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Here’s some stuff my boyfriend’s mom made. The discs can be ornaments or magnets. She does craft shows and pet portraits to order.
Brown was brighter originally but faded with sun exposure. He’s from a Dragonriders of Pern cosplay artist who sold finished firelizards for people’s shoulders as well as the pattern. Takes about a month to make one, trust me, and I didn’t finish this guy off because he was my prototype.
It originally has an outside wire in cloth sausage sewn to the head and back of the neck, I hid his with a mane tho. Ones that followed I just sewed the fliwer wire into the seam all along the spine from head to tail and it was better kept internal that way. They had pipe cleaners in the toes but I went with more garden wire for better grip, and a little handstitching around it would hold those and the wing ribs better but I didn’t do it on this guy excelt on the upper wing edge. You could do a zig zag pattern over the wire to hold it down well, I’m sure, if you don’t feel confident embroidering.
They just sewed beads for eyes and pulled in nostrils but I prefered the eyelid style for bigger eyes.
I don’t think the original pattern was meant to articulate beyond the sewn-in wire, but this guy has hidden buttons. You can see the outer button on the wings because that didn’t otherwise hold well, I actually have a loop at the end of the wire with one button inside his chest and the other was bare outside. The button string goes through the wire loop and the pressure of the buttons holds the wing in whatever position you move it. Then I sewed a little drawstring shower cap for the exposed button, put it on and drew the string tight and knotted it.
But the arm is different.
For the arms and legs I left the stuffing holes open in the arm and body, maneuvered a button to where arm and body meet at either side, and sewed the buttons together. Its key to make sure you go in and out the same hole in the cloth but different holes in the button, and make the buttons tight. Then you use chopsticks to add filling and finish that little bit of seam up behind you, leaving nobody the wiser. There’s a drawstring style stitch that makes that easy to hide, too, lol.
A good place to start is a foot or tail and and see what a single stitch can pull together. If it looks good, do more, if not try to put your needle back in where it came from to undo it. I did pretty good for a middleschool kid who just wanted a decent stuffed dragon and couldn’t find any for sale at the store.
One thing I didn’t do to any dragon was use clothing paint to build up little horns and spikes on these guys like the soft sculpture dragon artist did on the ones she sold.
I should have tried your eyelashes tho. That’s genius!
Omg, I love that crazy cute smile he has! And the eyelashes make me think ostrich family. You did absolutely awesome on the toe claws too!
Mine were the prototypes. I gave away a more professional looking blue version of the brown guy, no mane, and a couple smaller variants I wish I took pics of first. Oh well.
Green is an actual “soft sculpture” pattern I bought online. The mane is curly embroider thread done in rows. The eye and button system was the artist’s own but gave me ideas you will see in the brown. The tail has a bag of dried beans to weigh it down. The wing claws have pipe cleaners in them and the legs have floral wire in them but only into the middle toe. I embroidered the wing lines and toe lines. And to shape the face you do small stitches to pull in towards a seam and hide your anchor stitch to the seam. Great for shaping a nose! Eyes are a big round bead with just eyelid sausages attached, lol.
She slumps unless you fluff her limbs by the buttons. I solved that later with others.
Ack, no pic visible! Please show a pic, it sounds awesome! The false eyelashes sounds ingenious!
I made 2 soft sculpture dragons (from a couple very different sold patterns, one being a firelizard of Pern) plus a couple smaller of my own design in the past as a kid. I figured out how to make great eyes with simple beads and movable limbs with wire and hidden buttons. Plus how to sculpt a face with small stitching, and how to weigh down with a bag of beans or rice. I kept one new simple small design dragon but never actually made him. I only kept 2 dragons and the rest were gifts to friends, and just have old pics of them but no others if you ever want to see. If you want to discuss tricks and tips, let me know!
But tell us more, show us more! This sounds very intriguing!
