Old Ben wants to tease you ....

he wants you to wonder what he is doing with this old treasure-type map ...



he also assures me that he will show you a bit more, in a few days! Oh Ben! Stop teasing!

flashback ... me and a hairy ginger pirate!

long before my blogging life I was involved in making a pilot for a Devon-based company. I made the puppets and, as i boasted about my puppet wielding prowess, I was involved in filming not one but two pilots ...

Evil or naughty characters are always fun to do, and this pirate was no exception!

Christmas!

As we are well into December now, I thought I had better mention the festive season!



And I made some thing very small and sweet (my hands are tiny, BTW) - Here we are, It's for you ...



Munch, munch ... you remember Old Ben the rat? No, don't eat it Ben ...



There - You wear it Ben! Erk! Ben is not so sure.



Then we went out carol singing



It was a bit Dark for Dave's Camera, but you can just make out me with my blue hat and scarf, and Ben in my hands, singing and amusing Zebedee, my friend's Dogs-for-the-Disabled helping-hound.

Happy Christmas!

old, old ben ....

old Ben was born in 1984, so you can see he is doing quite well for such an old rat, dozing as he is in one of the more intellectual corners of the dining room. he reminds me that i must use spell checkers more often...

i sewed him all by hand from only three pieces of fur, and raided the kitchen draw at Fletcher's drive, burscough, to get some twist ties for his teeth. the sellotape i covered them with to make them shiny is yellowed as an old rats teeth might well be...

my great uncle George saw this rat a few years later, and had fun playing with it. then he asked me to make him one. i had no pattern and sat with a piece of fur and some scissors trying and failing to make another rat like Ben. in the end i made the ultimate sacrifice and handed Ben to uncle George. they worked hard together scaring lots of grand children until after George's death, Ben came back to me in 2001 when i visited aunty Ivy in burscough.

now he lives a gentler life, with his lopsided ears and tatty old fur. he has never had a bath, but he has always been well looked after. he was known as THAT RAT at George and ivy's house.

my girls and an old ratty gent ...

i made this puppet when i was 13 ... so hes aorund 24, cough ...
not bad for a vintage rat, is he? how daisy and matty love him, makes steve and i think we should get a pet again ... but not at the moment!
the shout in theback ground is mary-baby xxx

perch parrot puppet patterns...

perch parrot puppet patterns... , originally uploaded by RaggyRat.

i am indebted to the wonderful karen, at silver seams, whos dinky cute sun conure pattern i messed with and exploded to create the two perch puppets ....

http://www.silverseams.com/opensource/sun-conure-pattern.html

i printed her pattern on british A4 paper, after converting to black and white, then went over the lines black and started cutting the poor bird up... apart from the amazing feet, which i upped-size on the church photocopier, i sketched the rest of the pieces to facilitate the small changes i made and the speedy enlargement ...

i left off the lower bits of the underbelly behind the legs to enable insertion of hand, i lined perch with grey fleece, and i changed the angle his head would sit at, to make him a bit more upright as he is a hand and arm puppet .....

i forgot to add enough for the head gusset after i changed the angle of his head, and simply made a rectangle of fabric to instert quick ... !

here also are pics of me taking the parrots to meet local preschool age children, its fun to throw experiances at them!

Here he is folks!

smile perch ..., originally uploaded by RaggyRat.

and here is my 30 week baby belly ... and thats not a bad self-timer pic, i always look like i am worried the pic wont come out LOL !!!

after this pic i boxed up the parrots and put the girls in the car to get to the post office ... car started making funny noise, so turned radio off ... kept drivng carefully and noise started to sound rubbery .... made the desition to drive to PO ( and local shops) where i could get help and facilities for me and the girls, and after my call to the RAC, martin turned up just as i stepped out of the post office with the reciept for the parrots in my hand!

still driving round on funny wheel, kwikfit didn't have any in our size ...

wing wing ---

hurrying to make the deadline ... perch is to star in a show for children at centre parks .... this year ...

i actually mailed him off today, and his complete self will be able to be viewed on here tomorrow afternoon when his new owners, explosive productions ltd will have him safely ...

WIP - perch the parrot puppet's plumage, pretty !

sorry, getting too silly - and so much to do !
enjoy these lovely colours while i take my girls out and try to wear them out ... also will use a photocopy machine to enlarge the parrots feet ....
cat xxxx

puppets again, a peek at a parrot!

i plan to finnish PERCH by the end of next week, i am only showing you his beak and colour ideas, not the mess of parrot bits all over the table! my dining room looks great with all the colours spread about, and i have gone for a completely made-up bird rather than try to emulate a well known parrot, as i have been given only the instructions 'as bright as possible' :-)

squark ! a new puppet commission ....

yippeee i got the job pf making a parrot puppet for a cumbrian performance company, just thru word of mouth which is famtastic ... i have done some sketches and lots of fun research, and i hope to begin this week and get it done before 24th feb, as their deadline is 1st march ...
i also need to make a special raggyrat holding one of these camera cases ....
and containing one of these ... and talking of cameras, i forgot mine on friday when me and the fuzzy twins went to see seb green leaving on his round britain walk. We met flash, who i felt i knew really well after spending so long drawing him, but his barking made daisy cry. Matty eyed up the paramedic who was on hand, and i said hello to seb himself, who said he found my blog while 'googling' which was funny, i didnt even think of him finding me himself! i managed to wish seb good luck and shake his hand before it was time to go ...

