Sarah Appleton - Textile Artist Blog

Back in May I decided to make a gift for a young family member's second birthday and sadly not being able to find the pattern I had for  Karma Chameleon  I was forced to hit my local public library for some inspiration. I came across the book 'Sewn Toy Tales' by Melly and Me  (aka Melanie Hurlston) and fell in love with the cute faced characters - in particular one 'Darcy the Dinosaur' - and decided this was the toy for me! Or rather for the child in question.  I used some flowery fabric from my stash along with a plain semi-matching orange fabric and vintage green ric-rac for the ruff. To finish him off I used white felt for the horns (super fiddly to turn inside out but effective) and button eyes. Umm... can I keep it though? What do you think? The thing I love most about this toy is that it can stand up all by itself! I was in two minds about the choice of the flower fabric originally, but I'm really happy that I went with this one in the end because it looks...

I hardly ever seem to have time to update this blog at the moment what with all my uni work and general Life Stuff piling up, but the intention is always there to do it... anyway since it's currently half term I've found a spare few minutes to write so I thought I'd share this: That is my cat James, and recently I've made a couple of brooches in his honour: The first was a neon green and pink psychedelic felt effort for my penpal Sally, who looooves pink and green! Here you can see James modelling it like a pro... this was a little before it was finished, but you get the idea. Decatitated The second one I made in more realistic catty colours for my friend Serina, a Japanese student on my course whose time with us was only scheduled for two terms and last week she headed back home to Japan! I made her this as a leaving present; as you can see I used felt and little button eyes. Sally and Serina both seem to be very pleased with their James faces althou...