Handmade Hobart market weekend

The view of the the hall from the stage

The weekend finally arrived and 2 months of solid stitching and painting all came together for my first market stall in years.
Even though the weather was pretty lousy, heavy rain, wind and cold. I knew that Tasmanian's being a hardy bunch would brave the elements and support their local artists and crafts people! And they did.

Little Black Crow and friends

My stall was set up in the middle.

a very dangerous position in more ways than one. Just before we set up our stall we came dangerously close to being seriously injured. the lady behind us had a very heavy display board not very well fastened to her table and it came crashing down in between my boyfriend and I , glass going everywhere. Uninjured, we cleaned up and carried on as if nothing happened.
And the ice was broken, so to speak between us and the stall holder and we had polite conversation for the whole 2 days. the other dangers where posed by who was selling opposite me, Jo from Bird and the Fish, Narelle from Ruby Victoria, Rosie from Notions and Edwina from Little Snoring! Even my partner Pig found it hard to resist.

Penni, one of our illustrious organisers for the market. also a friend and fellow knitter.

Jo, with her scrumptious yarns, Bird and the Fish

Marita from Moderately Me

Look how well we did with our purchases!
I only wish that Jo had stayed there for one more day so I could have made up my mind to which one of her yummy yarns I needed.

All in all we had a fun time and I learnt a great deal about my work and peoples reactions to them. It was good exposure for my work and for myself after months and months of locking myself away and working hard making my dolls and other wares. I'll certainly be doing more markets in the future. Next time though I will need to take a large sktch book with me as I ended up doodling doll designs in my log book!

A bear on the side

Couldn't wait to introduce everyone to my new little bear design. She is just over 4 inches tiny!
So far she is the only one I've made. But I'm pretty happy with her. I like making the traditional bears but this one is more me! So watchout sor her buddies on Etsy in the new year.
Just about finished with all my dolls for the year and for the market, yippee...oh still got to work out how I'm going to dispaly my work. I have some ideas and in the process of building a few things. I'll have to do a few mock ups at home before the event.
In December I going to show case some peoples work that I have been buying through out the year. Can't wait to put them up. Christmas on the web this year has been so exciting and I've been a bit naughty and splurged on a few things but they are all well worth it as you will all see.
Okay thats it for now...still have to finish off a few tiny clothes and paint a few snowmen!

Treasured Gingrebread Men

These happy little fellas will be for sale at the Handmade Hobart market at the end of the month.

The design came about from a cookie cutter that has been in the family before I was born.

It belonged to my dad, who worked as pastry chef in Austria.

I've never seen another one like it. So the other day I rang my mum up to ask her weather she knew where my dad had found this cookie cutter. To my surprise she told me my dad had designed it himself and had it made for him by a friend of his who worked with metal and owned a shop in Austria. I was so amazed that I had never know this story and really makes me treasure my fathers cookie cutter even more.

Since my dad died 26 years ago, every Xmas I always make gingerbread men in memory of him.

oh and TEN more

I love it!!

Finally warm sunny weather, it's just brilliant. Last night Pig and I had a little impromptu barbecue....and yes we did chuck prawns on the the barbie!
Beers, wine, ouzo, what a night!

And today its back to work, but that's alright cos' I'm loving that too. Just finished and listed two more Xmas decorations/ornaments...one vintage style black SantaCat and Mr Snowman!!

Gotta get back to work....I've a table full of more Xmas dolls and ornaments. A few secret projects and oodles of doodles for new dolls next year!
One last thing before I zip off . A big thank you to all my new followers. In the last few weeks my list has grown so fast. I'm really very appreciative to all of you that have signed up, take a peek at my work and make comments!!

Veronica Vampire

What a morning!! First of all I had to do battle with a moquito and spider infested pond. All the fish died a long time ago. It was in the part of the garden that we, well apart from the cats hardly ever go. So it became overgrown with weeds, blackberries and worse ivey! I don't mind spiders it's the tics and scorpions that I loathe..fortunately I didn't see any. Anyway it's all been cleared and the plastic and water removed. So now we have little garden hide away that I think I'll just plant out in ground covers.
Anyway that was my weekend priority out of the way and now I'm back into the studio working on lots and lots of different dolls and ornaments for my little market stall at the end of the month. So if you find yourself in Hobart on the 28th and 29th of November with an urge to shop for handmade items get yourself down to the Handmade Hobart Market, St Peters Hall, in Harrington St between the hours of 11 - 4pm.
But the best news is that I've finished my little mini monthly vampire challenge for my Art Dolls Only group.

Veronica Vampire, 'it's just a little over bite', Veronica's

mum used to tell her.

My first full polyclay doll. I used super sculpy, wire armature, acrylic paint and black died sheep's wool roving for the hair. The hair I glued down little strands at the time.

The wip photo's shows glass beads for her eyes. I chose to make them out of sculpy too and shaped them to fit her eye sockets.
As much as I enjoyed making her I think next time I'll just make the head and hands out of sculpy and make a cloth body. I have a deep love for stop motion and some of my favorite characters are from Rankin/Bass's Mad, Mad Monster Party. You can see the imperfections and the hand made quality to the puppets, it's terrific. I approach my dolls as if the where 3D drawings. Drawing onto them ans scuffing them up.
Another thing I guess is that I just always seem to draw my little girl characters wearing a Wednesday Adams dress and a little widows peak...some would say that they also resemble the artist...well I was nicknamed at one work place as Eddy Munster!

Little Vampire girl in progress

 

My little vampire for the ADO mini Vampire challenge. Still need to make her hands and hair. She was fun to make. Her body took the most time to make.

Happy Halloween!!