Another recycling project for me. This rather unattractive girl’s denim dress into……
To make your own peg dolls you will need:
The first step is to paint your pegs, as you can see I mixed up a variety of pinks, browns and whites for the skin colour. Wait until the first coat is completely dry before painting again. Once again, allow to dry.
Now paint the legs, from the centre slit down to the tips. Allow each coat to dry before doing the next. You can make the legs spotty, stripey, plain, whatever you like. Then paint the tips with a darker colour for the shoes (I used black). Paint on hair in different styles. You can paint on the face if you have a fine paintbrush, but I drew mine on with Pigma pens. A word of warning – the varnish seems to smear the pen, so avoid varnishing the face, or leave to dry for 48 hours first (I don’t like to wait!)
When completely dry, coat the pegs with varnish and stand to dry. Coat again. You can use either a matt, satin or gloss varnish depending on the effect you want. Allow to completely dry.
Push a chenille stick to the top of the split in the peg. It should have fairly equal amounts on each side, but you can trim them later so don’t worry too much.
Taking the chenille stick from the front, wrap it around the body of the doll twice, winding up towards the head. The last wrap should go around the back of the head and stick out at a 90 degree angle to the doll. You can see I’ve also bent the other stick at an angle so it doesn’t get caught in the first wrapping.
Now take the chenille stick from the back and wind in the opposite direction, around the body twice again, and around the back of the neck as before. Trim the arms if they are not equal or readjust your winding.
Put a small dob of craft glue at the back, just underneath where the arms cross. This is not essential, but helps to hold them in place.
I’ll be posting the tutorial seperately seeing as it’s photo heavy. But first, an introduction starring the Peg Doll Girls!
Meet Jane, an all round nice girl, everybody’s friend.
This is Krishna, she loves spending time with her friends and is an adventurous cook.
This is Carmel, she’s a little bossy but a big softie underneath it all.
Last but not least is Anna the fashionista. Her favourite pastime is, yep, you guessed it – shopping!
An art journal cover that I’m practicing hand quilting on (and I really need the practice!)
Peg dolls that are painted but as yet unclothed, I’m trying to figure the best way to dress them without interfering with the attached arms. Hopefully I’ll have a tute up for these soon too š
A pair of shorts for one of the girls from recycled clothing.
I’ve been shopping just a little for some “essentials”. A few bright and pretty fabrics, some lovely hand dyed wool felt from Winterwood and wooden clothes pegs to make peg dollies with the girls.
It is a near perfect spring morning here, I hope you enjoy your day wherever you are.
Yes, I’ve been on Flickr, couldn’t you just spend all day there, so much to see! I do love pin cushions, I can’t believe I still haven’t gotten around to making myself one (or one hundred – I like them that much!) This cute little arrangement is by Lucy’s Daughter.
We tend to be a hand – me – down magnet as a family which is mostly a good thing, but involves sorting through bags of clothes we often don’t want and that end up in the charity bin. Recently I saved a few items that were made with nice fabric but in a style I didn’t like or were too big for my girls. Cut out the seams etc. and ta – da! Free fabric.
So here is the first installment, a top made from 2 other tops. The crocheted flower was a gift, so, apart from the thread and the sweat of my brow the top was completely free.
I have a growing interest in Crewel embroidery but haven’t gone so far as to buy the crewel wool needed yet. The design above is a simple one from a crewel work book which I worked in stranded floss. I’d love to have lots of little framed embroideries around my home, so this one will be the first. I actually want to do one for the laundry, seeing as I spend so much time in there these days and it’s possibly the least attractive room in the house!
I love hand embroidery very much and hope to increase my skills to teaching level one day. It is such a rewarding pastime and is so rich in history.
I do have one problem (see above). My mother in law kindly gave me her embroidery tin many years ago and this is what sparked my interest. Each new lot of cotton I buy ends up in here – a tangled mess! I would like to treat my cotton respectfully and increase my stash, but this is holding me back. I’ll consult my friend Google for solutions, but if anyone has any helpful suggestions I would be most grateful!
What a week! I attempted this sketchy self portrait tonight, which not only doesn’t look like me, it also doesn’t convey the intended message- that is, I’m exhausted! It started on Monday with a trip to Emergency for a suspected broken arm (our 2 year old, not me!) Several hours and x – rays later the patient began using her arm again as though nothing had happened, we now think it was a dislocation that popped back in when being handled for the x – rays. Mid week I was “sprung” with the surprise that 2 nieces would be arriving on my doorstep at an hour’s notice. After a 3 night stay and a baby who insists on crying nearly all day, every day, I was starting to feel a little put out and frazzled. The nieces (who are lovely, by the way) have now been delivered to another destination and we are back home resting after the lengthy drive.
Now here’s the best part. As you know, I’ve been dutifully handwashing since my washing machine broke down. Ta – da! I now have a new, larger and better washer and all is right with the world again.
And now to enjoy the rest of the weekend, hopefully with the absence of any phantom broken limbs or unexpected house guests!
A woman I used to care for in a nursing home would often say “porridge is knowledge!” (RIP Ludmilla – lovely lady). I myself am so enthused about porridge that I’m posting about it today. I think of it as a sort of all round superfood. It is very cheap, very healthy, and very filling. Not to mention it tastes good. If you’re also a porridge enthusiast here is a brief historical account and some Scottish recipes here.
Just don’t you dare make it salty like my mother in law used to! YUK!
We are so blessed to have had a lot of rain at this time and the garden really has some marvels to show for it. I don’t know that it has ever looked as lush.
The rather unattractive colourbond back fence is now completely dominated with flowering jasmine and dolocus.
And, most exciting, there are more than 3 apricots on the tree this year! Now the challenge is to convince the birds that we actually love them more than they do.