Light Tent

I was really disappointed in the way my angel mermaid showed, or didn't show, when I sent her photo in for the competition. Gerry and I were talking about how difficult it was to photograph a mermaid in the snow and I told my dear husband that I had bid on a light cube on ebay. He decided right then and there to get me one for my birthday...but then we went shopping for a thread rack for the treehouse and he ended up buying me a new sewing machine for my birthday. So, yesterday when the light tent arrived, I received a HUGE valentine gift instead!

Last night we put together the light cube and I'm just SO impressed with the difference it makes. The photo below is of my Oracle doll (courtesy of an online class by Pearl Moon). She's not finished yet, and she's scrunched into a chair that isn't appropriate, but she was the closest thing at hand for the photo. I can't tell you how impressed I am with this light cube, and we're just starting!



I also took pix of the first three collages I've done for the 7 day magazine challenge on the ClothPaperStudio list. Here they are, two of them cropped, one kind of suspended in space.




What a great tool this light tent is! I never thought I needed something like this, but now I can see all sorts of uses. I've been talking for years of adding photos of my soaps on my sales site, and now I'll be much more tempted to do so. I just added to my "to do" list, didn't I?

Is it Spring yet?

I know, I know...I shouldn't whine. Home is where Gerry is, right? Somehow, though, this is not how I pictured spending our golden years.

These pix show things as they were about 6 am today (you should be able to click on them and see the larger, more detailed versions):


And then around 1 pm today:



Murphy wonders when he can go out the back door again:



And this is what it looks like when you take a photo of snow with a flash while it's dark:

I have to remind myself, often, of the time we spent apart, and how much more unhappy I was being without him, but in a warm climate. We women may make the home, but we can't make it to our specifications unless our men are happily and gainfully employed! When I remember those bad but warmer times, I'm quickly reminded of how difficult it is for us to be apart, so...I can endure!

Working in the Slate Mines

OK, so it's not as bad as mines, but it is slate. The small bathroom off the master bedroom was functional, but not in the best shape when we bought this house. The tub surround was in particularly poor condition, and looked as though it was two different colors patched together. Gerry (of plumbing hating fame) took out the old surround and repaired the damp-damaged wall behind it. It was a lot of work. Then he put up a new tub surround and everything looked clean and white...and wet...from behind the waterproof wallboard he just installed. We were not happy. After he damaged his hands ripping out the tub surround, calling in a plumber, and replacing the waterproof wallboard again, we decided to do it right and get just what we wanted, not a "get by." It took us at least two weeks of shopping to decide, and we went back and purchased the very first thing we loved.

Right now we're working on 4 X 4 tiles in the tub area. Gerry has already installed a new shower door and we'll tile up to it on one side, and put up beadboard wainscotting in the rest of the room. The 1960s era Spanish-looking tiles on the floor will be replaced with 6 X 6 slates tiles. To offset the darkness of the tumbled slate, the wainscotting will be a bright white, and the area above that will most likely be a pale sagey-green (although the wall color is subject to change).We spent the day yesterday working in the tub area, and have two of the three walls done. Today we'll do the wall with the plumbing, and then we'll seal the slate. I think we'll take a couple weeks to get up our courage to do the floor. After all, that will mean removing the toilet and vanity, which involves plumbing, and we all know how that goes!

This is what it looks like with two walls done. The white tiles you see to the left will be gone and replaced with the wainscot. The grout we have chosen is a tan/gray color that is perfect with the variations of the slate. Though we were worried about the darkness of the slate, I think keeping all white fixtures and white wainscot as a contrast will provide the lightness we need.

As you can see below, we tried to keep a random effect with the tiles, but lay them out a little in advance, so we didn't get clusters of any one shade. Gerry cut cardboard to the size of the wall, and I worked on layout. So did the dogs; Cosmo helped too when the dogs were tired.

Messy Studio Contest

Judi on the FDA list suggested that we have a messy studio contest. Several of us have taken pix as our studios stand right now...and no creating extra messes. I have an unfair advantage because last weekend I met with a friend who is moving away and she gave me 5 bags of stuff! I was doing the happy little piggy thing and sorting through all of it, so...the broken jewelry is still on the desk, the flowers on the floor, and the fabrics on the floor, too. I have pinned up a piece of fabric on one table so I could photo things in front of it. Well...here, let's let you see for yourself. Bear in mind that this room is only 6 1/2 feet wide!

Looking toward east end. This is my main work area, and has the library/cutting table, sewing machine tables, and a desk at the window.


Looking toward west end of space. This is mostly storage. Note the flowers and fabrics on the floor awaiting storage.


