Lady Dances with Dragonflies.

Well my 100 post passed without me even noticing. I had been keeping track and then didn't keep track anyway whatever.
I have finished the challenge doll for my "No Limits" group or as my friend says "No Instructions". We each took in a fabric which was cut into I think 14 or so and then we all got a piece of each fabric back. I have had the fabrics for quite some time and I have done several plans of what I could do. They all got tossed out the window and I decided to do a doll. I have had Ray Slater's book "Cloth Dolls for Textile Artists" for quite a while and I did make one of the wire dolls for the pincushion challenge at the beginning of the year. I don't like the face on pincushion girl and I have made a new one.
Well actually I made a head for the challenge doll and it was too big for the body so I made another head. Serendipitously the big head is the right size for the pincushion doll. Anyway back to Ray Slater's book. I used the stump doll pattern straight from the book. It is supposed to be enlarged to 115% but I didn't worry about that. I didn't use her head pattern as I wanted to have another go at the head technique from Barbara Willis's book "Cloth Doll Artistry".
I really like this way of doing a head. You start with an oval of stretch fabric, stuff it, stitch it while manipulating the stuffing with your needle to make the features and then stitch it some more then color it. You'll have to ge the book for more details than that. It looks quite hard but trust me it isn't. I made my first one in a class with Barbara which may have given me an edge but I think I could have done it from the book.
The other photo is of some of the fabrics we had to use. I forgot to take a photo before I started. I also set myself the challenge that I would not buy anything for the doll.
The body and arms of the doll is a flour bag that I had in my stash. A friend gave it too me.
The head is white two way stretch lycra also from the body fabric drawer in my studio. After the sculpting I painted it with flesh coloured So-Soft fabric paint from the fabric paint bin in my studio.
One of the challenge fabric you can see in the photo above is a piece of cross stitch fabric. I painted it gold with Lumiere paint. I used that for her crown.
Her hair is the multicolored blue/pink/purple fabric. I unravelled it and then stitched it all over. Linda Misa did that with wool in the last Dolls, Bears and Collectables.
Her sleeves and the gold areas on the bottom of her skirt are gold lame that was in the fabrics I received.
The patterned fabric at the bottom of her dress is the whole piece that I got. I painted it and the crinkle muslins and the feathery piece with blue fabric paint. The feathery piece was orange and white. It is on the back of her dress. I vliesofixed it to a piece of the green with white leaves. The brown piece of fabric I used on the back of the dolls head and you can't see it at all.
I used a little strip of the red dragon fabric to make the red dragon fly. I had great plans to use the blue lineny fabric for part of the skirt but changed my mind. The color wasn't right and I couldn't be bothered painting it. So I used some of the threads I had pulled off the fringe to make the blue dragon fly. I cut a thin strip of fabric off the white and made the white dragon fly. I couldn't get a good photo of them. They are just over 4 cm's long and my camera doesn't want to cooperate. The wings are made of the left over white ruffled fabric I used for the cuffs and collar on the doll. It was another of the challenge fabrics. So I have used all the fabrics. The rules of the challenge were that they had to be used not how much. The Studio Assistant(Husband Greg) cut me a piece of wood to use in the base. I added this on later because I couldn't get her to stand up. I should have put a sand bag in the bottom. I am taking her to Adelaide on Thursday our No LImits group is doing the display in the Studio at the Embroiderers Guild This month and she'll probably be back on show there for the fringe festival. Now I jsut have to finish my bit on the group project and I am up to date. I also have to make a small hand made gift for Doll Club on Sunday.