New Bear

Looking at Joanne's bears the other day at http://desertmountainbear.blogspot.com made me get out my recently purchased mohair. She makes beautiful realistic bears that have just won awards. I tend to like realist art but when it comes to bears I especially like reproductions of old teddy bears. Joanne makes these too.

I've determined that this bear will be a girl. I've already started knitting her a dress. I hope she doesn't tell me later that she's a boy!

 

I also decided to stuff her with llama fiber. Poly-fil is great, you can needle felt into it but it's squishy. Fine wood shavings are great (excelsior) but it's hard. I wanted something that would give an old fashioned feel, be easily needle felted and have a wonderful musty smell. Sheep wool or llama is perfect for this. I had a large amount of llama, in fact just enough!

 

I was able to machine sew everything but I always hand sew the foot pads.

Here's the llama fiber, I got it from my friend Londa at http://www.etsy.com/shop/4hornsheep we're Trade-A-Holics buddies!