Looking toward the wall with hooks & fibers. Sewing machines are underneath.



Looking at the storage shelves. There's also a stand of drawers on the other side of the desk.


BONUS PHOTOS:

This is what has spilled across the landing into the guest room. Yes, that is a tree root leaning against the footboard.

My mother's desk in the guest room. She must be spinning in her grave.

Angel Revealed

Now that the voting is over, and the winners announced, I can reveal my entry for the angel doll challenge. I had such a good time making this doll, and found it fascinating to see how differently we each interpreted that pattern. My doll is "Harmony" (my wish for the new year) and started with colors I find harmonious. The free pattern did not include a base or legs, and it soon became obvious that my interpretation was demanding to become a mermaid. Well, that's ok -- mermaids need angels, too, don't they?

I did a lot of hand beading on this one. The gold at bodice and wrists is all tiny gold beads, as is the tracery on the chest, and of course the fringe from the fluke. I'll do some close-up shots soon -- you really can't see the detail work this way -- unless you click on the photo and look at the larger version. Incidentally, both of these photos were taken before I covered the buttons at the shoulders.

No win for me, but that's ok -- I didn't even vote for my own doll, though the ones I did vote for didn't win, either. I'm tickled with this doll and taught myself new things once again. Detail photos soon, I promise.

For Don

You had to be there...or maybe it's just as well you weren't. Hum to yourselves..."these are a few of my favorite things."

Message to All Princesses...

Don't kiss the yellow frogs (toads)!


During this bitterly cold weather, our dogs don't like to go far from the doggy door. Poor Hagrid, the lawn ornament, has suffered for it.

Just an Old-fashioned Girl

I just had to work on this gal last night. Once I got started and posted the basic photo of the parts put together, I realized what I wanted to do. Here she is from the front:



And then I had to take a bit of a side shot, so you can see Shashi's charming hat a little better:


Incidentally, I found out from a comment in yesterday's post that the body was made by Sherry. I'm pleased with how it all came together. Amazing, really, when you think of all the different parts coming from different places. As pleased as I am with every part, I especially have to thank Cherie Day for her lovely face. A great face just makes a doll, doesn't it?

Teapot Swap

Way back in the end of November, I submitted teapot parts to Sherry Goshon for her teapot doll swap. I made five handles, embellished, to submit in my name. Other people made spouts, bodies, heads and hats and sent them in to Sherry, as well. Sherry mixed them up and sent them back to us. I received my parts last week -- face by Cherie Day, hat by Shashi Nayagam, handle by Linda Pieratt, and spout by Kathi Butler, and body by a mystery person!)

So far I've been playing with putting the parts together, but haven't made permanent attachments. I still want to do some embellishing on the body, and think I'll do that before I attach the other parts. Though it looks like there are buttons and trims on the body, it's just the way the fabric is printed. Here are a couple of different angles on the doll:

With a flash:



Without a flash:


These dolls are so cute when they are done. What a unique idea to mix up the parts. I'll post more when I get things firmly attached and embellished.

Fabric with Cling Wrap

A few days ago, Linda F on the FDA list posted a link to a tutorial she had found making fabric from scraps ironed between two sheets of cling wrap (tutorial here -
http://faerydi.blogspot.com/2007/01/how-i-made-my-cling-wrap-fabric.html




My local grocery store had two colors, violet and rose, so I tried the violet. I realized that I had a lot of prints in my mixture, which were only printed on one side, so when I did the second layer, I focused on covering the back side and obscuring the unfinished aspects. I think I want to try making one where I could experiment a little bit with folding/layering/pleating the cling wrap before ironing. If you try this, make sure you have the parchment paper over the whole thing, so you don't get cling wrap on your iron.

What Planet?

Linda F. posted a "what planet are you from?" test, and this is my result:

***You Are From Uranus***
You shine with brilliant creativity, and you're more than a little eccentric.You love everything unusual and shocking. You're one far-out chick or dude.Anything unconventional excites you - and you have genius potential.Just don't let your rebel side get the best of you, or else you'll alienate everyone.Your original thinking and funky attitude is all you need to be you.
What Planet Are You From?http://www.blogthings.com/whatplanetareyoufromquiz/

It's so funny -- I'm sure my DH would agree, he thinks I'm quite unusual, but I don't like to be around way out people. I don't like a lot of attention when I'm in public, so weird hair-dos and piercings kind of turn me off. But I hate being or having things the same as others. When we still had our gift store in NC, it about sent me around the bend when the other retailers would copy display windows, or source gifts from the same companies. After all, why would you WANT to sell what everyone else is selling? Why would you want to be the same?

