Grazer...

 Another stuffed bear complete - available in my Etsy shop now.

Bears & Blankets...

This week I have made a Holly bear - she sold within 2 minutes of being in my Etsy shop...

...an Otis bear - he's still available, but not sure for how long...

...and completed the lacy crochet blanket that I have been working on over the past few weeks.

 The blanket is also in my Etsy shop.

Currently on the easel is another bear painting, although at the moment it is just the background whcih has taken me a week to finish - tomorrow I start painting the bear, yay!

How It Starts...

This is my current commission - I thought you might be interested to see how a painting like this gets started.  Initially the bear was drawn out carefully in pencil, with a sketchy background as in this case it is mainly leaves, with the water flowing around the rock that the bear is standing on.

Then I begin to paint in the background, carefully around the outline of the bear.  Usually I would use masking fluid to protect the edges of my drawing, but I have run out so on this occasion I have just had to take my time and do it the hard way!  Once the paint around the outline of the bear is dry, I rub out the pencil marks so that when the time comes to paint the bear, I have no dark smudgy lines showing through the paint.  I will do this throughout the painting in order to keep the pencil marks that are visible to a minimum.

The reference photograph I have been given was taken by the lady this is for and is a little bit fuzzy - she told me she was so excited that her hands were shaking!  So as I go, I will try and sharpen it all up a little - I do have quite a few other photos of this particular bear that I can call upon to get details of the face etc. to work from.

This is in watercolour on paper.  I have two more bear paintings to produce between now and Christmas if possible...it's going to take some doing!

Otis...

Just completed this - the bear 480 Otis, painted in watercolour on paper.  This was a private commission.  I have painted Otis many, many times, and thought it might get boring but this one kept my interest the whole way through.  The reference photo just had water around him but I was asked to make it that he was sitting in his 'office' - the area at the back of Brooks Falls where Otis likes to sit quietly and gorge himself on salmon.  I have also painted 'the office' so many times that I don't need a reference photo any more!  Painting all that fur was quite a challenge - so many curls and ruffles!  It took a great deal of concentration not to lose my way with it.

This is part of a double commission, the other being of bear 435 Holly.  Good job I like bears...

Interlude...

I have a ton of work to complete before Christmas (hopefully) but had to take a few days away from it to paint this little chap.  Sometimes it pays to take a step back from the commissioned work to do something for yourself in order to keep your work fresh - I mean, I love Otis the bear, but to paint him three times in a row gets just a little tedious!

So this is a young bear at Katmai who as yet has no number and is currently referred to by the unfortunately nickname of Bucky - long and involved story as to why, which I won't go into here.  A few weeks ago he was lying on a rock just watching the world go by and we got some great close-ups on the live web cams.  I collected a few images as I really wanted to make a painting from them, it was such a sweet moment.  Since then, the urge to get this done has been strong so I went with it and am very pleased with the result.  Watercolour on paper.

He will be in my Etsy shop shortly - and for me, it's back to Otis once again!

A Little Boaring...

Last week my son showed me a picture of a cute stuffed toy, a wild boar piglet.  It was being sold by an unknown company somewhere overseas and he didn't want to chance it.  So I said 'I bet I could make one of those'.

So I did.  I adapted a pattern I found in a magazine for an ordinary pink piglet - had to change the head, alter the tail, put the trotters on the right way round(!) and add the stripes.

 I used some remnants of a velvety fur fabric that I bought a couple of years ago, not knowing what I would do with them.  The whole thing is hand sewn because this fabric is a nightmare to sew on the machine - it slips and slides all over the place.

This is a one off for my baby granddaughter - I am not planning on making any more, too time consuming and fiddly and besides, I don't have any more of the fabric to spare!

Finished!

After weeks, nay months, of work in the evenings, this crochet blanket/throw is finally complete.  It has turned out beautifully!  I knew when I bought the yarn cakes that I wanted a stitch to show off the fabulous colour mix and luckily a simple zig-zag did just that.

I wasn't sure about putting tassels on the points, but decided to give it a go, using the brighter colours in the same order as the stripes, and it was the right decision.  This is such a lovely blanket, even though I say so myself.  It will be for sale in my Etsy shop soon - I am having difficulty getting decent photos of it due to bad weather and the sheer size of the thing!  If you'd like to nip in and get it before I list it, just give me a shout!
 

In other news, I have been sewing yet more Otises - these three are already spoken for and I have further orders to complete.  What started off as a silly experiment really snowballed and I have lost count of how many stuffed bears I have made over the past 3 years.  Thankfully I still enjoy doing them!

On the drawing board - I am now booked up until about Christmas.  I am currently painting a couple more Otis trinket boxes that have been commissioned and I have three bear paintings to do.  The first 2 are for the winner of the American Travel Guide magazine's summer competition - the lady couldn't decide which bear she wanted me to paint so has commissioned me to paint a second one so that she can have both!

It is great to be busy once again - the summer was dismal, both weather-wise and mentally and my creativity almost disappeared.  Being 'forced' to paint and make things to a deadline has kicked my backside back into action, haha!