3 new bears

This is Seth a new bear made from a viscose faux fur. This fabric comes from the German factory where the mohair is made for the Steiff bears. It is lovely & soft & wonderful to work with.
Seth is 5 way cotter pin jointed with black safety eyes.
His pads & inner ears are brown handmade felt.
Below is Sykes made from the same fabric as Seth, he is also 5 way cotter pin jointed with black leather shoe button eyes. His pads & inner ears are made from faux cashmere.
The last bear is Winston. He is made from a black faux fur with vintage velvet paws & innner ears. He has blue English glass eyes, & I have embroidered his nose with blue & black embroidery silk.
I have almost finished a bear made from a grey faux fur, along the same lines as Winston & he will most likely be called Churchill.

Midhurst Christmas show

On the weekend of the 26th & 27th November I did 2 shows. the first being at Midhurst, the second at Southampton University.
Over the course of the weekend 12 bears were adopted, which really made my weekend.
The photo you see is of a new stand that my husband made for me. It enables me to display the bears & the painted items together, which was a resounding success judging by the amount of stock I managed to sell.

Went to Petersfield Saturday for a Wessex Guild show, wasn't that successful.
I was able to catch up with Jenny Stacy, though, who was a previous Guild member & now lives in Petersfield.
About a month ago Jenny opened her own shop, which has been a dream of hers for years.
I was able to pop into Handmade Happiness through the course of the day & I have to say I was well impressed.
It is a small shop but it is packed with handmade articles of all descriptions, from knitted socks & gloves to beautiful jewellery made from velvet, crochet or knitted necklaces & bracelets. There is a lovely hand carved merry go round horse, cushions & buttons, lots of buttons. All the articles in the shop are made by local artisans   & it is truly a little treasure trove. I could have spent a fortune.
Jenny popped into the show to see some old friends & took away 2 of my bears for the shop. She likes bears to be traditional & undressed so Onslow & Stanley a new bear that I finished late on Friday night, while babysitting my two youngest grandchildren, fitted the bill perfectly.
Now I will have to look out some patterns for older type bears just in case Onslow & Stanley are well received in the Petersfield area.

Brent Lodge

A few of the chickens sunning themselves in the morning sun

Brent Lodge

Some of the ducks & swans

Brent Lodge

Brent Lodge is a wildlife hospital in the next lane to mine. I wandered around there Sunday morning as they had their Christmas fair, & normally have plenty of bric a brac on sale.I did pick up a few pieces so will be painting them some time in the near future. I did meander around the wildlife pens & saw a few ducks, geese, owls & swans. There also budgies, chickens, cockatieals & seagulls. The hospital take in anything from hedgehogs to abandoned fox cubs & sometimes injured adults. They have also had the odd badger. I consider myself very lucky to have such a wide variety of wildlife on my doorstep.

Off to Petersfield tomorrow for a Wessex Guild show. Hope the trend of last weekend keeps up & people are spending their hard earned cash for Christmas presents.
I am hoping, if someone will look after my stand for a bit, to pop into Jenny Stacy's new shop, which is not too far from the hall where our show is.
Let you know how it went next week.

Weald & Downland Christmas Market

Did the Weald & Downland Christmas Market at the weekend, it was absolutely manic.
I have to say I was a little worried, as the previous 2 shows I had done nobody seemed to be spending.
Anyway all was well & people seemed to have Christmas in mind. All roads to the museum were gridlocked & the queues to get into the museum from the carparks were taking up to an hour, so I was told.

Anyway here are a few pctures of my stnad at the beginning of the show on Saturday.

Weald & Downland Christmas Market

A beautiful painting by Anne Johnson, which my photography doesn't do justice to.

A small selection of some of Sue Mahler's beautiful handmade ear rings, of which I have 3 pairs.

This is some of Sarah White's traditional decoupage that is currently in Selsey Arts and Crafts.

lane's end bears

Here is Benny. He is made from semi long
faux fur. He is cotterpin jointed with safety
eyes. He wears a buttoned felt waistcoat.
Benny stands approx. 61/2" high.

lane's end bears

Here is Martin a new bear I finished Friday evening.
He is made from a plush faux fur. He is fully safety
jionted with safety eyes and a cheeky expression on
his face. He stands 13" high.