I can't tell yet how I feel about this planet thing...I think they based too much on my sun sign (Aquarius). Mama always said I was one of the cuckoos of the zodiac! LOL.

Medusa is back

I can only post a little bit of what I'm working on. Actually, my main project right now is the Wish for the New Year Angel challenge doll and I can't post pix of that till the challenge is over (assuming I get it done in time!) but every so often, I take a break and work on whatever DIP starts pestering me.

This Medusa I started months ago. I was going to test the pattern, and got a little fed up with the omissions in the directions and had to take off on my own. I figured it wouldn't be a very good example for testing, so I set her aside.

So far, I've sewn two heads and haven't gotten the face right, so I painted them out with gesso, and started over. Wednesday night I remembered that I had these rather eerie, almost serpentine looking eyes that I bought from Barb at Joggles, so decided they'd been waiting for the Medusa. I've done the work on the face so far on the flat white of the gesso, and feeling it's just odd enough for the Medusa. Whaddya think? Kind of creeepy?

How Many of Me?

Well, this was interesting. One of the gals on one of the doll lists sent in this link. I knew that my first name has always been a PITA (the first name Susan is the 25th most popular name...there are nearly 1.2 million of us in the US!) but I also knew that marrying Gerry took me into the rarer aspects (there are only 630 people in the US with our last name). Turned out to be a great combo, for more reasons than one!

HowManyOfMe.com

There are: 3 people with my name in the U.S.A. How many have your name?

Now...if I still had my name from my first marriage, it would really be a PITA...9,646 of 'em in the US alone.

Auditioning Fabrics

This was a new phrase to me, auditioning fabrics. One of the gals on the CPS list talked about visiting an artist's studio, and referenced being amazed as she watched the artist audition fabrics. That made so much sense, I just loved the visual...let's put you in here. Will you make the cut? Is there someone else better for the part? Can you hold my attention?

I'm contemplating a new doll. I sure seem to start a lot of dolls. I don't seem to finish very many, though! I have a new one buzzing in my brain, and what do I do? Favorite color (aqua blue), a little gold, and make mine batik.

I have a closet full of beautiful fabrics. Not as many fabrics as I had before the big move, but still a LOT of fabrics. Everytime I see a new doll, though, I go back to that little section in the treehouse, filled with batiks, and those mermaid-ish colors truly are the song of the siren for me.

Also, I've gone back to my beginnning M.O. While most doll artists whose patterns I buy have you put the whole doll together and then do the face, that just doesn't work for me. The face determines the personality for me, and so I have to do a face first and build the doll around it. I tried to change, I really did, and some of the dollmakers I admire most do the face last -- but perhaps they are a little more adept at faces. For the time being, I'm going to make lots of practice faces, and when I get one I like, I'll build a doll around it.

Christmas decorating

We decorated for Christmas this year. Last year, we were still so burned out from our years in retail, that we just couldn't face decorating. At the last minute, it may even have been on Christmas eve, we put up one of our artificial trees and put some spotlights on the house. We still were a little less than enthusiastic last year, but I just couldn't go with nothing.

This year we were feeling a little iffy, too. We're getting pretty bah-humbug-ish in our old age. A couple of weeks ago, we went through the Christmas decor department of a local garden center which had a bunch of beautiful designer trees. My husband happens to feel that Christmas should be red, green, white, maybe some gold or silver, and contain Santa and elves. Christmas is for children, not for high-buck decorators. But I said something about one day hoping to have a color coordinated, decor-type tree.

Yesterday we pulled out an artificial tree that we had as one of our "extras" from our NC house. We've decided not to have a real tree this year since we'll be traveling and not here to keep an eye on it. We then decided to make a trip to get all new, color-coordinated ornaments. I left the house thinking gold and green. We came back with gold and copper, feathers, and copper glittered twigs. Then I took the four foot tree out of the box and realized how small it is! Gerry had to leave to get new ornament hooks, rather than dig through all the boxes and try to find the ones we owned...and came back with a 6 foot artificial, pre-lighted tree! He said he just kept seeing the disappointment on my face when I realized how many ornaments I'd bought, and how little the tree is!

Here's a picture of the tree tonight. We had to go out today and get more of the garland, and we added a few more coordinated ornaments. I'm really happy with it. It may not scream Christmas in traditional colors, but it makes me really happy. I have more pictures at my picturetrail site -- www.picturetrail.com/windwhisper



Tonight, Gerry lit the house with spots focused on a large green wreath in the center of the house. I set up a lighted Victorian village. Feels good to get back into the mood. I was walking around, admiring how pretty everything was when I realized that Cosmo had left the first gift under the tree...unfortunately I'm not fond of dead mice.