Bendi dolls - quick and easy

I've never been particularly enchanted with Bendi dolls but my doll club wanted everyone to enter the Bendi Doll challenge issued by Art Doll Quarterly. Along with everyone else I bought a couple full size Bendis and a bunch of the mini Bendi Dolls - the 6 inch ones. I never got inspired by them so never made anything for the challenge. They have been sitting on the shelf for months, just a blank canvas waiting for my muse to speak. But the other night I wanted to make a quick thank-you gift for the hostess of our quilt shop staff party.

So I grabbed a baby Bendi off my shelf and

started coloring it with Portfolio water soluble oil pastels (is that an oxymoron or what!). I just drew streaks of color on it then wet a makeup sponge and blended the color - got great coverage. I left those beady little eyes on and just didn't color around them so I achieved the whites of the eyes with no effort. After I colored the doll I took a Pigma Pen (.005 tip) and did the detailing of the features. Those baby Bendi's have really small faces!!! Then did a little shading, sprayed the whole thing with Craftgard (a waterproofing spray) and left it to dry.

Ok - now it needed a costume .. and this is bad .. but .. I pulled out a piece of purple panne velvet out of the trash and made a tube, pulled it on the Bendi, cut a fringe at the bottom, added a bit of trim on the top, and voila ... dressed. The hair was about 2 inches of a fuzzy trim I found in the dreaded WalMart. Just sewed it on at the hairline and fluffed. Took 2 minutes! Sewed a bit of ribbon for a hanging tab and it was done.

All in all it took about an hour. My friend was tickled pink with it too. You know it doesn't matter if your efforts aren't the most beautiful .. just being presented with a handmade gift makes it special. Knowing you took time to make something just for them! So keep a couple of Bendi's on hand ...

Hair Today, Gone Tomorrow

Last night I had a holiday party to attend for the quilt shop I am affiliated with. We always have a gift exchange and the gift must be handmade. As I said earlier I've been working like mad to get the doll for my class finished, which, by the way, I got an A on (10 out of 10 points). Yay! So I didn't have much time to make a whole new doll, which is what the girls have come to expect from me. So what did I do?

I took pieces and parts from dolls that were never finished for one reason or another and combined them into a lovely little gal who now has a great new home. I had a doll body from a class, no hair, not much of a costume. So I added a new underskirt, wrapped ribbon on her feet for shoes, and gave her a sweet little updo with mohair roving. I had wings on another unfinished doll which were just pinned on .. so I took them too. Luckily they were in the same colors as the doll so it worked perfectly.

Use the world around you for inspiration ... I had watched an episode of Oprah while I was getting my nails manicured (a rare luxury for me) and she was giving away watches that were attached to ribbons which you wound around your wrist. It really looked more like a scarf. So my doll had one - at least she had the ribbon wrapped around her wrist - fairies don't need to tell time so no watchface. I cut a piece of material into a triangle and just wrapped it around her wrist, tacked it down with a couple of stitches, looked great! Make it long enough to go around the wrist at least twice, and end with the point on top. This would also make a great cuff for sleeves.

As I was working I was listening to the radio and they played a song by the B-52s .. remember them? Wild haircolors, big beehive hairdos? Yep, you guessed it, my doll ended up with purple hair in a crazy updo. I took a long piece of mohair roving and laid it down across the doll's head, forehead to nape. I had about two inches hanging over her forehead and the rest down her back. I then sewed it down around the entire hairline with matching thread. Then I gathered the long piece and twisted it into a french twist. Sewed that down to the top of the head. Curled the front piece back into a type of pompadour and sewed that down to the top of the french twist. Hair doesn't have to be complicated to look good.

Here's another great way to get inspiration .. eye candy! I love this book Patti Culea's Creative Cloth Dollmaking
- it has dolls by well known names and by, well, just regular people like you and me. The book has 3 doll patterns in it and lots of great ideas for embellishing.

A funny compliment

Yesterday on my way to the University to take my doll "The Last of the Faeries" in for grading I stopped in at the quilt store that I am affiliated with. A group of women called the Hot Bobbins (don't you love that name!) sew there every Wednesday, and two of them are members of my doll club. One of the ladies made a comment that really got me thinking.

I displayed my doll for them and as they were admiring it my friend said "Well, I might as well just stop making dolls now." It was an off-hand comment and I didn't think much of it at the time. But afterwards when I reflected upon it, I came to view it as a compliment. You see, for a long time I had the same reaction when I viewed a doll that was very well done. I thought I could never achieve that level of workmanship. But maybe I have achieved a little of it now, if I take her comment in the way I uttered it myself. It was a validation of all the hard work I put into the doll, but in a different manner. Just that one sentence meant more to me than all the other compliments. I guess you could say I feel that I have arrived at that point in my art that I thought I could never reach. Makes me feel good.

Wings to fly with

I finally got the doll finished for my art project - she is titled "The Last of the Faeries".

I had a lot of fun making the wings and they were so easy. I wanted lacy wings so I figured I'd try burning organza to achieve that look. I had never tried it before but I've read about it in magazines and it sounded simple.

I drew out a sketch of what I wanted the wings to look like so I didn't go into it blindly.

