I wanted to put together this quick little tutorial after Kitty said that she found getting the cushions pointy enough was the bane of her life, strong words, I felt like that once too Kitty...but then I worked out a new way of making cushions, inspired by Gill's patchwork tutorial. :D
I felt so bad about the thought of anyone else suffering with their unpointy enough cushions, I had to get this out there pronto! :D
You will need:-
Fabric
Needle
Thread
Paper (preferably graph)
Glass beads or stuffing
Iron/Hair straighteners
Carefully cut out a template using graph paper, keep it as square as possible, then cut a piece of fabric slightly larger.
Turn the fabric over and place your template in the centre.
Fold fabric (preferably along the grain) using the paper to guide you. Use your nail to press the edge down.
Press the fold, either using hair straighteners or an Iron, you will need to repeat this for each fold.
I use hair straighteners, because they're quite handy for mini ironing.
Make sure to test a scrap piece of your material, just in case it melts.
Fold as before, but on the opposite side from the last fold, and press.
Fold as shown, press, then fold the other side and press. Try your best to keep the sides of this particular fold, as square as possible, it helps to begin the fold at either end and move inwards towards the centre, using your fingers to press the fabric down.
Now make another one. I usually use plain fabric for the back, to conserve the printed fabric. An old pillow case is a great source of plain fabric.
Abracadabra.........the fabric will now change (apologies for the continuity error, we will now be demonstrating with a new fabric...)
Cut a length of fine thread, for this cushion I think I used about 35 cm. Tie a knot at one end, thread it, and insert the needle into the corner from the reverse of the fabric.
You should sew from this point, where you can see the folds (this means you will have a less fussy edge to sew later on). Connect the two with your needle and thread as shown.
Now that the two pieces are joined, begin sewing your cushion together. I use the ladder stitch, putting the needle under just a thread or two of the fabric. Do not sew the inner folds together, work over them.
Ladderstitch diagram.
When you are almost back at the beginning, you can start filling the cushion. I use micro glass beads, I can't remember which size, but I bought them from Mohair Bearmaking supplies. I hold the cushion over a jar of them, and use a teaspoon to drop them in, until it's just right. You may have to smoosh the cushion a bit to fit them in as you go.
Now carefully holding the cushion, sew up the hole, still using the ladderstitch.
Sorry for the blur, under the last stitch at the corner put the needle under and draw through until you are left with a small loop...
...then put the needle through this loop and draw through to create a knot close to the corner. Repeat once or twice more.
Then push the needle down through the corner as shown (where you just made the knot)
Push the needle through the cushion until it pops out somewhere on the other side.
And cut the loose thread. If there is a little short bit poking out after you have cut the thread, smoosh the cushion and it should disappear.
The only downside about this method, is that the stitches will be slightly more visible than they would be if you used the "turning inside out" method, you can always glue a strand of thicker thread around the cushion to act as piping, which I haven't tried out yet, but I imagine it would work very nicely.
Hello, I'm alive. I recently received the most gorgeous Elisabeth Causeret Pottery from the lovely Pepper (of Mitchymoominiatures), which is also very convenient because I have little to blog about at the moment, and probably won't until after Christmas. We're having very dull weather here in N.Ireland at the moment (what's new?), so photos have been lightened up so that you can see them. Pepper was at Miniatura this Autumn and asked if I needed anything.....which I did.......
Pepper surprised me with this little flower pot, I love the detail around the rim! It has a little drainage hole too, so your miniature plant won't get root rot!
And some cushions I made recently, all of the fabric is from Little Trimmings
And that's me away for another little while... I have quite a few miniatures in the making at the moment. If I post about them half finished, I may not finish them, new rule for myself, I'm too good at leaving cliffhanger endings to my miniatures on occasion. I'm sorry to say I haven't been great at keeping up with everybody's work at the moment either, and I am going to be working on some things for Pepper, which I will post about as well, once they are in her possession of course! Very much looking forward to the Pepper project actually! So until next time...
Hope you enjoyed the lovely work of Elisabeth Causeret!
Still in a strange haitus, thanks for your support in the last few posts everyone. I know we all get this from time to time :D Nature has filled in quite a bit for me for this one.
Last week I dragged a friend to the beach, and then embarked on a long mini beach combing session. Apparently it looked a bit strange and he suggested (if there is a) next time we should wear white overalls and fence the beach off, because it looked like a "crime scene investigation" was in progress. Not surprised either, finding tiny shells involves getting your eyes as close to the sand as possible and then carefully picking over it...I'll get him to take a photo of me in action! Many people walked past and the odd dog got in the way, I don't remember much, just lots of coarse sand with the odd nice shell in it.
The Shells are a mix of Dogwhelks, Periwinkles (ridiculous amount of those), Flattops (Gibbula..) Cone shells (Turritella..) and cowries.
Driftwood twigs. You can break driftwood twig into smaller sizes and then sand the ends. The starfish are made using thick wire and soldered in the centre, the tips are rounded off with a file and then sponge painted.