WIP - another cuttlefish created ....

the belly and swimmers of a cuttlefish i am creating in fleece, which will make a lovely christmas present this year, and i am to deliver to shaftesbury when he is finnished ....

here are the markings to give a hint of that shimmer of changing colours, in rust thread and 2 kinds of shot fabrics ...

a familiar face apears next to me on the sofa, needing some more padding and giving me the evil eye!

we really need to buy some christmas cards - i have not written a single one!

Catching up - some recent pictures ...

louise and tompot blenny in the dorset echo last friday night...they didn't mention her name, nor the maker of the puppets. boooh!lobster trousers hanging up in my workroom ...
scarey lobster lady emerges into sunshine ...
saying goodbye to the blenny, matty and daisy give him a few pokes before i have to take him and the cuttlefish along to the marine week launch on chesil beach...
matty has a good look at the cuttlefish - she must be really impressed with the piecing used to create his head ...
sea creatures can die in hot cars ....a yummy jellyfish cake for eating after the mayor of portland has finnished speaking ...
some of the wonderful junk found on the beach ready to be used for sculpting, along with a propper artist.
the echo shelter providing good sunshade and shelter from portland type winds. my car was fitted with a lovely handmade staff parking sign just for the event...
hilda from the echo makes notes while mums, dads and children make some art from the flotsam and jetsam. finbar webster was there to take pics for the paper, and he recognised me. there was i with my hands up 2 sea creatures but did he take a pic? nope. booooh!
i didnt take any more pics after this point as my hands were buried in my puppet creations, and then i had some cake. i will probably take some more next week when i come back with louise and the lobster costume.

Cuttlefish puppet lives !

Cuttlefish puppet lives !, originally uploaded by RaggyRat.

yippeee - i have finnished my most unusual puppet/creation yet, the pettern making for the head makes me feel i could tackle anything now! See the wallpaper shapes i made, to create his head.

Steve is modelling the puppet for me here, it only got its eyes today and before that steve was calling it my baseball mitt... after these pictures i showed it to my neighbours and one asked if it was a squid. well, same family - sort of, so im not worried.

so, back to lobsters me thinks ... if i have time today, between minding the twins while steve hoovers house, taking louise for a bike ride, bathing the ferret and other assorted mummy jobs!

have fun - its a sunny day!

busy busy .... and waiting for a cool photo ...

cuttlefish pattern pieces, the fish himself looking rather unstuffed - which is correct - and some sketches of eyes. i found looking on youtube quite useful in helping form a 3D sence of the animal.

also - some mug desgns by louise who was working alongside me...

cuttlefish puppet on the go ...

cuttlefish
Originally uploaded by RaggyRat

Here is the cuttle fish shell, as interpreted by me. they are interesting creatures that change their colours and patterns to communicate, in what seams like zebra stripes and dots ... i used white flowery stiff fabric for the frill ... are these fins? and some of the flowers onthe shell itself to tie in the piece as a whole.

In 2 other colours of upholstery fabric i made some wavy stripes, and then machined over the whole lot in 2 colours of thread. im simply alluding to changing dots and stripes rather than trying to slavishly copy from one photo of a cuttlefish. it was not easy to find whole body patterns, nor, i found, a good one of its eyes !

Blenny finnished - and moving on to more fishies!

Ran outside in between rains the other day to get some photos taken

i shoved a window cleaning tool (used once to clean windows before the rubber fell off it) up into tompot blenny's head, so i could hold him up for picks. think he is a boy, anyway ... who knows? i havent modelled too closely.





NEXT! a puppet cuttle fish, so i stripped down the blenny wall and changed it for a fresh piece of paper and some useful googled images. i worked out how to do the cuttle fish ''frill'' on waking, which is nice, and involved drawing round a side plate and making something which looks like an awful shirt collar. Opened out and pinned the outer edge undulates beautifully a bit like a full skirt.




Finally, as if i dont need a change from making fish, a challenge from Tami and Wendy from Teddy Talk to make one of these ...




so i drew this ....

and then made this ... which happens to be a bag with a zip under its chin :-)

and heres the local paper - saturdays - with a double page spread detailing the sea fest but not my puppets and costume yet ...

Did you know it was dry for one day - Tuesday wasnt it?

i do get a bit stuck on titles for my blog entries ...

Tuesday seems so far away now but me and the girls had a bit of fresh air and the ants in the garden came out to play again ...

i had a small blenny break sketching some kittens - pity the photo shows that page in shadow! i used 2 colours of gel pens and the smudging was provided by daisy. Both babies likes meowing and signing 'cat'... i have just been toting silly ideas in my head, esp while driving, and thought i would commit some of them to journal/sktchebook ... Church mouse and rat to follow!

Here, for those that have been nagging and saying i havent uploaded any pics, is the top pot blenny as of this morning, his head attached to his body and some amazing lips too made from fleece and bath scrunchie. In the end i didnt make the topnot from feathers as i was hoping, as i thought one tug from a toddler and he wouldn't look like a topnot blenny at all. his frilly bits are made from off red felted woolly jumper and now he looks just like red fraggle ... enjoy :-)

ooh, i believe the big wigs to do with sea fest and marine week have been reading this ... and they have still sent me an invite to marine week opening ... i will take my camera.