fairies

This tree topper needed some love.

And she came to the right place to get it.  I added layers of lace and rhinestones along with a crown, branches, and vintage flocked wallpaper wings.

Her friend was in a bit of a style predicament too.  First of all, why the orange ribbon? And the poof she sat on was wonky. 

I felt like she needed some freedom, so I took her poof away and gave her some wings.

But wait a minute, that fat little puff ball had promise, it just needed a redo of its own.  I pulled some stuffing out, re-shaped it, and made it the home of another little girl.

Last month, I made a few new fairies for Juju’ First Friday Weekend.

And I hope to make a few more for the summer.

I do love my soft colored, sweet, baby sprites.

And my sassy granny fae.

Aren’t they fun?

This is how they begin.  I bought a boxful of these handmade (from the 80s?) old biddies.  I think they have the potential to be something cool, but am not fond of their current style.  The rest of them will be witches for Halloween.  My crafty mind is already turning to fall and winter, I’ve started on a few things for spooky season and the Christmas holidays.  

I’m definately a holiday person when it comes to making stuff.  I am excited to get started filling my studio with goods for my two favorite holidays.

Yesterday I had a craft day with Beth, it has been way too long since we did that.

She worked on vintage paper journals, and I pixied up some unloved dollies.

See what I mean?  Not the best.  They deserved a makeover.

 I worked on all four at once, going back and forth between them as I let glue dry.  My first step is always cutting away or pulling off clothes.  I try to salvage what I can.  In this case, the white dress received some trimming and overlays.  The green gown lost its skirt and the bodice was redone as a blouse.  And that wonderful, but too country-cutesy pink silk?  I used it to craft a dress for the tiniest doll.

Doesn’t she look pretty in it, with her matching pink hair? (It’s yarn)

This is a detail from the white gown.  It has sequined bridal satin glued onto it and a net overskirt.

You don’t see much of the original dress, but it made a good foundation for the new, more fairy princess frock. Typically, I don’t keep the hair as is, but I kinda liked this headful.  She only needed a posy crown to add a new look instead of ripping it all off (hair comes off easier if you use pliers) and starting fresh from a bald dome. 

The green, velvet gown felt like a good beginning for a flower fairy.  I had some vintage, velvet and sequined leaves to fashion a skirt for it.  I dyed her bloomers and glittered her shoes, then added teensy weensy velvet flowers.  She might look more like autumn than spring, but she does look more like a fairy than a faux Elizabethan  doll at least.

It was a happy day, chatting with a buddy and creating little sprites from discarded dolls.  And heck, I even got to play with some of my new beads too, it was quite a fruitful afternoon.  When I finished these gals, I made a dozen gemstone bracelets to finish off my time in the studio.  

I could use more days like this, it was good for me.  There doesn't seem to be enough hours to get done what needs to be tackled, so now I’m off to make price tags for Good Juju.  

Which is high on my list of most hated and put off chores – like taxes, which is also on my to do list for the next couple days.

Those fairies will be on my desk as I work, and I could lie to myself and say something uplifting like “their delightful spirits near me will make my chores more tolerable as I reminisce about our lovely crafting get together.” But that would be a whopper of a lie, because nothing makes taxes or price tagging not suck.

Luckily, my fairies do okay at Juju sales.  Not GREAT, but enough that I can indulge myself in making more.  I do love crafting a sweet, winged sprite from a dilapidated doll no one wants. Friends have been passing along dollies that their customers haven’t picked up, so that I can play with feathers and lace to recreate the dolls into my winged girls.

This babe in blue has an ocean theme and is decked out in vintage seashell flower jewelry.

I use lots of different kinds of dolls, this pink petal girl was a storybook doll with open and closing eyes. But now, she has a different story.  

This one is porcelain, and is draped in French net lace.  Redoing her mostly meant cutting away her costume and adding lace, feathers, and flowers.  She was basically in good shape.  Some are not and often need major repairs.

 I collect odds and ends of legs and arms too, in case I come across a doll missing pieces.  I don’t try to be a doll doctor and put them back together as they were.  I just use a lot of glue to hold them in place.  Same with the clothing.  I’m not a seamstress, these dresses are fabricated with adhesive.

My very, very favorites are Nancy Anns. I love everything about these and try to save as much of their original look as I can.  This one even still had good hair.  It’s rare that I get to salvage the hairstyle.  Sometimes I can remake the locks by gluing the hair and adding flowers to cover bald spots.  Most often, I just pull it off and glue goats hair or dyed wool fluff over the heads.

This lilac dragonfly fairy has wool roving for hair.

This golden fairy’s hair is made from the goat hair “curly locks”.  Her wings are feathers painted gold and she has gold glitter polka dots on her gown.  I like to add vintage millinery to the back of each to embellish the wings.

Even if I use similar materials, no two turn out the same.  Each has her own, sweet personality.  And love them all.