Teddy Talk: Creating, Collecting, Connecting

Thanks, lovely ladies--you are tooooo kind. Really.

One reason I sent the snaps instead of waiting for the good camera is that I vowed to stay off the bear forums until I had a picture to post. It was awful. Miserable. So I compromised a bit . . . cheated, maybe, but I couldn't stand it any more.

He IS far away. My little 'toy' computer camera is so bad that I couldn't even doctor the pix with Photoshop. They just fell apart--and it won't focus any closer than 3 feet, and produces awful redeye. By sometime tomorrow I should be able to produce details---the stuff I worked so hard on!!

He is sad, thinking he's a failure as a duck and all, but . . . George?!! I'll have to ask him.

Learning curve was pretty steep, but I've learned a lot making this little dude

Nance, Nance, name your price!! I'd love some Tibetan Lamb!!

Thanks again, everybody. You're the best--

Eileen

I sure have missed this forum since my cold turkey!!

Shelli,
Alan Rickman is THE MAN in our house. Yes, it's the voice, but . . .

Winney,
your story reminded me of the time in college I decided I needed some [INVALID] black underwear (don't ask), but was dead broke. So I dyed some whites, and ended up with splotchy charcoal grey . . . not quite the intended effect.

Happy coincidence, Daphne, I just happened to find a black micron marker in the bathroom today. No idea who owned it, but I do now!!

Just to show I can be on topic, I ordered some artificial sinew from Tandyleather today, so there!  :P

Eileen

Hello all,

With fear and trembling, herewith snaps of my Ugly Duckling Bear, made in honor of Hans Christian Andersen's Bicentennial. No formal portrait yet, can't find my daughter's good digital camera, had to use the crummy thing that came with my computer.

Ugly Duckling Bear is made of taupe mink and black rabbit. He has cygnet markings on his face, grey glass taxidermy bird eyes with lids and gold sparkles, wired ears, a cute little upturned ducky/cynet tail, WEBBED FEET with leather pads and glass claws, WINGY arms with leather pads molded to look more or less like feathers, also with glass claws, and open mouth with 2 glass teeth.

His mommy loves him , but . . . Please tell me what you think--any suggestions for improvement would be most welcome.

Eileen

Yummy little bear, Sue Ann :D

He's Anime and beautiful!!

Eileen

Welcome, KBonsal & Hi Again, Jossan, :D

Omigosh, Judi--

My husband has been urging me to register my 'business', and I keep saying that I haven't sold anything yet, so why not wait. I've got to check the Ontario rules&regs and find out if I can deduct supplies I've bought before actually selling anything. Taxes make me dizzy :(

Thanks for the inspiration . . .

Eileen

Louise, Louise, Louise

Are you daft, girl?! I would kill to make bears like yours!!

But I know slumps. Maybe you need to splurge on bit of inspiration, like a new chunk of mohair??? :D

Eileen

Hang in there, Dilu :lol:

My eldest (27) has been through a range of very "interesting" boyfriends, some of whom ended up living with us.
But each one is a little less awful than the last, so I have hope!! :rolleyes:

My now-married daughter (25), the settled domestic one now working on her Masters Degree in English, used to dye her hair bright purple, wore a ring in her nose and bellybutton, and swore she'd never marry anyone but  a rock singer.

I used to iron my very long hair and dress like a goth, long before there WERE goths. In those days, I would have been every son's mother's nightmare. Got a BA in Greek, a PhD in English, got very respectable as an English Prof and mother. Now I'm making teddies. Go figure.

Lysistrata's heart is in the right place, and that's what counts. We gotta love the people our kids love, if only on spec!

Eileen

Hi from Toronto, Gail,

I found a treasure trove of metallic nail polishes at clearance prices at the local Guardian Pharmacy. They're somewhat out of fashion here, I think, since none of the mainstream cosmetics companies seems to be offering the really radical colors, but you might find some at Walmart, or at one of those mall stores that caters to the very (very very) young. Hardware/home reno stores often have small bottles of enamel for model-making and appliance repairs.

Hi Marie! Welcome! I've been asked this question before! It's a a real bear--a little grizzly cub in the snow--because haven't yet finished my first serious bear   I'll post a pic as soon as I do. Next bear will be from Nancy Tillberg's pattern for the Bears4Charity challenge, and NEXT bear will be that little griz!! I love the realistic bears too, and I'm determined to figure out how to make one.

Eileen

Ditto--Shelli's the best :D

Eileen

She's called Lysistrata? Dear God in Heaven!! That's the naughtiest of naughty Greek comedies Doesn't seem to fit with serious PETA, somehow!! Better warn your son . . .

Eileen

Nice poetry and piccy, Jane! :D

Marie, my mom used to kill the little slimers in her garden with salt. Nasty business, but it worked. I manage to keep them away from my hostas with a ring of copper tubing--I've heard they won't slither over it. Maybe one of these would work in a drain?

Hooting English drains make me think of Mrs. Lopsided in "The Ladykillers" :lol:

Eileen

Aww, Penny,

Joshua is a love!! Lucky you. I adore baby cheeks!! :)

Eileen

Great idea, Winney Making prototype of faux fur. I'm going to try it next time!

Eileen

Thanks, Rita :D

You give me hope! My husband keeps saying, "Well, I guess you must be almost finished now . . . " :/

But I think there's a lot to be said for experimental trial and error. My least favorite errors are the ones I make when I'm distracted, e.g., jointing the arms in reverse when I was swept up in an audiobook--King Lear, Paul Scoffeld, divine!!

