(Hint – that is no ordinary coffee cup)

Dawn been stitching as long as she can remember.  In her own words, “I’ve tried many different arts and crafts but I always come back to stitching.  Over the past two years I’ve been making plush.  Not toys, they are really more fiber sculptures.  I like to recreate things that might be found in nature if your imagination ran free.

Golden snails, purple angler fish, mermaids and cheese.  Most of my best ideas come from spending time with my kids.  I told them a story about stinky cheese and it ended up becoming a piece of cheese with legs!  My children’s sketches have become robots.”  (See the slide show below for some of Dawn’s creations.  All images courtesy of the artist.)

Dawn has worked with elementary and middle school children as an assistant in the classroom and through an art club that she ran last year at Phantom Lake Elementary school.  She loves helping children with their artistic adventures and likes the idea of children being able to make their own plush creatures because it gives them the freedom to create their own little buddies.  It also gives them a chance to learn some basic sewing skills – a must for boys and girls of all ages.

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Dawn Rogal will be teaching her plush sculpture during the first week of the Hillside Student Discovery Program.