boo. This is Oliver and I’ll show you what I did wrong and how I fixed it. Oliver and Licorice ( who you will see in the next post) both have jointed limbs so they can be posed however you like.

Here you can see I’ve used one pattern of upholstery fabric for the arms, body, upper legs and head. The ears and lower legs are another and the vest is a lighter, mostly a pillow weight fabric.  Because I don’t like seams like the neck to show, I made a collar and fastened it at the front with a black patterned button.

The mistake I made was to sew the vest with too large a seam, which made the armholes too big. First I made some caps to fit over the shoulders, but that wasn’t enough.  

Using a complimentary silk fabric, I made ruffles to fill in the hollows of the armholes. I used the same vest fabric and made cuffs around the wrists to cover the seams where the hands are attached. The hands were made with a stretch fabric.

The final touch for Oliver were his boots  A few months ago I was given a bag of leather pieces taken from a jacket she had cut up. It’s a lovely soft leather making it so easy to work with for doll shoes.

Oliver’s boots are made from a few pieces pieced together, and completed with metal eyelets and waxed thread. Everyone that has seen his boots, love them. They really look like a real boots and have a bit of an aged look. It’s great when you work hard to make something special like boots and people recognize that.

Yes, I did thread it through those little eyelets and tied it with a nice bow. ;o)  Stay tuned for another post to see Licorice Allsorts.