Missy Mischief

This was a little project I was working on at the start of the week. This is another of my older designs - I think I used to call it 'Big Foot', for obvious reasons! 

I decided that the funky design needed some funky fabric - and found this piece of the crazy orange/electric blue tipped mohair that was all the rage about 10yrs ago, in my personal stash. 

And so 'Missy Mischief' was born! I love her little innie belly button and bright blue nose. I love how fun she is, and how I smile whenever I walk past her on my display shelf!

Time out for a bit of painting.

Mark recently suggested that I should take up painting again, as it was something I used to enjoy in my teens, but hadn't had a chance to do in a long time. So I pondered on the idea for a while. I would need to buy EVERYTHING again - paints, brushes, canvas, sketch book, pencils, mixing pads... I had nothing left from my early days of painting. But I the idea wouldn't leave me alone, so I just did it.

I bought a few small stretched canvases, a small packet of brushes and a sample set of acrylic colours. And a sketch book. And spent many hours brainstorming ideas and just drawing. It was actually really nice to be drawing for a different purpose. Not because I needed to make a new bear pattern - but 'just because'.

These are the resulting ooak original paintings.

My kids have been really excited about the paintings too. My 5yr old came home from preschool and just stood in front of the counter where I had this owl painting drying, staring at it for a few minutes.

She then asked, 'mum, why is there a teddy in the tree?'

'Um... I'm not actually sure Chels. Maybe someone left him there after they had a picnic, and forgot about him? The owl looks like he's saying 'who is this in my tree!?' doesn't he?'

She had a little giggle then got on with her afternoon (demanding snacks while I cook dinner - that kind of fun parenting stuff).

I just about used my whole tube of yellow for this one! I do love the texture in it though - I managed to track down some impasto which has let me achieve the texture on the centre of the sunflowers here, and the texture in the bark and the owl's belly on the painting above.

And this one is my all time favourite so far! I only dreamed of being able to paint like this in art class. I honestly don't know how/why I suddenly can, but I am quite chuffed with it.

Many hours went into the detail on this one. And it actually looks just as good from a distance as it does up close. You're eyes are drawn more to the shape of the nude lady from a distance, and up close you see more of the surreal landscape detailing.

I've set up a special section for these paintings on our website as well if you're interested in a piece of 'Emma's Bears' canvas art!? lol
All one of a kind, hand painted on quality gallery-style stretched canvases.
Something a little different :)

Lulu bunny (and her gorgeous fur)

This is Lulu, named by her new mummy (sorry, she is adopted)...

She was made in a piece of one of our latest Limited Edition new faux fur fabrics. We have a little bit of this still remaining in our store if you'd like to make your own critters :)

Stella

Today I've been working on this little lady. I cut her from our last piece of 'Vanilla' Yeti' faux fur (I can't believe we've sold over 100m of this fabric in the last 2 years!!! We will be ordering in some more, but it won't arrive until the end of the year sadly).

I had specific things in mind for this girl. Like pulled and shaded toes. And that I would dress her in a gorgeous summery jumpsuit with matching floral headband. And thankfully it all pulled together wonderfully.

Her name is Stella. And she is available for adoption :) 

Pip, Smudge and Forrest - playing with Viscose

We received some viscose in our last new fabric shipment, so I decided to have a play with dyeing it. I was pleasantly surprised to learn that it dyes just as well as (purhaps even better then) mohair. And I was able to achieve some really pretty mottled/batik effects with my colours.

I chose one particular piece in my favourite shades of olive/mossy green and cut three bears using various reductions of our 'Booth' pattern. (The original pattern makes up to 11" tall, and then we reduced it to give us a 9" bear and a 5.5" bear).

I'm really happy with the end result actually. I adore the feel of the viscose - it's silky to the touch. But with a woven backing it was easy to use. The 5.5" one was a little tricky to turn right-side out, so I reinforced the seams to avoid fraying. But all in all, we ended up with three pretty cute little bears.

All three are currently available in our etsy store. And if you'd like to find the hand-dyed viscose in the other shades we have in stock, just pop on over to FurAddiction.com. I think there's even a little bit of this green/tan 'Camo' colour batch left if you really love it too.

New Fabrics! (and bears)

Ooh So much to tell you!

We have new Limited Edition faux fur fabrics in our Fur Addiction store...

... this one is 'Bush Fire' and it is one I have used a few years ago to make the bear above called 'Bumble' (he is adopted). It is SUPER dense and very very soft and as vivid as it appears in the photos. We have a few pieces left if you'd like to have a play with it.

We also have this STUNNING rainbow tipped white faux fur fresh in the door as well. I've been itching to get my hands on this one. It was expensive, but it is seriously worth it. We have limited pieces of this one available in our store as well.

These are some bears we made in the new rainbow faux fur. The bigger one 'Aneko' is a VERY chunky 22" tall and mixed in panda style with out long pile 'Ace of Spades' black faux fur. It gives the rainbow fur a totally different look to the little 16" bear ('Kai') who is just cut from rainbow.

(The close up photo below is the best 'true-colour' example out of all of the panda photos)

We decided to try something a bit different with Kai and offer her in a facebook auction. Similar to an ebay auction in that it has an end time (3pm tomorrow, Thursday the 17th July - local Brisbane time), and the bids started from $10. We will cover postage anywhere in the world, and have just asked people to bid what they would be happy to pay for her. At the time of writing she is up to about $60 - so a GREAT bargain if you're looking to add a one of a kind beautiful little rainbow artist bear to your collection!

Bailey

After spending so much time over the last few weeks working on our new patterns for the 'Lost Toy's collection (see last post), I was itching to get back to my roots and make a bear from my original style. So I rummaged through my patterns box and found this one I had drawn up over a decade ago for a big 20" bear. I also found a large piece of blonde distressed mohair that I had been hoarding for the right bear. 

And 'Bailey' was born. 

(just quietly, I LOVE him!)