Camellia-Rose

 

It is several years since I last used my dye pot to create a teddy bear but last week, I remembered just how much fun it was...

I had a beautiful piece of ivory mohair in my box but it wasn't quite hitting the high notes for me to want to start making a teddy bear, so I decided to use some beautiful silk dyes to mix up a little teddy bear magic! After mixing my dye, I hung the mohair to dry in my garden near the camellia plant my dad gave me for my birthday, about thirty years ago. The plant, originally in a heavy ceramic pot, was eventually transported to our new home and transplanted to the garden about seventeen years ago. It settled into the flowerbed perfectly and has since grown huge over the years, bearing the most stunning pink blooms in April. The colour of my mohair was the colour of the Dad's camellia blooms, which made me smile and inspired me to create my Camellia-Rose teddy bear last week.

Happily, Camellia-Rose was adopted shortly after I popped her onto my website and she will be flying out to America to meet her new owner this week.

I am feeling inspired to create my own palette of pretty teddy bears over the coming summer months, so have ordered a lovely selection of dyes and am looking forward to sharing the results on my website!

Back to the future

BACK TO THE FUTURE

Phyllis was made as a commission order for a collector in the US. I recently received an email containing a photograph of another teddy that I made way back in 2007, together with a request for a similar style of bear... not as easy as it perhaps sounds!

I put on my thinking cap, searched suppliers' websites for suitable mohair and in consultation with my customer, settled on this fabulous tangerine mohair to contrast with the white head and paws in the style of my original bear. My collector asked if I would be able to recreate the face she first fell in love with all those years ago, so I set about hand painting glass eyes to capture the sparkle, shading and needlefelting sleepy little eyelids and embroidering a stunning tangerine nose to create a 2022 version of my original teddy bear.

With her lovely chunky body, hugging arms, drumstick legs and face so full of character, 'Phyliss' has been a delightful revival of a style of teddy bear I very much enjoyed creating in the past ... and one I hope to share again with collectors in the future!

Making a splash!

I think January has to be the bleakest month of the year with its short, dark days...

 It seems to drain the colour from everything!

14" Merriweather

Hopefully the bear I have just finished will help put that right, by adding a very welcome splash of teddy colour to our dreary Winter days...

So, if, like me, you too are craving a little colour in your world, please pop over to my website to meet my latest teddy bear 'Merriweather'!

www.allbearbypaula.com 

I hope he makes you smile while we wait for Spring to arrive.

:-)

Update: Merriweather has now been adopted!

In glorious technicolour

In my last post I promised glorious technicolour and I think you will agree, it really doesn't get more glorious, or more technicolour, than this teddy bear!

20" Rhubarb

We are talking bold, we are talking fun, but most of all, we are talking ABSOLUTELY FABULOUS!!!!

This cheerful 20" mohair clown teddy, is now available for adoption and one thing is absolutely certain, Rhubarb Bear will brighten the darkest room and bring sunshine smiles to his new owner every day!

If you would like to know a little more about Rhubarb, please pop over to visit him on my website:

www.allbearbypaula.com

:-)

Update: Rhubarb has been adopted!

Lovely Lupin

I have just finished this beautiful teddy bear ...

20" Lupin

Another truly fabulous mohair from the famous Schulte company in Germany; this time, a stunning kid mohair with a soft wave to the pile ... in possibly the prettiest shade of lavender ever.

In fact, I think this is the perfect mohair with which to celebrate Summer!

Lovely Lupin is now available for adoption from my website. 

I hope she makes you smile!

www.allbearbypaula.com

:-)

Update: Lupin has now been adopted and will be flying to the US!

First Crocus of Spring

Today was a beautiful sunny day and I spotted the first crocus of Spring ... they are such delicate little flowers pushing through the earth and after a long Winter, are a welcome sight. I have had a nasty bout of 'flu recently so to find Spring just around the corner, cheered me no end!

11" Crocus

Today seems the perfect day to share my latest little teddy girl with you and yes, I have named her Crocus!  

If you would like more details, this sweet 11" bear is now available to adopt from my website:

allbearbypaula.com

:-)

Updated: Crocus has been adopted and will be living in the US!

Lavender's Blue

The lavender is spectacular at the moment and happily, I just happened to have the perfect shade of mohair for a lavender inspired teddy girl.

Dilly has been adopted

I am delighted to tell you, Dilly will be winging her way to live in the good ol' USA next week.

Lavender's Blue

Lavender's blue, dilly, dilly
Lavender's green
When l am King, dilly, dilly
You shall be Queen!

Call up your men, dilly, dilly
Set them to work
Some to the plough, dilly, dilly
And some to the pond.

Some to make hay, dilly, dilly
Some to cut corn
While you and I, dilly, dilly
Keep ourselves warm.

I have happy memories of singing the nursery rhyme 'Lavender's blue, dilly, dilly' as a young child at school but had no idea until researching this morning, that the earliest version originated as far back as the 17th Century and was then considered quite a saucy song! 
We live and learn eh?!

;-)

Mellow Yellow

After my Buttercup post, I had yellow bears on the brain, so started hunting for photos of some of the yellow bears I have made in past years. Sadly, some were lost thanks to the failure of an old hard drive (am hopeless at backing stuff up) but I did find these and couldn't resist putting together a little 'Mellow Yellow' montage to share here with you today ...

Sunny Jim, featured in the central pic taken with me, is one of my all time favourite teddy bears ... I can't quite believe it has been ten years since I made him, where on earth did they all go?!  Looking at these bears, it seems I have used yellow mohair for Spring, Summer and Autumn teddies - I couldn't find a wintery yellow bear though; maybe yellow is just too cheery for a chilly winter teddy bear?  Or maybe there lies a challenge for me to rise to this coming winter ... create a wintery yellow bear ... hmmn, might give that further thought!

:-)

Hubble, Bubble!

When I was first invited to create this special bear by a dedicated collector of artist bears, I wondered how I could ensure the bear would be the perfect colourway ... my collector loves brightly coloured bears and as intense mohair colours are more often than not, difficult to source direct from suppliers, I knew it wouldn't be easy to find the perfect colours 'off the shelf'' for this particular bear. So I put my thinking cap on, sought advice from other bearmakers and found myself pointed firmly in the direction of Woodland Witch (in the nicest possible sense) Rita, who is the font of all knowledge regarding such matters!

Rita's Rainbow Dyes

I arranged to have a chat with Rita at the Hugglets show in London earlier this year, to discuss how best to proceed and she kindly spent a considerable time prior to show opening (!) guiding me through my options to achieve the perfect hand dyed mohair with her 'Rainbow' dyes, created especially for use with mohair.

I mixed the carrot dye with hot water as directed and after dunking a small sample of mohair to test the colour strength, (one Marigold glove is inadequate by the way - I couldn't find the other one and consequently dyed my other hand!) plunged my mohair into the dye and left it for about twenty minutes to achieve the colour I needed.

Then I dunked my other piece of mohair into the pink potion - by this time I'd given up using the single rubber glove and dyed my hands shocking pink!

I rinsed both pieces of mohair in clear warm water, with a little fabric softener ...

At Rita's suggestion, I stored the leftover dye in a screw cap container when it had cooled, for use another time ...

... let my mohair dry in the breeze ...

... and finally, hubble, bubble, a little toil and not much trouble, here's my very colourful bespoke bear 'Calypso' a few days' later, ready to fly to the US to meet his owner!

If you would like to learn more about hand dyed mohair using Rita's 'Rainbow' dyes, please visit www.woodlandteddies.com