It's Fat Tuesday!

Today is Fat Tuesday, Mardi Gras, or as we call it in England - Shrove Tuesday or Pancake Day! Here in Bosnia and Herzegovina they call it Maskara and their tradition is to do 'trick or treating' like we would do for Halloween. I'll wait and see how many of the kids we know knock on our door tonight! We will be observing the British tradition of eating pancakes :)

As the Plush Team we are celebrating this day by doing a Mardi Gras themed plush swap. Mine still hasn't arrived - but I haven't been to the post office yet today so maybe it's waiting for me there... This is the plush that I sent to Jen of FuzFrenzy.

what do you think?

This is the first amigurumi doll I've finished in ages! I've been so busy that I haven't had time to make any. Maybe it's because I'm a bit out of practice, or because it took me so long to finish her, but somehow she didn't turn out quite like I wanted. I haven't decided yet if I will put her in my shop, and if I do I need to think of a name and a story for her and some kind of accessory.... What do you think?

Double Giveaway!

Exciting news: Yesterday I launched my first amigurumi pattern! It is for sale in my Etsy shop and on Ravelry.

More exciting news: To celebrate the launch of my first pattern I am having a giveaway - a double giveaway even!

Prizes:

• First Prize is a copy of my pattern AND the original amigurumi bunny doll featured in the pattern.
• Second Prize is a copy of my pattern.

How to enter:

• Leave a comment here on my blog or on any links to the blog that I post on facebook =1 entry.
• Tweet about the giveaway or share links on facebook = another entry.

Make sure I have a way of contacting you in case you are one of the lucky winners!

The giveaway will close on Thursday 5th May at 21:00 Central European Time and the winners will announced very soon afterwards.

Winners will be chosen using a random number generator.

Ready, steady, go! and may the best person win :)

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)

photos from CandyLand

Thanks to FuzFrenzy for taking these photos :)

Sugar Plum, Flossie and Bronwyn hanging out in CandyLand

and here's my Cherry Lolly Tree in the distiguished company of plush made by Zfla, Plushroom Soup, and PterodactylPants.

Business cards on the table...

Spot my 'Lifesavers' Letter O in the Bonbon banner.

My little Cherry Lolly Tree again and look at that massive Pez elephant made by zfla!

Sugar Plum, Flossie and Bronwyn and a huge ice cream made by Diane Koss of Cutesy but not Cutesy

My Russian Christmas Gift

I have been expecting quite a few parcels for a couple of weeks now and have been wondering where they've all got to. Well today I found out! I went to collect the post from the PO Box for the church and found all our mail had been put in there too! So today has been like Christmas.

One of the parcels I was excitedly waiting for was my Russian Christmas Plush Swap from someone in the plush team. Well here it is! Thanks to Heather from Needlings for my awesome new plushies.


First - an awesome Needlings Christmas card and a cute little business card...


And then - 3 awesome plushies, some pins - and is that some werthers originals I see down there?

And here they all are - the complete contents of my parcel!

Thanks again Needlings :)

And keep checking my blog over the next few days to see what other awesome things I got in the post today!

CandyLand

The Plush Team Show 'CANDYLAND' opens on Friday at the Hot*Pop Gallery in Milwaukee. There will be some amazing plush art on show. If you live in the area make sure you visit and for those of you who don't (like me) let's hope someone takes lots of good photos!

Check out this article in OnMilwaukee.com about the show and see if you can spot the reference to outoftheframe :)

The CandyLand Stories

I'll be off to the post office in the morning to send these 4 pieces off for the CandyLand show which will be at the Hot*Pop Gallery in Milwaukee.

available to pre-order now...

The next issue of Stuffed Magazine comes out on 1st January and is available to pre-order now with free postage within the US until 25th November and reduced rates for international postage. It's an awesome magazine full of amazing photos of amazing creations made by amazing people - many of which I know, AND.... I'm going to be in it this time so buy your copy now! Click here to pre-order :)

Look What We Made!

A couple of weeks ago I posted about the latest Plush Team Challenge - FrankenPlush, and I uploaded a photo of 2 arms and 2 legs that I was posting off to Cat of RaggyRat in the UK.

Well Cat recieved these random limbs about a week ago and has now completed our FrankenPlush. Cat's kids have named her Ingrid Ennerver! I think she's awesome :)

working down my to-do list

I've got a string hanging from my curtain rail with notes clipped to it listing all the amigurumi things I need to make and the deadlines. This helps me keep organised and gives me a sense of satisfaction when I finish something and I can take it off the string! At the moment I'm working on some more Christmas stuff for my Etsy shop and on pieces for the Plush Team CandyLand Exhibition which will be at Hot*Pop Gallery in January .

PlushYou 2010

And we're finally online :)

These are some photos of my dolls at PlushYou 2010 taken by Anne-Claire of Hibou Cards. As you can see they are in good company - Just in front of them are the Moon Buns from Moon's Creations, on the wall are the cats from Yummy Pancake and you can just see on the shelf above some spider babies from Scrumptious Delight.

FrankenPlush

This is my part of the latest Plush Team Challenge. I'll be sending this off to RaggyRat in the UK and then she'll do her part and in a couple of weeks we'll see what kind of monster we have created!

PlushYou 2010 - I'm in!

PlushYou is an annual Plush Art show which takes place in the USA. It is curated by Kristen Rask, owner of Schmancy. This year there will be 2 shows, one in LA and one in Seattle. I applied to the LA show a few months ago and didn't get in but then I applied again to the Seattle show and today I got an email to say I have been accepted! I had to read the email 3 times to check that I wasn't dreaming! I'm so excited to have this opportunity :) The show is in October and I very much doubt that I'll be going in person, but I'm sure some of my friends from the Plush Team will take some photos for me!

Polly Loves Knitting

Polly loves knitting. She always has her latest project in her bag so that in a quiet moment she can get it out and do some knitting. She has to catch the bus to college every morning and she usually knits as she stands at the bus stop. Some people look at her funny, but most of the regulars are used to seeing her standing there knitting - and some of them have even commissioned her to make them winter scarves and gloves! Polly is available in my etsy shop.

the adventures of Lulu

Lulu has moved to be with Zazu in LA. If you want to learn more about her adventures there check out the PlushTeam blog.

Threadknits Competition

After a couple of days of unsuccessfully trying to enter this competition the website got fixed :) so here is my entry. And today it has been featured on the threadknits facebook fanpage he he!

Essi the Eskimo

This is Essi the Eskimo. He is an Ice Lolly Farmer. He was on his way home from harvesting some of his crop when he started to feel a bit hungry so he decided dip into his basket and see just how good this year's orange lollies taste :)

Essi the Eskimo was inspired by a t-shirt from threadless.com and will hopefully be my entry into the threadknits competition if only the website will let me sign in!

preparing for the winter olympics...

Yesterday we went to Sarajevo. There are many good reasons to go to Sarajevo, including the amazing cafe Torte i to where you can get the best cheesecake ever and the fact that there is a cinema. But yesterday we found another reason - sledging! The Winter Olympics in 1984 were held in Sarajevo which was then part of Yugoslavia. (today it is the capital city of Bosnia and Herzegovina in case you didn't know) Yesterday we were walking around in the park enjoying the snow and then we saw some people sledging down the paths. This made some of our group very excited so we went across the street to the toy shop and bought some little plastic sledge thingys and joined in the fun! Winter Olympics has been on my mind a lot recently because of entering the Schmancy Olympic Challenge competition. I hope that yesterday's brief winter sports fun in the Olympic City of Sarajevo will bring me inspiration and that I come up with something really fab!