Winner on Wednesday

This morning, I had a new comment on my blog. Even though it was from Michelle Palmer, I didn't really think much of it. Lo and behold, I read the comment and discovered that I was the winner of her latest blog giveaway for a lovely journal with a bird and quotation illustrated by Michelle herself!

(This image copyright Michelle Palmer)

So beautiful! I love illustrations, and Michelle is so talented. I've been over the moon all day!

When I was 5 years old, my mom asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up. She wrote the answer in my "school days diary," and I remember what I said to this day: an artist and a mommy. My first love (artwise, anyway) was drawing. I even earned a bachelor's degree in fine art, though my emphasis was in graphic design. And I had always loved stuffed animals, so when I discovered bear making, I was smitten. Lately, I've been picking up pencil and paper much more often to sketch teddy bears and their friends. Someday, I just might share them with you!

Please go visit Michelle's blog and her Etsy store to see her fabulous work. And let me (and her!) know what you think.

Thank you so much, Michelle!

Pumphrey the Clown

Happy Teddy Bear Day to everyone! A friend of mine told me it was Teddy Bear Day today, and I thought it was so fitting to introduce you to the newest Crew member today. Please meet Pumphrey the clown, who I've affectionately been calling my "grand experiment":

Why is he a grand experiment? A few posts ago, I shared that I had the crazy notion one day to design a two-piece head pattern instead of the typical three-part head with gusset piece. I also decided I wanted this bear to have a ski-slope profile, so I put pencil to paper and came up with a pattern with darts top and bottom. After I cut the pieces out of mohair and stitched them up and stuffed them, I worked on the face. The head sat in an antique teacup on my desk during the process so I could look at him, and he at me. He looked so funny when he only had pin heads for eyes! When I finished Pumphrey's head and liked it, I designed his body and limbs.

I wanted him to be very different, so here also I didn't do my typical traditional-style bear. Pumphrey has shorter limbs and a longer body, perfect for a clown! He also has a little tail!

Pumphrey is named after my great-great-great uncle (there might be another great in there somewhere), whose middle name was Pumphrey. He and his wife, Imelda, were affectionately known as Aunt Meldie and Uncle Pun. Looking at their portrait and the twinkle in Uncle Pun's eye, I can just imagine how their nicknames fit.

Pumphrey the clown bear is 13 inches (33 centimeters) tall and made from curly matted tan Helmbold mohair and a lovely purple Schulte mohair. He has gold wool felt paw pads and black glass eyes, his nose and mouth are embroidered with pearl cotton, and I've given him light shading on his face. Pumphrey has his very own clown hat with a vintage flower button from the button box of one of my grandmothers or great aunts. He is stuffed with polyester stuffing and plastic pellets and has a wobble head joint for those quirky clown poses.

If you would like Pumphrey to come live with you and keep you entertained, visit the AVAILABLE BEARS page on this site.

I have very much enjoyed creating Pumphrey and having him around the studio. I have been posting updates about him on my Facebook page as I've been making him, and I know I've kept many of you in suspense waiting to see him. I'm glad I'm finally able to share him with you!

I hope you've enjoyed meeting  Pumphrey the clown!


Note: You can click on the photos to see a larger version and more detail.

Ben, My "Oldie" Bear

I'm happy to finally be able to introduce you to my "oldie" bear, Ben. This little Crew member is very special because he is the only one who actually lives on New Avenue. He arrived at my parents' home earlier this week, and my mom loves him.

It seems only fitting that Ben is living with my mom, because she is the one who found the short, soft, dense vintage upholstery mohair he is made from. She is also the one who introduced me to antique teddy bears and subsequently artist-made bears in the first place; we used to go to doll shows to look at the antique dolls she loved so much, and the teddy bears started appearing at those shows. I was smitten.

Mom has been asking me to make her a bear for years. Lest you think I'm a bad daughter, I want you to know that she had Oolong, the teatime kitty (pictured four posts below and in the sidebar), for a few years before giving him to my sister. And then I was in bear-making hibernation for a while, so there was no Crew member on New Avenue.

I started working on Ben many years ago, and he sat, partially completed, for quite a while. I always wanted him to appear to be older and well loved, so I took a deep breath and set to work "aging" him. You can see my brief post about the process called On Looking Old and Loved.

In the photos above, you can see Ben's worn areas, the "moth" holes in his wool felt paw pads, and the two little mending patches I sewed onto his arm and wrist. I made him a little shirt, too, my very first clothing design. (Did you know that I don't know how to sew clothes?) The shirt is adorned with antique buttons from one of my grandmas or great aunts.

