A Beady Bird In The Hand

Ooopsy, another long gap in between blog posts. One day I will get the hang of posting regularly, one day!

I'd like to share a recent project with you in this post. I wanted to invest in some new props and display stands for my craft fair set up, and decided, given that my business name is Hollybird Beads, that I wanted to buy one of those ornamental wire bird cages to hang jewellery from to add interest and draw peoples' attention. I found one for a reasonable price and bought some wired paper flowers to wrap around the bars to pretty it up a little. The one thing my birdcage was lacking though, was a bird.

Having hunted around for a small ready made bird and not been able to find one, I decided to go ahead and try and make my own. Thus the challenge to create a beaded bird began. 

A search of the internet found this tutorial and pattern for a fabric bird http://www.spoolsewing.com/blog/2008/05/16/bird-mobile/ and so I embarked on first creating a fabric base out of ultrasuede on which to embroider. 

Pinning the pieces together ready for sewing...

The finished form - note, I had rather a bit of trouble with the ultrasuede being relatively thick...and had to resort to getting my pliers out to pull the head out through the small hole at the bottom of his tail to turn the form inside out to hide the stitching!

 Then the embroidery started - I definitely 'winged' it quite a bit with this piece. If I make another I would definitely draw out my patterns on the form first before starting embroidering.

 

The finished bird in the hand...several days work in short bursts, I couldn't tell you an exact time it took to make. I sewed 2 large beads onto the underbelly in order to allow me to thread some wire through to attach to the perch on the birdcage.

I love my beady bird, who has been named Beadrick Featherington. I hope to make another (I've plenty of ideas for modifications after my first attempt) at some point...well it would be rude if he didn't have a friend!

 Beadrick has been getting up to quite a bit of mischief...here he is inspecting my purchases from the Big Bead Show at Sandown last month.

He's also been out exploring in the garden...

I suspect Beadrick might have many more adventures in between adorning my craft fair displays. I hope you have enjoyed seeing how he was created.

TTFN

Nicole

xoxo