Operation Elephant Restoration is Finished!

All right, I was all prepared to slice open the stitching on the back side of the trunk, stuff in more excelsior, and stitch it back up and I chickened out. Nope, just couldn't bring myself to make the cut. So it's going to continue having a broken trunk indefinitely.

I did, however, make new tusks and an eye!

Judging by internet pictures of other Steiff elephants I'm pretty sure the original tusks were plastic. I'm pretty sure that by the time I had access to my elephant the tusks were already gone; if not I don't remember them at all. I know that the eyes were made of glass because (of course) that's what the remaining original eye is. Since I don't know where to get "friendly plastic" anymore (if they even make it) and glass is not one of the mediums I know how to use, I decided to make all of the replacement pieces out of premo sculpy.

To make the eye look more like the glass one I first painted it with watered down black paint, painted the pupil in solid black, then added a little dark brown around the outside of the pupil. The paint and sculpy were both matte and the glass eye is very shiny, so I used several coats of clear nail polish to give it both shine and depth.

Here's a photo of the side with the original eye for comparison:

The tusks were simpler because they stayed white, all I had to do after sculpting and baking them was to give them a quick sanding.

Apparently the elephant originally came with a red blanket with bells on it; I'm thinking about making a blanket and maybe a headdress for it, but probably something fancier than plain red. If I do, I promise to post pictures!

More Work on the Toy Repair

When I started work on my little elephant the mouth looked like this:

This morning after picking up some apricot colored wool roving from Weir Crafts I got down to work, starting by sewing shut the mouth were the stitching had started to unravel:

Some of the felt had deteriorated (which is probably why the stitching had come undone in the first place) and there were a couple of moth holes in the wool, so a new needle-felted mouth was definitely in order:

While I was at it I repaired the end of the trunk, which was the same color as the mouth:

Now that the mouth is done I'll try to figure out how to add stuffing to the middle of the trunk.

Progress on the Elephant

Today I needle-felted roving to the bottom of the elephant's feet, covering the moth holes. I should be able to repair the mouth and end of the trunk tomorrow.

Childhood Memory

An old friend recently came back to me: a mohair elephant that all of my siblings and I played with at one time or another. My sister, being the oldest, claimed it when she had her own kids, but neither of her kids had any interest in the poor, shabby thing and it languished in storage for almost two decades. I can't say I blame my nephew and niece for not wanting to play with it; by the time we were done with it the elephant had a broken trunk- the end of which was almost completely worn off- and had lost both of its tusks and one eye.

I have actually been itching to restore this toy for years, so you can imagine my delight when it was given to me (actually my sister offered it to one of my brothers, and when he didn't want it she said she was going to give it to charity and I snatched it).

Here are some "before" pictures:

 Here you can see the one remaining eye and the sad state of the trunk.

The holes from the lost eye and one of the tusks.

The mouth is torn at the corner and the hole where the other tusk should be is visible.

Over the years the wool felt at the bottom of the feet was eaten away in places.

Looks like I've got my work cut out for me!

Completed Cat Bed

Sorry I didn't post this sooner- I went out of town, then I came back and finished the cat bed, then I went out of town again... Anyway, here it is!

I added burnt orange and dark brown roving to the tan stripes so it resembled the sandstone on a building in town that I like, and I felted in medium grey, black, and white bits to the pink areas to make it look like granite.                     

And- best of all- it received the kitten seal of approval!

Cat Bed Phase 2

I put another layer of wool on the outside of the cat bed. I decided that I wanted it to look kind of like a metamorphic rock with stripes of different colors. I used wools that resemble those found in rocks around my yard; a bit of rosy granite, some limestone, a bit of sandstone, etc.

I also increased the size of the opening when I observed that it had been too small for a cat to feel comfortable about entering.

Up next: the finished product!

Cat Bed

To those of you who don't know there's been a new feline addition to our house, a female grey tabby kitten. She's been taking up a surprising amount of my time and head space since she came home from the no-kill shelter where I volunteer (Mosaic Feline Refuge- a truly wonderful place for cats!) a couple of months ago. To keep my boys (our two cats that have been family member for just under 3 years now) from feeling neglected I've been making them things. One got a hand-knitted mohair blanket to sit on top of the down comforter on "his" chair (he has wisely claimed the soft cushioned chair in the laundry room as his winder roost- it's next to a window, the cat door, and a heat vent, and is in the warmest room in the house), and the other is getting a felted cat bed.

I started by wet-felting dark brown wool (grown locally) over an inflatable beach ball. After it was felted I realized that the wool wasn't thick enough, so I had to add another layer and felt it again. I'm pretty pleased the way it turned out, though.

I'll be adding several more steps to this and keep you posted as I go...