Well St Mary's church was a bit of a flop. I have to say I find it a bit worrying with Christmas just around the proverbial corner. I still had an enjoyable time with my good friend Sue who is a jeweller and I always take her with me to this particular event. Sue always finds the best home made cake stalls and we have a wonderful time stuffing our faces.
I'm at the Weald and Downland museum for the weekend of the 12th and 14th and as it is their Christmas market I hope it will be a bit more productive than the church this weekend.

St Mary's church

Tomorrow I am off to St Mary's church, Littlehampton. This is a craft show I did a few years ago and then stopped for some reason that I cannot remember. Anyway this will be the 3rd year of restarting, it is quite a large event with some charity stalls, but by and large it is handmade products by local artisans.

Selsey Arts and Crafts

I posted a couple of photographs of Selsey Arts and Crafts yesterday and here are a couple more.

Selsey Arts and Crafts is a small shop that I and several other are involved in. Here are a few examples of the work available in the shop.

Bobby David

Here is our great grandson born 5th July 2011.
He really is a little treasure.

Bramley

Bramley is a 6 1/2" mohiar bear.
He sits in a basket with autumn
leaves, & several apples

Simon & Sophie

Simon & Sophie are ready for their picnic.
They have their own teaset, food & table cloth,
all neatly kept in their picnic basket

Hi my name is Lindsey. I am a 50 something mother of 3, grandmother of 5 and great grandmother of 1.
A few years ago I became interested in craft work. This was in the form of canal art. From there I progressed onto my own design of blue and white. I also love the country kitchen look with cows sheep and chickens. These are painted almost cartoon like. Naive, I think the term may be. All the designs are painted onto unwanted, by other people, teapots, jugs, breadbins, even old irons, which make great doorstops.
A year ago this coming Christmas, when my painting room was cleared (on an annual basis), so we as a family are able to sit and eat the turkey etc I took up knitting needles again after 20 odd years. What did I knit? not something useful for one of the family but a teddy bear.
I then progressed onto a few more, which were then sold and now I am making bears of all different descriptions.
I use mohair, faux fur, and fabric. I love vintage fabrics and I have been lucky enough to be given some 60's Liberty Lawn by a friend and hopefully this will make some lovely bears. I also love the retro fabrics that are all the rage at the moment.                                                                                                                                               

Hunni Bear is a 12" bear made from faux fur with upholstery material for his pads. He is 5 way safety jointed with safety eyes. He has a sad expression on his face because his honey jar is empty.

Cracker is a 12" bear made from long faux fur. his pads are made from a Christmas fabric and he has a little Christmad tree stud on his right footpad. He is 5 way safety jointed with English blue glass eyes.

Tinsle is another Christmas bear made from the same faux fur as Cracker. She has Christmas fabric for her paws and is 5 way safety jointed with button black safety eyes. Tinsle stands at 10" and has been adopted and is winging her way to Australia.

These two little sweeties are made from handmade wool felt, curtesey of Michelle Green. They stand just 3" high and have tiny glass seed beads for eyes. Both are thread jointed. They have been adopted, one to America.

These two are Tuppance and Farthing. They are made from very sparse German mohair with with faux cashmere pads and black glass bead eyes. They stand 5" high and are thread jointed.

Arthur is a 10" bear made from dense faux fur. He is 5 way safety jointed with safety eyes. He has a hand knitted scarf and glasses. Arthur has been adopted.

This is Albert. He is a 10" bear made from faux fur, 5 way safety jointed with safety eyes. He has a little handmade waistcoat and spectacles. Albert has been adopted.

I am involved with a little craft shop in Selsey, near to where I live and this is where some of my painting and bears are sold. I also attend craft shows and am a member of the Wessex Guid of Craftsmen.

I will now attempt to post some photos for you to see, there will be none of my painting at the moment, as I have changed computors and there are none saved in the new computor as yet.