April 2013 meeting notes

Katie's newest original art doll is here: If I Had Wings I Would Fly.  Please visit her site to read her detailed write-up of the techniques she used.

Her face was sculpted in clay during an online class.  We showed it in progress here. Her cloth body design was painstakingly designed by hand by Katie, who then created an exquisite costume for her.

The cape is minutely hand-beaded, and her dress is made from vintage silk velvet.

She is altogether beautiful.

In more show-and-tell, Ann has been applique quilting!  There are many other blocks finished  here too, and they are all just as pretty as these three.  The pattern for the blocks is by Edyta Sitar.

Julie G. brought her Deanna Hogan doll Suffragette Sally, started in a  Doll Gatherers class.  Her clay face has a cloth overlay, which is painted.

Here's the doll in her period costume.

Next up, a traveling goblin -- Mary found herself lucky and won Cody Goodin's recent give-away.  I'm not really sure what to say about him, but he seems happy to be here?

After show and tell, Julie G. showed us how she learned to make doll wings, a la Alison Marano.

Here's the sheer fabric and stabilizer used to sew the wings on the sewing machine.

And here's a beautifully embroidered maple leaf, with a channel sewn to hold the wire that will attach the wing to a doll.

It was a good meeting.

March 2013 - Progressive doll faces

Last month we learned about drawing faces, so this month some of the progressive dolls came in with their new faces.  Below is Julie G.'s doll, with a definite nod to Christine Shively's style.

And, here is her body so far -- you can see that the clown face coordiates very well with her harlequin stockings.

Here's another face and body combo, although Leslie decided that the first head was a little large for the body; she made a new head in a smaller scale, with features yet to come.

Our next face is not on cloth at all, but is Katie's sculpted clay head, now with painted features.  Katie has been taking Deb Wood's online sculpting class from the A for Artistic website.

And this is the lovely body that the clay head will go on.  Katie has designed an original cloth body in proportion to the head, and is creating her wardrobe from the skin out.

Please check out the beautiful lingerie, as this might be the last time it is ever seen.  Like all good foundation garments, this underwear will be appreciated only by the wearer.

Now, from the supremely realistic to the slightly more abstract form... Meet Martha's little 'Bug' doll, from Tilda's book 'Spring Ideas'.  (Tilda's new book 'Fairy Tale Wonderland' is pretty cute, too!)

Even more abstract: Leslie's new name tag pin doll, comprised of her initials L-W.

Moving back toward the traditional, cuddly doll: new member Maggie brought one of her angels, all in textured cream and pearls.

From huggable to wearable -- Jude brought a decorated sweatshirt, which she embellished with paint, felting, and jewels on top of the printed paisley pattern.

And lastly, back to cuddly, as new member Vicki brought her quilt top in progress, made from charm squares and jelly roll strips.

Believe it or not, even with all of this fabulous show and tell, we did manage to fit in Andrea's lesson on wefted yarn hair, so hopefully next month we'll see some fabulous hairdos, too.

February - Progressive Faces

Our second meeting of the year saw the second mini-class for our year-long progressive doll project.  Martha taught us to draw lovely features.

Even though our progressive dolls are just getting started, Martha finished one early, as a gift for her granddaughter.  She was unfortunately reminded of the importance of sealing the face if you're using water-based colors, but the doll is still a cutie (and might get a makeover to fix her mascara).

Katie brought a doll-in-progress from the online sculpting class she is taking with Deb Wood.  We can't wait to see her fully painted!

Just to prove that practice really does make perfect, Katie also brought evidence of the hours she puts into her creations -- a bag o' heads in various stages of needle-sculpting and coloring.

We are a multi-talented group, so we naturally make 'things that are not dolls' every once in a while. Shelby made these lovely socks. which are knitted from the toe up.

Ann R. made this stunning little crazy quilt for her antique doll club, the local chapter of the UFDC.  There is a lucky reproduction Jumeau doll that will receive this quilt, pieced from vintage fabrics and beautifully hand-embroidered.

Go home and practice drawing faces, and then put one on your doll!  Next month, we'll learn some simple wefting techniques for making doll hair out of all kinds of yarn.

January 2013 - a full house!

Our first meeting of the year, and we nearly ran out of chairs!  This is a very good thing, and we are delighted that our club is doing so well.  We had 19 members (plus one young guest) at our January meeting.

A meeting room full of dollmakers!

Besides just being there, of couse, we did stuff too.  We decided that our challenge theme this year will be 'Mythological Beings', after reluctantly ruling out exotic birds and magicians.  We decided that our workshop with Barbara Schoenoff this summer will be her Three Faces of the Goddess.

Three Faces of the Goddess, by Barbara Schoenoff

And, we had show and tell, of course!  First was Erin, who brought some fun paper samples made with her new Silhouette Cameo electronic cutter, which works with paper, fabric, and even fondant icing!

Next was Martha, who brought the cutest little matryoshka doll, made from the pattern in the November 2011 issue of Soft Dolls and Animals.

We also had some amigurumi, with a definite sci-fi twist!  Leave it to Mary to combine Mr. Spock with super happy crochet cute.

Last in the 'show' part of show-and-tell, Mary Jane brought in two vintage souvenir dolls from Ethiopia, possibly dating from the 1960s or '70s.

