Its been a while so I thought it was about time I did another post to share my latest creations – bulb boys and black cats.

This probably goes to show, in case you need any convincing, how my work varies considerably from one creation to the next. And yet, as Ryan O’Neal memorably says to Barbra Streisand in the movie What’s Up Doc: “I am not repeating myself, I am not repeating myself… Oh God, I’m repeating myself!”

Unlike some makers, who find their niche and essentially keep making the same thing over and over again (and there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that if it’s what floats your boat, I hasten to add) I tend to get bored easily – and then my inspiration disappears down a sinkhole of repetitive tedium.

My “not repeating myself” way of working doesn’t really make economic sense: it is, after all, far less time-consuming to perfect and then repeat one thing and keep making variations of that thing, than to constantly imagine, develop, test and create new things. Time really is money when it comes to making, so if you can make things quicker and better, you really should. At least, you should if you want to make money.

But I am a contrary beast and consequently the thought of endlessly repeating myself or confining myself to making one thing, ad nauseam, makes my heart sink and my soul shrink.

That said, it seems that I do repeat myself from time to time, when the mood takes me…

You may have read my previous post about my first bulb boy, a therapeutic winter make to fool my seasonally-challenged mind into feeling that spring was on its way.

I enjoyed making that so much that I made another, slightly different bulb boy…

I really enjoyed making him, too. And after I finished him, I had a thought…

What if I made a series of dolls, showing the transition (in bulb form) from winter to spring? From a little corm (my first bulb boy doll) to a big, beautiful, blooming bulb?

So that’s exactly what I did. A classic case of repeating myself whilst not repeating myself.

In the process, I had to rummage out suitable materials to construct and convey what I wanted.

The list of ingredients required included:

• wire
• threads
• offcuts from a dress I altered
• bits of an old sheet
• parcel string
• scraps from a tea towel left over from a quilt project years ago
• part of one of those socks you get given free on long haul flights (from a long-ago trip to see my sister in Australia)
• stuffing from a cushion that had been left discarded by the bins
• paint
• PVA glue
• a bit of old bath mat
• paperclay
• foam-covered wire plant ties
• vintage millinery stamens
• silk ribbon
• various other fabric bits from my scraps basket

I studied endless photographs of daffodils and narcissus flowers online (as there weren’t actually any real ones in flower yet to study) and learned more about daffodil anatomy than I ever thought I would know.

I enjoyed every minute of it. And though I say so myself, the resulting bud and flower look, to my eyes at least, reasonably convincing fabric replicas of their real, natural selves.

When I had finished, I had the full set: from sleeping corm to blooming bulb.

My personal favourite is the final doll, who is gazing up, full of wonder at his own efflorescence…

It was an absorbing project from start to finish, done purely for my own amusement (although I have actually sold two of the dolls) and a fitting response to the darkness and winter blues that often envelope me in the dreary months of late winter. It reminded me of C.S. Lewis, writing in The Lion The Witch and The Wardrobe: that “awful” feeling of “always winter, never Christmas” (or in my case, Christmas just a distant memory). It’s a description that has stayed with me since I first read the book in childhood.

So that’s the bulb boys. Making four of them was great. Although making forty of them would make me die inside.

Sometimes I don’t mind returning to things I have made previously, as with the black velvet cats.These cats (both the one above from before and my new ones) were commissioned by Sarah Campbell. They are dressed in an assortment of the beautiful, vintage archive fabrics that Sarah designed for Liberty, back in the day. I couldn’t quite believe that it had been five whole years since I last made any of these cats – but the date was there in black and white on my Instagram profile, so it must be true.

Working with velvet is always a challenge, as anyone who has tried making dolls with it will know. But in this case the joy of having made these dolls before is that I have already done the hard work of figuring out how not to shred their slender limbs as I turn them.

The type of velvet is important – and luckily I had spotted some suitable-sounding stuff online (not too heavy – definitely not furnishing velvet) at a bargain price.

So off I went…I’ve only made four kitties so far, though if they sell well there may yet be more.

So it’s a good job that I haven’t exhausted my tolerance of them!The thing that I love most about making dolls is the endless variations you can incorporate, even when you start from seemingly identical beginnings. With a bag full of Sarah’s wonderful fabrics to work with, there’s never any reason to be bored.

The flower crowns were the most fun to create – lots of faffing about with tiny scraps and snippets, matching and contrasting colours with their outfits. I could make lots more of those without getting the least bit bored.But soon it will be time to move onto the next thing…

Sarah has a new book coming out shortly, all about hand painted textiles. If you want to know all the details of how to go about that, I would heartily recommend you check it out (its available to pre-order from Bloomsbury).

To go along with the book I will be making some more dolls with Sarah’s hand painted fabrics, all being well – dolls like, yet not like, the ones I made that were sold in Anthropologie a while back.

Another case of (not) repeating myself to look forward to. ♥