Hopefully Back for a While!

The last few months I stopped blogging to get some real crafting done!  It was nice to have some time crafting without trying to get good pictures and edit them and then documenting what I did.  Just to enjoy making lovely things ( in my opinion) and design future projects.  I also enjoy blogging and sharing ideas with others so it is time to start to enjoy blogging again too!  Unfortunately I did not get pictures of all the things I made but I will share pictures of those I did.


Recently I went back to http://www.craftster.org/ and got involved to a Spirit Doll Swap.  Here is the gallery for the swap.
 http://www.craftster.org/forum/index.php?topic=433511.msg5196183#msg5196183 

Craftster is a great place to find a swap and has a great variety of them to choose from.  I had been wanting to make a doll for a long time and so the swap was a great way to get inspired.  Here are some pictures of the doll I made and represents "Living in the Moment".

 

Spirit  Doll "Living in the Moment".

 

Close up of doll.

To start the doll I first folded a piece of paper in half and cut out a paper doll.  It took several tries to get the proportions right I wanted her to have an enormous butt.  I was going for a goddess shape but a bit different.  Once I had a shape I decided on the pedestal leg shape to accentuate the enormous butt.  Then I decided to have separate arms so I could pose them, but that didn't work out.  My partner for the Spirit Doll swap like jewel tones so I decided on a bright red, I wanted to use purple but that would have made the doll darker than I wanted.

So next I marked the body on a piece of red fabric and put it in a q-snap and started to embroider it.  The body was embroidered with two strands of embroidery floss creating a one wrap french knot in a circular spiral pattern.  The circles had a center and then about six French knots around them but I made at least one a different color that started another circle.  So there was a pattern but not an obvious one.  After I cut out and sewed the embroidered pieces I was almost stumped with  the next challenge.  When the doll was stuffed it was too tight to do any soft sculpture on and I didn't like the flat face and butt.  So I created yo-yos out of the red fabric and sewed them to the butt and face and stuffed them so the doll was more dimensional.

Close up of dolls face after applying the yo-yo, embroidered eyes and face.

The yo-yos worked out great but they did leave a seams.  I embroidered the face with matching silk thread and so the nose and mouth are very subtle.  The eyes were outlined with straight stitches and then embroidered with white silk sewing thread.  The eyes are Swarovski crystal  montees in blue.  I had some montees in red but they would not show up as well.

 

Close up of dolls hair in back.

The hair came next.  I sewed several layers of silk ribbon in red and purple, a yellow boucle embroidery thread and red eyelash knitting yarn.  There are also strands of purple size 10 seed beads and size 15 red seed beads on top of the hair.  I wanted the hair to be wild so I spent hours adding more and more to the hair.  Unfortunately I strung so many beads that she is top heavy.

Close up of dolls arm.

So with her face, body and hair done I started working on the arms.  At this point I almost gave up.  It took four tries before I even got this nice an arm.  One try looked like a claw and made her look like a lobster!  I finally settled on this arm and hand embellished it with green rayon Brazilian thread and couched it to the doll with single chain stitch leaves.  Finally using the spider rose technique created lovely yellow silk roses to finish the arms.

 

Close up of enormous butt.

With the doll almost finished I decided that the butt shouldn't  be done in french knots.  I wanted her bottom to stand out so I did a simple running stitch in same colors as I used for the French knots.  The running stitches are also rather randomly made to match with the randomness of the rest of the doll.   

Clothes just didn't work for this doll.  Everything I tried something on her just took away from spontaneity of the doll.  So to dress her up I decided to make her some Ferengi earrings.  unfortunately I didn't get a good picture of the earrings.  The basic difference that makes the earrings "Ferengi" is they are connected to each other with a chain that hangs down like a necklace and has dangles.  These were very simple.  At each ear is a clear crystal cut into a leaf shape with a gold chain connecting them.  It had only one drop a lovely dark amethyst at the middle of the chain.  So with the doll finally finished I sent her to her new home!  I experienced a real challenge making a doll pattern for the first time and working with a woven fabric instead of a knit.  Hopefully there will be another Spirit Doll Swap soon.  In any case I signed up for the County fair and "Art Doll" is one of my entries!