Then I took a piece of floral wire - think it was 16 gauge - and bent it into an extended 'v'. Took another wire and formed the same shape but made it much tighter, then I nested the smaller 'v' inside the big one. I sprayed the wires with 505 - a temporary adhesive spray and stuck them to the organza. Didn't stay too well so I added a couple of pins across the wires.

Zig-zagged the wires down with the sewing machine and then trimmed the organza a bit. Now the fun started. I took my Versa-tool, which is like a soldering iron with lots of different tips, and put in the stencil cutting tip. It's a bit bigger than the tip of a soldering iron - but that would work great too. Then all I did was just draw the shape I wanted with the hot tip - the excess organza just melted away.

It was so cool!

You really have to be careful though - it takes a really light touch or you could end up with a really big hole! The nylon kind of built up on the tip of the iron so I had to keep wiping it off on a wet washcloth - read that tip somewhere on line - it sure helped! Once that was done - and it only took a couple of minutes per wing, I painted the wings with acrylic paint. It was hard to control the flow of the paint on the organza - I think that will take more practice than making the wings!

But it was a grand experience and I'm sure to make more fairies now! Or maybe just a wing collection ...

Wigged Out

I've had a beautiful piece of white tibetan lamb skin for nearly a year but haven't used it because I was afraid of wig making. The piece was perfect for the doll I'm making for my art final so I took a deep breath and plunged in.

I had done some research on wig making before and the attempts I made at just making the wig form were awful. Tried wetting buckram and molding/darting it to the head - looked terrible and, boy, was it ever sticky! But I found an interesting picture/tutorial on Mimi Kirchner's blog (she's got hair) which I adapted for my doll.

What I did was take the basic measurements of my doll's head (hairline to nape) and cut out a piece of craft felt to size. Then I pinned it front and back to hold it in place. Using Mimi's technique I then took my little binder clips and pinched in darts - I only needed four - two by the temples and two by the nape of the neck. Took the felt off and drew lines where the binder clips were and then sewed the darts in. To draw the lines I took my trusty old tracing wheel and some wax-free transfer paper (you know - the stuff you used when you marked darts on clothing. First attempt fit but wasn't long enough in front after I sewed the darts - so I cut another rectangle of felt but added 1/4" to each measurement. Now to be absolutely honest this method makes a very strange, skewed pattern because the darts aren't even with each other. So I got kind of anal and made a paper pattern using the felt as a guide but I made this mathematically correct- making the darts opposite each other, same size, etc. Made another cap from this pattern and it fit fine. I then trimmed the felt piece while it was on the doll head so it was even all the way around. This then was my final pattern.

So then I needed to make a pattern from the felt piece to transfer to the skin. Felt is kind of flimsy to draw around - it moves. I scanned the felt pattern and printed it out on card stock.

I"m happy with this method and now I will start using that big bag of fur scraps that I have had for ages also!

Wire Woes

I think if it wasn't for little problems (stumbling blocks) I wouldn't experiment as much as I do. I said earlier I'm working on my project for my art class - and I'll be doing so for at least a week.

Living in a small town can be a real challenge to finding the materials that you need. I spent one morning going from hardware store to hardware store looking for aluminum wire to use as an armature. I finally found some wire to use for the body but none for the hands. I went through all my wire at home but none had the same malleability as the Alumaloy armature wire.

So I ended up using four strands of that jewelry making stuff, Wild Wire, for the hands - seems to have worked pretty well so far. Instead of using pipe cleaners and twisting them together, which makes for a rather thick wrist, the pattern called for twisting the wire into a hand shape. Interesting process. Then the wire I found for the body (which was a 4 foot coil) wasn't long enough to reach the feet when bent in half. Of course I didn't realize this until I got the leg skins on and noticed that the wires reached the ankles and that was it!

Would have been really hard to put the feet on that way .. and now that I have a right and left foot I really want to use them! Lucky for me my husband has all types of welding equipment, so I had him weld an extension to both leg wires . I trussed up the doll in foil until it looked like some strange shaped pot roast and then left, I couldn't bear to watch.

I also couldn't afford to have sparks make holes in her, hence the pot roast couture! I wish I took a picture to share because it really looked funny.

But now I have wires that are long enough to work with. Can't wait to see what the next stumbling block will be!

Three left feet

Yesterday I was working on a doll that I'm making for my final in my Color & Design class. The pattern I'm using has a two part foot; you sew the heels together on the sole before you add the top of the foot. The toe of the foot has a definite curve so you have a shapely foot for sculpting.

I cut the pieces out at the same time but didn't pay a whole lot of attention to the pieces before I began sewing. Just peeled the first pieces off the freezer paper and began to sew. Then picked up the next two pieces and put them together - no thought involved, just sew.

I made two feet and when I turned them I realized I had two left feet. Oh well, not a problem I'll just cut out another one and sew a right foot. I looked at the finished piece, while it was right side out, and played with the new pieces to make sure I was sewing a right foot this time. Not sure what I did but I made ANOTHER left foot. Grrrrr.

So I cut out another two pieces but this time before I started to sew I turned one of the left feet inside out so I could make sure I was sewing the pieces in the right direction. Moral of the story: Make sure you lay the pieces out on the table before you start to sew instead of leaving them stacked.

When I'm done with this little lady I just might have to make a dancing doll ... with two left feet!