Steampunk Steve is finished!

Here he is! The finished article. As I said before, I made him for the Plush Team Steampunk Challenge so at some point in a couple of weeks time you will have the chance to vote for him in the competition! I'll let you know when that time comes. In the meantime I hope you like him - and he is available to buy in the Plush Team Etsy store.

Exercises that make drawing fun...

I recently bought a book called Drawing Lab for Mixed Media Artists (52 exercises to make drawing fun) by Carla Sonheim. It's full of great ideas to help you get over the fear of a blank sheet of paper and to help you put pen to paper and start drawing. This is my interpretation of one of the exercises in the book. I'm going to try it out with the kids at Art Club tonight!

Amigurumi goes Steampunk

This is what I'm working on at the moment. It's for the Plush Team Steampunk Challenge! It's a bit different from my usual style but I'm having fun. I'm looking forward to seeing what all the other team members come up with.

My first attempts at Needle Felting

Last Friday, while I was still in the UK, I went to the Stitch and Craft Show in London. I have been thinking about learning needle felting for a while so I took the opportunity to buy some wool roving and a needle felting tool at the show. Yesterday, after watching this youtube video I had a go - here are the results!

Plush Olympics

The Plush mascots for the 2012 London Olympics as seen in the Olympics Store in London St Pancras Station.

The one with the orange accents is called Wenlock and is the official mascot for the Olympic games. The one with blue accents is called Mandeville and is the official mascot for the Paralympic games. For the story behind them read this Wikipedia article.

Nora in Florida

Nora the knitting bunny has arrived in Florida at the eve-n-odd gallery ready for the Stuffed Bunny show in April.

The Bearded Man is finished!

If you read my blog regularly you will know that I was struggling to make a beard last week. Well I did it! and I'm qutie pleased with the result. This was a custom order. The customer sent me photos of her friends and asked me to make amigurumi caricatures of them. If you would like a caricature made of someone you love - or even of you then please contact me at my Etsy Shop.

Kali the Fashionista

I made Kali for the eve-n-odd gallery in St Petersburg Florida. If you like her make sure you like the eve-n-odd facebook page too :)

The Plush Team in CandyLand and in Starbucks!

Milwaukee photographer Doug Downing loved the CandyLand show so much it inspired him to make a photo exhibition. His photos of the show are up at the East Pointe Starbucks (544 E. Ogden Ave.) Milwaukee and they will be up for the duration of the show. The photos look fab - and one of them is of my Flossie - can you see it? 2nd from the left :)

(photo taken from the Hot*Pop Blog)

Don't forget Candyland...

The Plush Team in Candyland exhibition is open for another 21 days! So if you're in the Milwaukee area don't forget to check it out. It is at the Hot*Pop gallery N. Broadway. Yesterday the exhibition was featured as part of an article about art and creative endeavours in Milwaukee on the JSOnline blog - and the picture they showed has my dolls in it! (they're hanging on the wall on the far right of the photo)

The Bearded Man (work in progress)

This is for a custom order - a caricature of someone. I've been sent some photos and now I'm trying to make the man! I've only ever made bearded amigurumis twice before and those were with the gotee kind of beard that's only on the chin - but this guy has a round the mouth and under the nose type gotee. (hope you like my techincal explaninations!) This is now the fourth beard I've made, the first was too long and he looked like Santa Claus, the second was too wide and the third just looked wrong. I think this one's a winner although perhaps it just needs a little more trimming...