'Chip' the needle felted Jack Russell, doting pet for a Red Nose Day Doll!

After the success and admiration of Salty the sea dog, I was left feeling bereft by his absence!

The best way to cure such sadness was to create a new friend for one of the Red Nose Day Dolls.

'Chip' is a sweet and shy little Jack Russell

With fine markings and a happy wagging tail!

His little face just makes you want to kiss him and melts your heart!

Like 'Salty' he wanted a unique little tie around the neck and being a shy little gentleman I decided to make him a rather splendid bow tie!

Dapper don't you think?

...and of course as its all for Red Nose Day he was given his very own Red Nose. (He seems to wear his a lot better than Salty!)

Ive also made a special box for him, like Salty it has his name embroidered on the top!

Bless him, I do miss him too now he is at Red Nose Day Dolls HQ.

So, if you want to get your mitts on either Salty or Chip then head over to the Red Nose Day Dolls Ebay page where the auction is on for 10 days!

Each doll has a small collection of fab pieces each made by clever crafts people.

You will find Salty in Macs trousseaux....

...and Chip is in Blossoms trousseaux!

As you can see, all 4 dolls are rather excited about their fame, interviews in The Guardian, TV  appearance on Graham Nortons Big Chat show and of course....

                                       

Mac, Salty and the cat with no name have their own film!

Enjoy and get bidding!

Tiny Empty Stockings

Hello! My name is Rebecca Cobb and I am a children's book illustrator. You can see my work and books here: Rebecca Cobb Illustration

I cannot believe how beautiful the Red Nose Day Dolls are with all their tiny hand-crafted clothes and accessories. I was admiring them from afar and wondering what else they might like when I was very happy to be asked if I could make them some miniature copies of The Empty Stocking. 

The Empty Stocking is the brilliant, funny (and also a tiny bit sad but I can't tell you what happens or how it ends because it will spoil it if you haven't read it) Christmas story written by Richard Curtis. This is very appropriate for the Red Nose Day Dolls because Richard Curtis is the founder of Comic Relief and Red Nose Day so it is the perfect book for the dolls to have as a bedtime story. I was very lucky that I got the chance to illustrate the book and it meant that I had all the pages and was able to make four mini versions for this project.

It took me a long time to work out which pages would need to be next to each other and back to back with each other so that when the book was bound together the story would read in the right order. It also took a while to get my printer to print the back of the pages perfectly in line with the front of them but after a bit of jiggling about and cutting the edges off the paper it worked, hooray!

After cutting out all the doll-sized pages I folded them and sewed them together and then trimmed all the edges to make it neat.

Next I made little cardboard covers with the cover illustrations wrapped around and stuck down.

And finally I stuck the pages into the covers using the endpapers to hold the whole book together.

Now they look just like the original books.........but much, much smaller!

I hope the dolls enjoy their books as much as I enjoyed making them!

The dolls and all their wonderful accessories are being auctioned to raise money for Comic Relief and you can also sponsor them here. Keep following this blog and the Red Nose Day Dolls pages on Facebook and Twitter for more information. 

Bake Me a Cake

 Hello! My name is Gina and I blog over at Fan My Flame. I love all sorts of textile related crafts but most of all I am a machine embroiderer. I have been watching with absolute delight at all the wonderful things that have been made for the Red Nose Day Dolls and couldn't imagine there was anything left that these lucky little dolls could need. But then Emma suggested I might make an apron for when the dolls do a spot of baking...

What a perfect idea! Especially as my other great love is baking cakes. So I set to work straight away and made two tiny aprons decorated with machine embroidered applique.

Perhaps the dolls will have their own Comic Relief Bake Off?

It was so much fun making tiny versions of my own baking apron.

But what's this... it looks as though the dolls have already started baking...

Little cakes all ready for their picnic!

What lucky dolls they are!

And what a lucky blogger I am to be able to take part in such a fun project.

Lets hope it makes lots and lots of cash for Comic Relief. Remember, as well as following this blog you can keep up to date on Facebook and Twitter as well as supporting the fundraising here.

Micro quilting ...

Hello! I'm Tracy and I blog over at Dragonfly.  I am a passionate crafter, like many of the other contributors to this wonderful project, and was delighted when Emma asked if I'd like to make a tiny quilt for Mac.

It didn't take me long to pull out some boyish blues from my fabric stash and start planning. Up for the challenge of down-sizing my usual makes, I decided to recreate the quilt I made for my teenage son last year. Only this time, the 8" squares were a miniscule 1".

All 192 of the teeny squares needed trimming down for accuracy - phew!

As I played with the layout in my sewing room, I prayed that a sudden breeze from a closing door wouldn't blow all the pieces off the table!

Finally, I was ready to go and sew them all together.

I'm hoping that Mac will perhaps take a rest from an afternoon of happy fishing and lay back on the riverbank on his very own quilt.

Do keep popping by here to see how things are progressing. Or why not follow us on Twitter or Facebook. You can also donate to the auction here.

A shawl for Blossom!