Ethiopian dolls, front and back

But wait!  There's more!  We also had 'tells' in our show-and-tell, starting with Katie, who told us about the online class Sculpting a Female Face she is taking with Deb Wood, at Adele Sciortino's 'A For Artistic' website.  And Sandy told us about the camel races in Qatar, where her daughter is teaching.  Smaller jockeys meant faster times, so children were often used as jockeys until recently, but it was dangerous.  Qatar is one of a number of countries who have recently switched to robot jockeys!  Now you know.

Believe it or not, our meeting still wasn't done.  We started our progressive dolls, by drawing our very own doll patterns.  Our job will be to sew them up and bring them to the next meeting, when they will get faces.  There was also one more special and historic item to share, but it will have to go in our next post.

Ordinary September show and tell

The show and tell at our September club meeting was awesome, as it always is.  Our members have been keeping very busy, making wonderful things. 

However, since the highlight of our meeting was the unveiling of our Round Robin dolls, and this post doesn't have those pictures yet, we'll just have to see the 'usual', ordinarily fabulous show and tell.  Stay tuned for the reveal soon, though.

To start us off with a bang, Erin brought in a complete and most fabulous puppet, made from the 'Mostro' pattern from Project Puppet.  All of his pictures are action shots, since nobody wanted to put him down!  He is a classic Muppet-style critter (temporarily named Beano) complete with furry feet and a well-made working mouth.  His foam rubber construction and soft blue fur made him very huggable.

Next up: our prolific newcomer Shelby, with her 4th finished doll.  It is a Jan Horrox design, but Shelby has added lots of her own touches to this one.  Her hair is elaborate, with twists and a beaded headdress.  Shelby added costume texture by cutting out tiny leaf elements printed on the body fabric and stiffening them with Fray-Check, then sewing them to the body with beads.

Kyra of Avalon, from a Jan Horrox pattern

Our other show and tell items were not dolls, although much of the hand-dyed silk from our workshop last month will end up in a doll someday.  Mary's salt crystal piece was stunning.  The trick to getting a strong pattern was to use lots of dye (actually, Jacquard's Dye-na-flow paint) so that the fabric was really wet, and then using a lot of large-grained salt and leaving it to dry on the fabric.

Last one: Martha has fallen for English paper piecing and as always, cannot make just one of anything.  These are only two of at least a dozen pieced stars, waiting to be appliqued onto pillow tops.

June 2012 Show and Tell

What a great June meeting!  Lots of people, including one new member (welcome, Shelby!) and tons of show and tell.

Night-Mer by Mary McNeely

First is Mary's newest original doll, Night-Mer.  The idea for this one has been hanging around Mary's brain for a long time, but those tentacles took a while to figure out.  You can see the doll in person next month at the Sci-Fi and Fantasy Art Exhibit at Garfield Park, on the south side of Indianapolis.

Mary also brought her Lucius Malfoy doll, started in our Elven King workshop with Judy Skeel (way back in 2006, but who's counting?).

Lucius by Mary M., pattern by Judy Skeel

It has obviously been a good time to finish some UFOs, because Julie G. also brought a workshop doll to share.  This one was from a Lucy Landry workshop at Magic, Mischief, & Mayhem in 2010.

Moth Woman by Julie G., pattern by Lucy Landry

Our next doll was not years in the making, although she looks like she should have been.  Katie brought her absolutely gorgeous original doll, Tashi.  Check out Katie's blog for lots more pictures and close-ups.  She describes the Tibetan jewelry and other costume bits that inspired her design.

Tashi, original design by Katie

From elaborate to elegant simplicity -- the next doll is actually a knitted lamb, made by Erin for Baby Bea.  I was in the other room, taking pictures of our Round Robin dolls in progress (maintaining the secrecy until the grand unveiling this fall!), so I missed all the discussion about Erin's soft and cuddly creation, and do not know what pattern was used.  I can vouch for cuddly, though.

And finally, our last doll is actually the first doll ever made by our newest member, Shelby.  She is from Jan Horrox's book, Introduction to Making Cloth Dolls.

Great meeting, everybody!  See you next month :-)

March 2012 meeting

Another great meeting, with 16 people in attendance and lots of pretty dolls to see.  We also found out about an art show possibility in June, so stay tuned for more info to come on that.  Now on to show and tell!

Ann R. wins the 'Most Stuff Accomplished this Month' prize, with not one, not two, but three finished dolls to share.  Ann has made several of Gail Wilson's dolls in the past, and they are all just perfect.  This one is a little pioneer girl.

Gail Wilson 9" Basic Doll wearing the 'Going West' outfit. 

Check out the closeup of her button bonnet.  This is an historic style, but a hard one to find much info about.  I did find a pattern modeled from an adult's antique bonnet, and a cute new baby version, too.  As they say, everything old is new again!

Next, also Ann R.'s doll, is Kewpie, fully dressed in feedsack fabric.  See the January meeting for the 'naked' picture of this Kewpie doll in progress, with pattern info.

Finally, we had lots of finished Chun Woo dolls from our Leslie Molen class a few weekends ago.  We got them mostly done in class, but now they have pearl earrings and lovely purses hanging from the ribbon sashes at their waists.

Ann R.

Julie W.

Nita B.

Julie G.

Erin

Martha