I also took the plunge and aged his nose. I really like it!

Because he was completed on the fourth of July and has an Americana type of shirt, I decided to call him Ben after Benjamin Franklin. I thought he needed a sweet, simple name.

Before they each traveled to their new homes, I took a photo of Logan and Ben together. They are the two friends in the Quiet Conversations post below. I am glad they are both loved in their new homes.

Quiet Conversations

I've been wanting to share this post from my old WordPress blog with you, and now is the perfect time. Please enjoy this post about quiet conversations.
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For the past few weeks, I have had my bears in progress sitting on my bed. Two of them always seem to end up in what looks like a conspiratorial pose, or one in which they are having a long chat or are looking lovingly into each others’ eyes…I always smile when I see them. I thought I would share a snapshot of them with you, even though they are not finished–a sneak peek at my sweet little chums in progress–and tell you what I think they might be discussing.

“Goodness, when do you think she will finally finish us?”

“I don’t know, but it’s been years in my case.”

“Mine, too!”

“Did you know that she is a proofreader during the day, and she’s a wife and mother, and she works on us in between everything else?”

“Oh! What’s a proofreader?”

“She makes sure that the written word sounds good, looks good…that kind of thing.”

“But why has it taken her so many years to make us?”

“She and her husband adopted their two teenage daughters last year. That took a long time.”

“I’m sure it did!”

“But you know, I’m really very glad she has come out of her bear-making hibernation so we can be loved and adopted one day, too!”

“Me, too!”

“By the way, though it has taken a few years for her to make you, she is going to ‘age’ you some more. Your fur is what they call ‘vintage’ upholstery mohair, and she has already given you some worn spots on your ear, forehead, and muzzle. Her mom collected antique dolls for many years, and so she became a fan of antique teddy bears. She has made one other ‘aged’ bear; he looked well loved. And that’s what she wants for you.”

“Oh! It must be a good thing to be loved.”

“I think it must be.”

Pattern Play

Since I emerged this spring from my self-imposed hibernation* from bear making, I have discovered that I love creating new patterns. It is so satisfying to start with a piece of paper and an idea, then take a flat piece of fabric and turn it into a three-dimensional little "soul" that looks at you so lovingly.

When I dug out my bear-making materials earlier this year, I found four bears waiting to be finished, three of whom had faces that looked up at me so trustingly. So sorry I made you wait, little ones! The biggest one, my very patient big brown batik bear, needed a smaller body and some limbs, so I set to work. A sketch here, a test body out of paper towels there, and I had what I thought would be a good size to go with his head. Same thing with the limbs, though I didn't make paper towel tests for them. (It all sounds so easy and breezy, but there's a lot of drawing, erasing, testing for fit, and so on in pattern making.) The batik bear is now jointed and mostly stuffed. I think I haven't completely finished him yet because I love him and would like to keep him around a little while longer.

Because I like the batik bear so much, I decided I needed to make a smaller size version of his pattern. Once that was finished, I cut the pieces out of beautiful wavy distressed pink mohair. Now I need to trim the fur from the seams and sew her up!

And then I got a wild hare of an idea and decided to design something completely out of the norm for me. Two somethings, in fact.

The first is a first for me: a rabbit. Can you believe that in 14 years of bear making I haven't made a rabbit before? I've designed and made three cats and even a pig, but not a rabbit. So I gathered photos of rabbits--so cute--and designed the rabbit's head. But I haven't gone farther than that with the pattern design. If you look closely at the two photos of my desk in the post that shows where I create, you can see it. It's only a sewn furry "envelope" in the pictures, but now it's stuffed and has test eyes in position. Nothing else. So funny but endearing at the same time.

And the second is what I'm calling my grand experiment. Why is he my grand experiment? Because he is such a departure from my usual designs. He has...drumroll, please...a two-piece head. Yes, you read that right. There's no middle gusset piece. He also has a different body and limb style than my usual bears. Right now, he is waiting for me to tighten his limb joints, just lounging here on my desk looking cute. I can't show him to you just yet, but when he's finished, he will appear here on the New Avenue Crew blog. I like him. I hope you will, too.


*By the way, I plan to stay OUT of hibernation. I am enjoying playing with the fur and fluff far too much to give it up, and I plan to create my Crew members for a long time to come. I've found that I really do have a need to create, whether it's sketching, writing, or making a teddy bear "come to life" with my hands. I believe that's the way God wired me!