Eileen

Great topic, Dilu! :D

I've never used a pattern for stuffed animals, maybe because I couldn't find patterns for what I wanted. My first 'bears' were a family of Berenstein Bears I made for Christmas. My middle daughter was mad for them. I also made her a tree house out of wood, chicken wire and paper mache. My second bears were 3-foot Care Bears--Grumpy, Birthday and can't remember the third. I just folded and snipped and folded and snipped some more until I got the shapes that looked right. The tree house finally came out well, but my first attempt collapsed with a great SCHLUMP just as I was abandoning it for the night!

So when I started on my first 'artist' bear, haha, I thought I wouldn't need a commercial pattern. I did make a clay model, draped it for a pattern and made a muslin prototype. So far so good. When I started making the bear in fur and stuffing it, all the proportions seemed off. So I'm on my second head, my second pair of front legs, etc, etc.

It's my learn-as-you-go-bear. :lol:

Eileen

All your stories are wonderful!! I certainly understand the depression. I spent 8 years coping with my OCD ridden daughter, with no time for anything else. None. She slept and woke at odd hours, and kept trying to turn herself into the police as a danger to society. We spent hours every day of 'exposure' therapy' -- I forced her to hold knives or scissors aimed at me or one of the pets until her anxiety level dropped.  Watching her suffer so much, and having to force her through all this pain was very stressful, not to mention the strain of constantly bargaining with her high school, which was no help at all even though she was designated Special Ed.

I finally started showing the classic symptoms of depression. It's the worst illness I've ever been through. I was lucky enough to recognize the symptoms, and finally managed to drag myself to my doctor. Thanks to the Zoloft she prescribed and therapy with my daughter's psychologist, I started feeling better. About that time, Alex (my daughter) gave me a huge polar bear for Christmas--not very expensive, but 4 feet long and very realistic. The rest of the family thought we were daft, and got awful frights when they came on my bear in the dark, but Alex clearly knew what I needed!

Her psychologist suggested I start healing by doing something every day that I wanted to do. This was a new and revolutionary idea for me!! By now I'm into it full time, but back then it wasn't easy. Some days I thought I wanted to clean the oven. The therapist told me to try something else.  I wasn't looking very hard, but when I found the world of artist bears, I knew this was IT. I haven't cleaned the oven in a long time!

Alex has just finished her first year at the University of Toronto with straight A's, and I'm feeling new at 60, which ain't bad!  As far as I'm concerned, 60 is the new 30!!

Eileen

Absolutely. Thank heaven for the psychotherapists. I wonder if there's a name for stuffed-animal trauma?

Aroma's picture appeared in my preview, but seems to have disappeared. He was a weird skunk. Raccoon.

Eileen

Oh, man, I agree with both of you. Some of the best people I've ever met were teachers, and some of the worst.

And c'mon, Penny, out with it . . . couldn't be worse than what I'm imagining!!

Eileen

Wonderful story, Shelli. If you think your first bears were ugly, wait till you see mine!!! :mad:

But you give me hope and, for us bloodstained, fur-covered, overspent rookies, that's a great gift!! :D

Eileen

Thanks, Dale I'll get the hang of this sooner or later.

But I digressed. My alltime favorite animal was Aroma the skunk. I can't remember where he came from, or how I got him, but he went everywhere with me.  It wasn't until many, many years later that I was stopped in my tracks by a violent existential shock. Aroma wasn't a skunk at all. Never had been. Aroma was a RACCOON, ringed tail and all. Double Duh. I've never really got over it. Anyway, here's me with Aroma, my Dad and one of my sisters with some weird creature I can't remember or identify!!

Daddy's girl,
Eileen

Sorry, make that $15 US

It certainly is amazing what uses we can find for things, Rita!! I've forbidden ANYONE to toss out bags or shoes until I've checked the condition of the leather. And I've confiscated all mateless earrings from the daughters'  jewellry boxes. 

You never know . . .

Winney--the best source of horsehair I've found is  www.tandyleather.com
You can buy a 4 oz. hank for about $US and the selection includes white, which is usually much more expensive than black or brown. In my spare time I'm making a rocking horse!

Eileen

Love the rat, Rita--what an elegant little cutie!! What do you use for the tail and whiskers?

Eileen

I'm HOME--

Golly! Bears, menopause, bear dreams, snoring husbands, creeping out in the wee hours to play, animals real and stuffed, coping with the interesting lifestyles of offsprings' significant others . . .

Where was I? Oh, right . . . I literally stumbled into bearmaking when I was cruising eBay, looking for a pre-owned sheepskin coat for my husband. His was literally in tatters, which never stops him wearing anything.

Some combination of "fur" and "vintage" landed me on the "artist bear" page. I visited websites, googled bears, etc., all the while drooling into my keyboard, and in no time had a huge file of real bear pictures, a list of bear artist and bear supplies websites, and a serious obsession.

I had so many ideas, and so many techniques I wanted to practice that I couldn't seem to get down to any one project, so I decided to go for broke and enter the Ace Awards competition in order to set myself a deadline. Unfortunately, my little bear didn't make it in time, and I'm not sure I'd have found the nerve to carry through, but the effort kept me working, and to very high standards. The little dude is now mostly jointed, and just needs his head and neck attached. He's no prizewinner, but I'm a very proud sow!! :D

I really wish I'd discovered this years ago, but I guess it's never too late to discover what you really want to do when you grow up, right!?  :rolleyes:

Eileen

Like Laura, I slept with all my animals--and a younger sister. Most of the animals, and sometimes my sister, ended up on the floor by morning. Here we are in Falls Church Virginia. I'm the one on the left, sprawled out in a rather unladylike pose!

Eileen