Hello! I'm Annie from knitsofacto, and I've been knitting lace for almost as long as I've been knitting anything (if not always intentionally in the beginning ... it is way too easy to make holes where you don't want then when you're starting out!). I've never designed and knitted beaded lace on such a small scale as Blossom's shawl before though. But when I was asked to contribute something warm and woolly to the Red Nose Day Doll's wardrobes I knew that at least one of those little ladies deserved something a tad more exciting than a scarf.

Being possessed of far more yarn than I can probably ever hope to knit* it was a certainty I'd find something suitable in my stash, and this lovely raspberry pink alpaca/wool blend, a fine laceweight, was surely the perfect choice. Finding matching miniature glass beads proved a bit more of a challenge however, and my miniscule 0.5mm crochet hook - essential for adding tiny beads to tiny knitting - was adrift somewhere in the mess that is my studio mid revamp. Much hunting through boxes ensued but eventually I was ready, and with a cuppa ever to hand and Radio 4 and my five lovely whippets for company - they like to lie on my feet when I'm knitting which is soooo warming in cold weather - my needles clicked away for a whole long afternoon, and then another, and then Blossom had a shawl**. And d'ya know, it made my heart sing!

Being involved in a project that has brought so many talented designer/makers together in support of such an awesome cause has been a privilege from start to finish. Now all we need is for everyone who reads this to spread the word. Perhaps you could tweet about the dolls, link to their facebook page, or share a link to Mac's video or this blog. Anything to alert folks to the fact that one of these little people and his/her belongings could be theirs. Bidding begins on eBay on March 7th ... go on, you know you want to!


* Knitters call this SABLE, or stash acquisition beyond life expectancy, and it is the most pleasant affliction, just so long as you never see a moth!

** And Mac had a manly scarf, which should have had woolly 'red nose' pompoms on the ends, but didn't - you can read about that little disaster here - and Poppy had her very own knitting bag, complete with needles, wool, and a teeny card of itsy bitsy buttons. Oh, and Maisie had a wee wooden dolly of her own (because I don't just knit), with shiny black painted on hair and shiny black painted on boots, and long spotty pantaloons, and a flowery dress with a ribbon bow at the back, and blow me if I didn't forget to take a photo of her before posting her to HQ so I'm hoping Ros might arrange a little photo shoot (pretty please Ros :) )

Fun in the sun for the Red Nose Dollies

Hello! My name's Val and I am completely thrilled to be one of the people helping the Red Nose Day Dolls. I am an obsessive crafter and I write about what I make at my blog, dottycookie; I spend almost all my free time sewing, knitting, beading, quilting and get quite twitchy if I don't have a project or two on the go. So when Emma asked on a sunny Sunday afternoon whether I would be able to make something for the Red Nose Day Dolls, I thought for about half a second before saying "Yes! Of course!"

But what to make? There are so many clever and lovely people sewing and knitting and quilting and beading for the dolls. What could I do? Well, one of my absolute, all time favourite pursuits is weaving. Could I make something small enough for the dolls? Oh yes, indeed ...

Just like us, every little doll wants to make the most of the sunny weather and have a picnic. And for a perfect picnic you need a basket just the right size to hold all your goodies. If the basket has flowers on it, so much the better. 

And perhaps a pretty picnic tablecloth would make the party that little bit more festive. I always enjoy my sandwiches more in the sunshine, don't you?

Now, one of the dollies is a very fine young man called Mac, and while I'm sure he would happily eat picnic food, I suspected crochet flowers and lemonade might not hold his attention too long. But what could a fine strong lad use? A fishing creel, perhaps? 

Along with the creel comes a small school of sparkly eyed fish, in case Mac doesn't have any luck catching his own. They don't seem to mind being kept in a basket. Yesterday was gorgeously sunny, but on a cold day like today they might positively relish the shelter!

All he needs now is a fine day and a dry spot on the riverbank.

It has been an absolute pleasure creating these baskets. They've occupied my thoughts over the last couple of weeks and I hope the dolls (and their new owners) enjoy them. It's a huge honour to be included in a project which has already brought so much pleasure will hopefully raise valuable funds.

I have written up a free pattern for the little fishies if you'd like to make your own. Do keep reading here, maybe follow the dollies on Twitter or Like them on Facebook, and keep your eyes peeled for auction details!

Maisie

Hello, I'm Maisie and I am from Australia where it is very very hot and full of fires and crazy hotness right now. I came here on a plane and it wasn't even one bit scary. 

Geoff came with me, cause he is my best friend ever in the whole world. Mostly, on the plane we slept and Geoff was a bit grumpy but he is happya again now cause there are biscuits and tea parties in England.

I was maked by Jodie and she maked me some clothes and stuff but no clothes for Geoff cause all his naked is hidden inside his shell so he doesn't need clothes. 

Me and my new friends Blossom and Mac and Poppy are going to all get new forever homes really soon, and we are going to help raise money for Red Nose day.

Did you see my Red Nose? It is the bestest ever present in the world what I have ever been given. Dottycookie made it for me with a special hooky stick thingy. I am going to wear it everyday and even at night time but not to bed.

Jodie told me that lots of really famous makers have maked things for me and my friends and I think that is really nice but I am not really sure do I have to do that bobbing down thing when I meet them?

In Australia we don't do bobbing down much, we just wave.....maybe I'll just wave a lot and they won't mind.