mini-macaroon

The inspiration for today's mini-mal comes from a gift I recently received from my boyfriend - some delicious Parisian macaroons from Laduree

The boxes are so beautiful I thought it was worth making something to put in it again:

I think someone's eaten the rest of mine!

Maybe I'll have to make some more to fill the box up.

Mini-penguin

I'm really sorry I seem to have fallen a little behind with the blog updates - it was an extremely busy weekend!  

Friday's inspiration was the start of the Winter Olympics in Sochi.   I was trying to think of sufficiently wintry characters to make and the winner was....

A mini skiing penguin!!!

Hope you are enjoying the coverage of the Winter Olympics - so far I think it looks pretty spectacular - there are some weird and wonderful winter sports out there!   

Another mini-mal installment will be along soon...  If you have any suggestions or ideas of mini-mals that I haven't thought of yet please leave me a comment.   x

Mini-rat

.... And, today's inspiration is Lauren Child.   If you have never come across Lauren's work you really must visit her website or do a Google image search - her illustrations are just beautiful.   I have been slightly obsessed with Lauren's illustrations, books, magazines, merchandise and animations ever since my sister introduced me to Charlie & Lola.  I love the way that she layers details, uses a combination of drawn and photographed images and the patterned fabrics and prints that she uses are just gorgeous.  I have many of her books and one of my favourite characters is That Pesky Rat:

And here is my (slightly naked) version:

See you for the next installment tomorrow.... x

Mini-girl

Day Two's mini-mal hasn't turned out quite as well as I was hoping it would.  :(  But, I am trying to stay positive and, this is a learning experience after all, so nothing is a mistake, it's just work-in-progress!   I mentioned the inspiration for this mini-mal in yesterday's post - Kirsty Neale.   I have admired Kirsty's work since I discovered her through the Mollie Makes magazines and books.   And, last year, I entered a competition and was very lucky to win a copy of her book Hoop-La! and the original hoop that Kirsty embroidered for the front cover which is now hanging on the wall of our spare room/ office/ studio.

I love Kirsty's characters especially the faces and hairstyles that she gives them.

I wanted to try and take inspiration from the kinds of fabrics that she uses to create a little girl character of my own but somewhere in the translation from my original drawing to the actual sewn item something went a little awry and she is not a cute as I was wanting her be.

Anyway, on to the next mini-mal.... see you tomorrow! x

Day One....Mini-Rabbit

I was really having problems knowing where I wanted to start with this project.   Every idea i had about mini-mals seemed like i was over-thinking or would be too complicated to make in one day - I really don't want to give up halfway through as I can't finish anything in the time-frames I've set myself!   but anyway, an idea hit me as I was lying awake in the middle of night worrying about it.   I had been reading a series of blog posts on copy+paste by Kirsty Neale and Julie Kirk about illustrators that Kirsty is inspired by and so I thought that to at least start this project I would take inspiration from my favourite illustrators, designers and makers to create mini-mals influenced by their work.

And so to the first inspiration and mini-mal....

My inspiration today is the lady that sowed the seed for this whole project - Marisa from Creative Thursday. If I hadn't seen Marisa's book when we were in San Fransisco last year and become mesmerised by her illustrations I wouldn't have had this idea in the first place.

To be honest, I didn't think I was going to enjoy the text part of the book as when I read reviews it described it as a motivational book and I really didn't think that was my kind of thing.   But, the illustrations won me over and I bought it and ended up reading it cover-to-cover!  It made me realise that I was not alone in my procrastination and most other makers go through the same dips in creativity that I have been experiencing lately.   One of her ideas to get over this was a one-a-day project..... and so here we are!

Mini-mal number 1...

Please pop along tomorrow to see the next mini-mal....  xx

A quick make this morning

Yesterday, whilst browsing the internet, I stumbled across a really good idea:

A pin cushion for your sewing machine!

Never again will you have to reach across the room for your pin box whilst sewing as it attaches to your machine so that you always have somewhere close at hand to collect pins as you pull them out of your work.   This may be a very practical item but why does it have to be a dull and boring shape?   I was looking at my most colourful fabrics but just couldn't bring myself to make just an oblong to stick on my sewing machine - so here is my take on the pin cushion:

This is far more fun to look at and really brightens up my machine but will I actually be able to stick pins in it?!?!?!?!

Apparently you're never more than 20 feet away from....

A rat!!!  Hopefully you won't find these ones scary though:

I have been pretty over the past few weeks and these rats are the fruit of my labour.   I'm going to be putting some for sale on Etsy soon so please have a look at my shop here.  Here are some more photos:

And here is some work-in-progress.  Hopefully finished pictures will follow shortly when I can figure out how to get the faces looking right!

Easter Bunting

We'll start with the bad news first:  As yet no creatures have materialised from the eye experimentation but I promise something will eventually!

And now to the good news!   I was beavering away ALL day yesterday and this is the result:

Some Eater bunting.   I enjoyed making the Halloween bunting so much last year that I thought I would continue the theme and rustle something up for Easter.   Here are some close-ups:

And this is what it looks like hanging up (thanks to Jasmin for the photo effects!)

It is now listed in my Esty shop so pop in and it could be yours!   :o)

Eye Experimentation

Last week I decided to try and complete all those little half-finished creatures there were sat in a bag in the back of a cupboard.   I am very fickle sometimes with projects -  I get an idea, design the pattern,  knit/ make up all the parts until I am happy with the outcome and that's usually as far as it goes!   I often find half sewn/ stuffed parts that need putting together but by that time I'm halfway through designing the next piece.   But the thing I struggle with most are the faces.   The pile I was working through last week were all  little faceless creatures.   The majority actually got finished and some even listed on Etsy but one still remains faceless.   I was having terrible trouble embroidering on the stuffed face.   I started experimenting with embroidering on other fabrics first but couldn't cut close enough to my stitches to loose sight of the underlying fabric (fraying edges everywhere!) or without cutting into my stitches and this also caused a problem with actually attaching the embroidery to the face.   But after some trial and error (and plenty of research on the internet) I think I may have stumbled upon a solution:

These eyes were supposed to be for a cat but when I made a pair and put them together I wasn't quite sure - what do you think?   Do these look like cats' eyes?

I also tried putting the eyelids on the other way round:

I think they look more like owl eyes now:  maybe there's an owl toy on the way.....

But the experimentation will also continue as I am still not completely satisfied with the outcome.  I want to achieve a more bulbous effect under the iris and pupil, at the moment any stuffing I put behind there is popping out the back because the embroidery causes too much stiffness.   I'd also like to try and add some eyelashes.  :o)

Next to figure out is the nose!!!