What's New: A Basketful of Beauties!

Sharing my little Felt Matryoshka dolls on my site today!

CLICK HERE TO READ AND SEE MORE!

What's New: Pretty Maids All in a Row

I've been working on a lot of fun projects over the few months, but, as often happens with motherhood, my kiddos have taken a big chunk of my creating time!

And I wouldn't have it any other way!

You can read more, by clicking the link below:

What's New: Pretty Maids All in a Row 

Things to Make: Happy Little Heart Pin

I'm sharing my Happy Little Heart Pin tutorial over on my site today!  Click the link below to see all the details!

Things to Make: Happy Little Heart Pin

(I originally shared this post over at BeccaWilhite.com and HERE!)

What's New: More Matryoshkas!

One of the items I've created for the Scandinavian Festival Craft Fair I'm attending tomorrow, are some more cute little Matryoshka Dolls!
Although these little sweeties aren't exactly Scandinavian per se, they give that same folksy feel that I always get when I go to events like this!
Here are my latest little ladies!
Each one is hand stitched and embroidered from start to finish, with little flower motifs!

Black Babushka with Hot Pink Dress

Baby Blue Babushka
with Denim Blue Dress

Soft Pink Babushka
with Dark Pink Dress

Turquoise Babushka
with Sage Green Dress

Kelly Green Babushka
with Turquoise Dress

I love how each doll has it's own personality...Maybe I should give them each names?  Katerina, Anya, Natasha, Sonya, Anastasia?  What do you think?

I'll definitely be making more of these...they're so fun!  And I'll be getting a listing up in in my shop sometime soon!  I'm also trying to figure how to make these into a pattern so others can make them, too!!

Have a great weekend, Everyone!!

What's New: Three Sisters

One of my favorite folk songs goes:

"There were three sisters, side-by-side;
Sing aye-day, sing aye-dum..."

It's always had a special place in my heart, as I am the oldest of three sisters myself, but especially as I've had three little girls of my own!

These cute little Matryoshka Dolls came about because I was experimenting with the idea of using sawdust as a stuffing for 'toys'. (We happen to have A LOT of sawdust lying around right now, because of our fence-building project...and as you all know, I hate to let anything go to waste!)

I decided to try my hand at creating a felt doll in the shape of a traditional Matryoshka doll, as the shape lends itself very well to this sort of thing! If you don't know what a Matryoshka is, click here, to find out more them. Obviously these don't open up...but they do have the look of a traditional Matryoshka doll.

Anyway, as I experimented I found that the felt was too porous for the sawdust filling.(Ah, well...I guess the sawdust will just go into out compost pile!)

I didn't want to abandon my creations, though, so I decided I'd finish them up with polyester fiberfil, instead! Each doll is made from simple acrylic felt which is hand stitched with embroidery floss; then stuffed and stitched closed! The embroidery was done before the doll was stitched together...and I decided to make each one 'look' like one of my girls, so they each have different coloring and personalities! A special thanks goes to my Aunt Linda who taught me how to do a Lazy Daisy stitch, a French Knot, and a Blanket Stitch!

The girls love them...especially my youngest who keeps wrapping up all the 'babies' and carrying them all over the house!







I'm going to develop a simplified pattern that I will sell in my Etsy shop...maybe with diminishing sizes of dolls...so keep looking for that new item! I want to have it up before Christmas time...I can just see a whole bevy of 'sisters' in christmas colors sitting on the mantel!



P.S. This project is entered in this fun contest! Go check it out!

What's New: Spooky!

I've been working on A LOT of projects lately. Most of them for Halloween and autumn time...I LOVE this time of year!

Here are a few of my new creations (Thanks to my wonderful sister, of ArtisanMaskers fame, for the lovely pics!):