Bobble Hat Cat and Rainbow Scarf Cat (b.14 March 2010)

Do you know, it's been a while since I blogged about some of my more 'mainstream' designs - looking back, I've only tended to write about the commissions I've made (and granted, I've had a lot of those :) So I thought it would be fun to reintroduce a couple of old favourites (and when I say old, I first made this design back in October, so they're hardly about to draw their pension!)

I've recently discovered a new way of making stripy scarves that I'm rather pleased about. When I first started making Rainbow Scarf Cats, I took two thin logs of contrasting clay, twisted them tightly together and then rolled them sideways on through the pasta machine. Then I trimmed the two long edges and hey presto, the scarf was made. There were some limiting factors to this method, although on the whole it worked very well. Firstly, it was difficult to use more than two colours, and sometimes the resulting scarf wasn't wide enough after rolling the twisted log through the pasta machine.

I got the idea for the new stripy scarf from the wedding couple cats I made a few weeks ago in May (I'll be writing about them soon when I've caught up with the backlog!) I made up pinstripe trousers for the groom by layering black and grey sheets of clay together, cutting them in half, stacking the halves on top of each other, and reducing the cane down so the stripes were very thin. I applied this same technique for the stripy scarf using lots of different colours of clay, which resulted in lots of neater stripes of as many different colours as I wanted!

Rainbow Scarf Cats and Bobble Hat Cats are available for sale in my Folksy shop - click here to see the full range.

Santa Cats, Bobble Hat Cats and Rainbow Scarf Cats (b.4 November 2009)

I've been burning the midnight oil this past week getting more stock prepared for this weekend, and another three Santa Cats have materialised along the way! These are just so much fun to make - choosing the right colours of clay, and then mixing them until I'm happy with the resultant swirly patterns, which are always unpredictable! A coat of varnish really does help to bring out the pattern - it's like wetting a pebble on the beach, particularly with the darker clays like the centre cat here.

As well as Santa Cats, more Bobble Hat Cats and Rainbow Scarf Cats (twins no less!) have also joined the family:

One of the Rainbow Scarf Cats is winging its way to Blissknits as we speak!

Small Bobble Hat Millefiori Cat (b.31 October 2009)

Thanks so much to Sharon (aka Blissknits - creator of all gorgeous things knitted, crocheted and stitched - have a look at her blog for more info) for commissioning this Small Millefiori Cat complete with hat and scarf!

I spent a blissful day yesterday working with canes - I haven't returned to them for a while now, and I wanted to experiment with some different techniques - will post more about that later.

The cane for this wee cat is a basic flower shape, with a pink centre, fuschia pink petals, and a deep violet background. The petals and centre were formed with clay logs, and the petals were finished off with a white border to add definition. Small wedges of the violet clay between the petals makes sure they keep their shape, and the cane was finished off with a thin sheet of violet wrapped round the entire design.

Having made the basic cane (which measured about 3cm across), I then reduced this down by rolling it out and made a number of different sizes of cane. I cut one section of a long, thin cane into seven lengths and then arranged the flowers into another flower pattern (see photo). I then reduced this cane down further, so the resultant flowers measure on average 2-3mm.

Once happy with the size of cane, I then covered a clay core with thin slices from the cane, blending and smoothing the edges as I went. It is painstaking work, as it's important to make sure the pattern makes sense and the flowers remain intact. Once the body was complete, the cat chose a vibrant green hat and scarf combo, so he'll be nice and cozy for Christmas!

He stands 5cm tall to the top of his bobble, and 3cm wide.

Rainbow Scarf Cats and Bobble Hat Cats (b.25 October 2009)

As autumn is well and truly upon us, and the nights are getting so much darker now that the clocks have gone back, the kittens are definitely in need of some warmer gear. So here are the latest batch of winter woolly kittens - I feel toasty just looking at them!

Bobble Hat Cats (b.7 October 2009)

You may recall that I was toying with the idea of adding hats to the Rainbow Scarf Cats. Well, here are the results! It took quite a bit of trial and error to get the hat looking like a hat, and not just a piece of clay stuck on top!

In the end, for the small yellow cat, I used the santa hat template (essentially half a circle rolled into a cone), and then rolled up the eges to form the woolly rim, and cut off the point to flatten it. Having the ears poking through the hat completes the look.

For the tall cat, I cut out a full circle from thin clay and then smoothed it down to form a dome, I added a thin strip of matching clay around the rim, and indented it to look like a ribbed hat. The fact that the hat covers his eyes was a happy accident!