Yeah, holidays will be interesting. We’re switching our mom from independent living at a big facility to a group home assisted living Thanksgiving weekend and they’ve been on complete lockdown with only outside visiting until Covid surged back up here in IL, now they stopped even that. Just getting her moved in is turning into a logistical challenge (the nice way of phrasing it), and Christmas looks like it might be virtual at best, or maybe us just talking on the phone to her from outside her window. A big change from just presents, chatter, good food and lots of hugs.
I know it’ll be hard on her. Earlier this year after the first lockdown she fell and I got to see her in the hospital because I’m her POA. She was apologizing for making me come, and I told her that it was ok, at least it gave me a chance to finally hug her. And gave her a big hug. She almost cried right there, saying how badly she missed hugs. Before this I was visiting every weekend and giving her hugs then, so I can understand.
At least I can give her a hug again when we move her to tide her over until another opportunity.
Hug who you can (safely). Distant hugs if need be. Reach to your seniors and disabled and at risk people, the isolation they are enduring is extremely difficult. Spread what happiness you can, it’s the best gift you can give.
On that note, I am wishing everyone hugs (physical, virtual, mental) for the holidays! And good vibes, knowing it’ll be something else but may it all work out somehow. 💐🌈🦄🐉
Btw Bodine, you (more than others, tho many here do) seem to spread a lot of happiness here in the forums, so I wanted to give you a special shout out for that. Thank you for it!
One finished project (gave to bf because he fell in love with it).
And this one is in the works. Yes this has eye ridges. Unfortunately it curves and is therefore very hard to photograph. Painting and sculpt practice while waiting for dragon-repair conditions (I need an overcast weekend day or day off, interior lighting is too dark or has too many shadows, and outside is too dark by the time work ends now).
Thanks! It doesn’t look too bad for a fixer-upper (lol, I just keep imagining it on one of those house flipping shows). I might put it up for trade after (depending on how attached I get). Really I just kept seeing it all sad on the Ebay feed and thinking “but it’s not a hard fix and it’s cute and multipurpose as a house for a small figure even but appealing to even non fantasy fans…” with a million reasons running through my head and ending with “why is it still there?” Lol. That’s how I get most of my projects.
I just bought the fixer-upper cottage that was sitting on Ebay. I figure that at least I can work on it on bright days when I can’t fix my ruby dragons. And the colors are similar to the mother-and-baby cat I repaired and gave to my bf recently, so should be simple enough. It’s a cute cottage at that.
The new winter project. 🙂 🏚 -> 🏠
I suspect some are darker due to smoke exposure. It darkens the whites most notably but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t effect other colors in a similar fashion. Otherwise lighting also plays a big factor in how colors come out. The female peacock looks similar to my old male so I’d say it’s the old original color. Newer production sculpts in peacock do seem a little bit different but I think that’s due to changes in paint type and how they’re “antiqued” now (someone correct me if I’m wrong tho).
T19 was one of my first leftover bantam picks and thanks to a wonderful person I now have him to join the conga line. So he’s kind of a grail. 😁
The new conga line!
Luv the costume, dragonfeathers! Then again, I’m biased. 😉 Their skull masks are absolutely awesome and I can’t wait to see your feline one. I’m watching a different vendor (Bushaeng, I think?) who is making a snake skull one, as that’s perfect for my next project – Quexacoatl (skull version)!
Just a thought tho from years washing cars as a kid: the leather chamois, when wet, is both shapable and stretchable, and… well, it was skin, so…Man, El hara, you can’t catch a break! I hope he gets better soon and that you guys can squeeze in a little fun.
Setsuna, I was actually talking to bf’s mom and we laughed that she could just throw the candy to kids over the fence when they come. I don’t know how old your little one is but it’s still a way people can trick or treat, just gotta wash hands a bit. Maybe the neghborhood could have a walk-by costume parade of sirts? Or maybe a skype costume contest with friends? Some church here had a sign that they’re giving free Halloween packs if anyone wants, likely some candy and fun stuff. Hopefully something similar is near you?
