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Fabric painting, art dolls and embroidered birds

This is my allotment, where everything's lush & green & growing like it's been put on fast-forward.  Sweet marjoram and mint are taking over the beds they've been planted in, and there are so many foxgloves in flower.  I did think about cutting some and bringing them home to put in a vase, but I always feel guilty if I do that, depriving the bees of their food.
An hour and a half of mainly cutting overgrown grassy paths left me tired and a bit headache-y, so I've been spending time this afternoon messing about with paint and fabric again.  
I applied paint to various pieces of cotton, calico and synthetic material, and while they don't look like much as yet they'll be prettier when this layer of paint's dried and I stencil over top of it. 
I've got something in mind for these pieces, and it's a light bulb moment I had this morning while I was slurping tea and trying to fully wake up.  It's to do with two mini stylized dolls I made a while ago, inspired by a YouTube video for Gelli Arts.  The link's here if you want to take a peek.  
While I was half-heartedly watching something on telly last night I decided to make another of these dolls, and happily sewed it together, stuffed it with fabric scraps and began embroidering stems and leaves on to it.  Also, I made a very round face out of felt and embroidered that.  The circular face gave me the name 'Moon Doll' and this morning I linked up the idea of making a series of these dolls tied in to the names given to each month's full moon.  So, March was the Egg Moon, April was the Seed Moon, May's known as the Flower Moon.  The doll I'm still in the process of making will be April's moon, I think, or possibly May.  I'll see what I think when I've finished adding embroidery and beads.  
I like the thought of making dolls in the colours that reflect the month & season.  Greys, black, white and silver for winter moons, autumnal russets, crimson and gold for autumn.  They'll all be made of painted fabric and about the same size, all with a moon face, but with different embellishments.  
Some of the names for each month's full moon appear to differ depending on what source you get your info from, but I'll simply pick the name I prefer and go with that.  
From a crafty project that's still in its early stages to something completed, namely the second embroidered blue tit that I've made.  I like making these hand embroidered birds, though I'm never entirely satisfied with the shape of them, not feeling I've got them 100% perfect.  But, as my 2024 motto goes, 'better done than perfect'.  
The two blue tits join the two robins.  I may have to make a twiggy arrangement in a vase and hang these birds from it, unless I decide to part with them, in which case they'll migrate to my Etsy shop.  But would anyone want to buy one?  Who knows?  
Hope your weekend's going well, and goodbye for now.  







 

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