Handmade Holiday 2013 in the Softie Sweat Shop

Handmade Holiday 2013 is well underway, and an impulsive decision to take part in a vendor market a week in advance has me churning out the softies and Xmas tree ornaments in what I’m now calling my Softie Sweat Shop. The Softie Sweat Shop offers workers comfortable working conditions and many benefits, such as dry fingertips and tiny stab wounds.

I’ve been working in a lot of multiples, as well as working on many softies at once so I’m never bored with my projects. If I’m over owls, I set them aside and work on sugar skulls. If I don’t feel like coming up with creative details, I can cut out a bunch of starter softies to decorate later. It’s a perfect system! Never mind the haphazard chaos of my crafting room, where various piles of in-progress projects sit in random areas, sometimes under books, craft supplies or a cat.

Here are some of the fruits of that labor--things that will be available for sale tomorrow, Saturday Dec. 14 at the 12th Avenue Patio Sale at 12th Avenue and Desoto (unless it rains, then here is a sneak preview of my soon-to-be-awesome etsy shop)!

If you're a devoted fan who has followed this amazingly consistent blog for several years, you might remember these little pencil/makeup/change bags from the time I failed to sell them at the Port City Market circa 2009. They're still available, but demand is obviously high!

 These are larger sugar skull softies but for all you know they're microscopic because this photo has no scale. They have a little bean bagginess to weigh them down and help them stand upright. They're probably 6 or 7 inches high and they have little "fug" tags on them.

 I really like this angry looking cat. I'm hoping a lot of other people also really like it and that this shared interest will translate into cash in my unsold felted money bag.

 Please tell me owls are still a thing. I made a whole bunch of them.

Whoa. Do you even understand how serious this is? I had BUSINESS CARDS made, because when it comes to felt, I mean BUSINESS. Special thanks to Sam with knitting company Meat Warmer for designing these cards!

More sugar skulls. Come buy them!

More Apron

I wanted to make another apron. This time, a full version.

Instead of using a thrift store skirt, I used a thrift store dress. This cat helped me out. Her name is Ollie, Design Consultant at Felt Up Goods, Inc.

First I cut out an apron shape from the front of the dress. I had some navy blue fabric from a bunch of curtains that never got made, so I used that for an accent. I made the straps same as the other apron, except with an extra one for the neck. Additionally, the skirt is very A-line, so I mimicked that shape by making the pockets inverted triangles just for visual interest.
To make the pockets, I had to use forethought and planning, which is a huge step since I'm usually more likely to put the bulk of craftime forethought into what kind of beer I'll be drinking for its duration than how to make a conceptually and technically solid creation.

This time I outdid myself with a delicious Trippel Belgian style beer from North Carolina (Thanks, Sam & Brandon!) and by folding back and ironing the edges of my pockets, along with a strip of the turquoise dress fabric for a little detail. I sewed only the top part, then sewed the edges back while simultaneously sewing them on to the actual apron to avoid double seams on the pockets.
I only pin when I ABSOLUTELY have to. In this case I just put two pins in the top of each pocket while sewing them to the apron fabric to hold them in place and remind me not to accidentally sew them shut, rendering them useless.
I thought I was finished, but then decided it needed a tiny bit of the navy blue to balance the design by pulling the eye back to the top of the apron. I cut out a quick little square and stitched it to the piece of fabric between the breast triangles.

Next weekend, perhaps I'll snap one of a person wearing it.

Sister!

A while ago I made a doll of myself (left). Then I made one of my sister Elise (right). I never photographed the latter...until now!

I needlefelted and embroidered the details, and I put pipe cleaners in the arms and legs because pose-ibility makes a softie 38 percent more fun.
Here is Doll Elise on a stack of books, though some might say this pose is misleading. While Real Elise does enjoy reading, at the moment she's more likely to be surrounded by scholarly articles or books pertaining to her thesis research than, say, anything by Nietzsche or Shakespeare.
This is Elise Doll and Me Doll playing in the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft & Wizardry, as represented by a Harry Potter pop-up book. You might be wondering why I own a Harry Potter pop-up book. If so, do you know me? Why are you even reading this? STUPEFY!

My First Softies

Way back in January I became interested in softie-making after finding a book about it at my boyfriend's house. I acquired some felt and went to work creating these fellows, Julio (left) and Jeffe (right).

Julio and Jeffe are characters from the future. They live in a post-nuclear-apocolypse world and they are scientists charged with seeking out the few survivors in the nearly barren wasteland Earth has become. They bring the survivors back to their salvaged research facility and perform tests on them to find out why these humans and other lifeforms have survived. They are the building blocks for the post-apocolyptic continuation of the human species. Julio is a hopeless romantic, an endlessly idealistic warrior for the power of humanity to prevail peacefully. Jeffe is Julio's chubby best friend, a bastion of logic in the face of the absurdity and chaos that surrounds them.

These jovial gentlemen were created from felt and stuffed with pearl barley before I'd developed much skill with a needle and thread or harnassed any concept of craftsmanly design. I love them all the same.