I REALLY, REALLY LOVE THESE! Miniature Japanese style glass floats, made using crochet thread and marbles. I made one for Genevieve in a swap, though I've perfected them a bit since then, particularly the colour, Genevieve, if you want a refit, get in touch! I used a brilliant video and picture tutorial by Sharon Ojala, which you can see below. Instead of using a wire ring, I made a loop in the middle of one of the eight threads needed.
Lovely little beach finds! Tiny limpet shells, sea glass and coral weed. The pretty little spiral one is a Gibbula Umbilicalis (thank goodness for Google :D )
Edit :-
I was just reading that a stunted version of Coral weed grows in high shore pools, which makes it perfect for miniatures eh? This is the skeleton of the plant, washed ashore.
Crates with rope handles (lollypop sticks and linen thread)
Er...yeah. getting there. The tomato leaves and flowers are from a Georgie Steed kit. Instead of using the red beads supplied I made little tomatoes with fimo, which came out a little RED! I had made the plant up, but then decided it was far too big and took it all apart, next time maybe....... :D
I almost managed to see this happen in a rock pool, but unfortunately there were two crabs fighting over the same shell, so I had to watch it on youtube instead..I should have flipped a coin for them and removed the loser :D
This is a 1:12 scale customized Falcon miniature Park Bench.
The slats happened rather sooner than I thought. I used lollypop stick wood for the new slats, which was treated with Pepper's magic silver wood solution, and then stained with Rustins Antique pine. I was going to add bolts to the end of the slats, and also add some old flaked off paint and maybe a touch of lichen (as though it has been brought in from outside) but I haven't made my mind up yet...
The lollypop stick wood was a bit warped, which I think adds to the effect, though one slat was a little more warped than the others, so it casts a bit of a shadow. I wasn't too worried about precision, so the gaps are a little irregular, though it has been lying outside in all weathers! ;)
Think I'll have a cup of tea and a biscuit now! :D
Er..yes, I went against my own advice and messed about with that metal CONTAINING LEAD... I did sand it slightly here and there too. I got the jewellers saw out and (awkwardly) removed some of the "ledge" on either side of the bench ends. The metal is almost like butter to saw through, which is great, but you also have to be careful not to bend it, as after a few bends, it would snap right off. I then painted it with Humbrol matt black paint, and didn't bother using primer :D
Next stop, tomatoes!
Thanks everyone for your encouraging comments in the previous post :)
Awhile back, Pepper very thoughtfully asked if I "needed" anything from KDF ( don't we all :D ), as she was well aware there are some must-have miniatures that you literally cannot get anywhere, unless you go to a miniature show. As it happened I did "need" some Causeret pottery and Ray Storey glassware, quite badly actually. My shopping list items ended up being mostly unavailable, so Pepper had to choose for me, and she chose perfectly! She also had to dig into her Ray Storey glassware collection, as he had sold out prior to the show. So another giant Thank You again for that Pepper! Aaand... she got me more than a few extras! Everything arrived individually wrapped in tissue paper, and I had no idea what was in each one, so you can just imagine how amazing my afternoon was the day I unwrapped each of the following miniatures.... Warning - Photos do not do these miniatures justice, though they still look amazing despite the lighting conditions :D
Pottery by Elisabeth Causeret.
They are just...beautiful. The crackle glaze is even more crackly in reality.
Each piece is signed with a potters mark on the base, bit hard to make out in the photo. They are incredibly stable too.
More Elisabeth Causeret Pottery. The mugs are both the same size, one is just standing slightly in front of the other.
Even more Elisabeth Causeret Pottery ( I know, I have been spoiled!). The lid on the teapot is removable.
Ray Storey bottles.
Colander and ladles by Orsis Miniatures. Very bad photo, these are delightfully dainty, ie. each ladle handle has a curl at the top. The matchstick is 3.8 cm long.
David Provan spice tower, honey pot with dipper and recorder.
The recorder has a thumb hole on the other side......I forgot to turn it over to show that :D
Each container has been turned for a precision fit, and the lid has a beautiful knot too.
Potato peeler by David Provan, part of me believes that you could actually peel a tiny potato with this.
The last miniature parcel to be opened was this little box, I actually didn't expect anything to be inside it, but it was a tad heavy....
...?! :D
YES! The most amazing amount of biscuits!! And they were beautifully arranged in rows, which I forgot to record, in my haste to get them out of the box. I will definitely need tweezers to recreate how they were arranged :D I've even got an order for eating these, bear goes first, followed by star, then rectangle finished off with plain rounds, then back to bear,etc, :D. These were made by Orsis Miniatures.
And everything together! I had taken an inpromptu photograph of some of the pottery in the conservatory, but there has been an invasion of cat hairs and fluff, so I didn't include it :D Spring clean coming soon...
Thank you so, so much Pepper!
Pepper has opted for payment via miniatures, so this is one side of a swap, sadly she has to wait for the other side as I haven't made them yet, as much as I would have loved her to have them for Christmas :D
Hope you all have a fantastic Christmas and New Year.
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