Happy New Year

Christmas has come and gone for most people. We'll be celebrating both Christmas (again) and New Years here this weekend with my #2 daughter and her husband and son from New Jersey, who couldn't make it last weekend. We still have mounds of packages to open and lots of cookies, candies, pies, cakes, and other goodies to wade through.......and need I say, pounds to gain!!!
I look forward to getting back to my studio and concentraing on some creative projects in the new year. I have two round robins going, one is almost finished and the other is barely begun so that will give me something to look forward to each month for awhile.
Then I'm planning some new sculpting projects, some new egg decorating, and if I'm v-e-r-y smart, maybe I'll even start some things to make for Christmas 2007.....that would be a first! I'm making an effort to start knitting again and I've about decided that rather than plunging right into making socks right away (which I've never done!), I'll do some leg warmers first. That surely will help get my fingers accustomed to the rhythm again. I find knitting very relaxing, but I've never been very good at it! And leg warmers would make great gifts for grandaughters....and even husbands who complain about cold ankles in the winter!
Whatever I do, I'll share some photos from time to time. I hope you all have a wonderful, happy, healthy, productive, and prosperous new year!!! With love....

Christmas Angel

Woohoo! I made it work this time! This was my first Christmas Angel. Her head, hands and wings are clay and her gown is crinkled paper. She stands about 12" tall. I have two others that hang on the wall but I don't have photos of them yet.

Try again

Okay, I got this one to upload, anyway. This one was given to me by my son and daughter-in-law. She's about 9" tall and 14" wide.

New Look!

Wow, I just changed to Beta. I like the new look, I hope it works as well for me as it has for others.
To see if I can get it right, I'll try uploading a couple of photos.
Here are two Christmas angels made of clay and paper. I bought the tall one years ago and was given the blue one not long after. I use these in my decorations every year and pack them away carefully after the holidays.
Well it seems that the tall angel won't upload at this point. I'll see if I can fix that later.

Wall Canvases Finished

Well they're almost finished! I still need to paint the edges of the canvases that didn't get sprayed during the final session. I was really hesitant to cover over that lovely rich blue I had on the background, but once I started with the spray paint I was having so much fun I overcame all regrets! I learned a great deal with this project. One being that inkjet printing on fabric will blur dreadfully if the glue you use seeps through. I had a lovely music staff printed on the drape at the bottom, but it got spoiled when I dipped it into the Paverpol. I still like the way it turned out, I just wish the colors were truer in my photos! Thanks for a great class, Sherry!

Work in Progress

This is a project from Sherry Goshon's online class. We're making wall pieces on canvas and I'm currently just toying with different elements to fit a "musical" theme. Actually as I'm writing this I'm thinking of an entirely different direction I could go with this.....smile....so there's no telling what these pieces will look like when I'm finished!

The Empress

Musings
This is the cover doll from Linda Fleming's Not Your Mother's Paper Dolls, made and embellished by the author herself. I'm happy to be the proud owner of this lovely creation and she will soon be displayed in her own frame or shadow box....whichever she decides!

Linda's new book!

This is a brand new release by my friend, Linda Fleming in Florida. It's a fabulous find for paper doll enthusiasts, art doll enthusiasts, paper art enthusiasts, well you get the picture. You can buy it with the dolls all printed on sturdy card stock, or you can get the instruction book with the dolls on CD so you can print off as many as you want. She gives instructions for embellishment and display as well. For more information and ordering, go to:
http://notyourmotherspaperdolls.blogspot.com/
Wouldn't it make a great Christmas gift for someone you love? Or embellish a paper doll for a dear little girl you know!
Oh, and I should mention (well I WANT to mention!) I am the proud owner of the cover doll, The Empress, in all her beaded elegance! I'll try to get a good picture of her to share with you today. Thank you Linda!!! She's a treasure!

Drawing with clay

I've been doing some face "masks" in polymer to use for making molds, which I will then use, hopefully, in dolls or other projects where I just need a face for embellishment. Don't these look spooky with their blank eyes glaring at you!!!
This is a very quick and easy way to practice sculpting faces, akin to drawing on paper in my opinion. I start with a flat oval of cardboard and create the face on that. They go very quickly unless I get hung up on trying to get the eyes right! Then when the mold is made and I pull a face from that, I can add the back of the head if it's to be used for a doll, or simply adhere it to whatever base I'm using for my project.
This is a journal cover I did in an online class with Jean Bernard, using just a face "mask" for embellishment. The base and the vines and berries are all Apoxie Sculpt, but the face is polymer.

Another egg

This is the egg I started in the workshop with friend Jeff a couple of weeks ago. I realized after I got it home that the silk print and lovely beads and trim were placed too low for a hanging egg. So after some fretting and mulling over various ideas I suddenly decided Apoxie was the obvious solution. I THINK it's finished now! This new (to me) craft/art is so much fun, and thanks to Jeff I have more goose eggs to play with, plus an emu egg, and a teemy little egg to make a pendant! But those will have to be sandwiched in amidst the dollmaking, sculpting, crazy quilting, and journaling! Life is good!

Egg Art!

I just had a lovely visit from my friend, Jeff K. (aka Grasshoppa/aka The Egg Man) from New York. He came down for a workshop at Eggcetera, Alice's shop in Easton, and came up to my studio to work on eggs and other crafty things with me while he was here! He brought me this amazingly beautiful emu egg which opens up to become a "trinket" box lined in velvety fabric. Gorgeous!!!
It also contained a beautiful lapel pin made from a piece of eggshell. I didn't get a photo of it yet because I was wearing it when we took these shots. He also brought me several other eggs to work on myself, emu eggs, goose eggs and a tiny little egg to make a pendant with. So much generosity in one young man! My creative muse is going to get a real workout in the next months with all I want to do now. I have some paper dolls to embellish that my friend Linda has designed, and a couple of round robin dolls to complete and send out, and now the eggs to play with! Life is good!!

Third Paper Doll

Here's the last paper doll for the swap on Doll Street. She'll be going off to Judi in Alaska tomorrow or Friday.
I combined two of Patti Culea's rubber stamps for this one, painted her with watercolor pencils, added a skirt and some "bling bling" (love that term) and she's ready to go!
I hope to make more paper dolls soon, but right now I'm getting ready for my August visit from some of my children and grandchildren, and then a friend from New York (Grasshoppa!) will be here after that!
So much to look forward to!

Paper Dolls

Here are three paper dolls I've made...some for a Doll Street swap, some for fun.
The first is from a Mirkwood Designs template, the second is mostly original using a
face mold from a commercial mold. The third is my embellishments on Linda Fleming's African woman design. Wish I could get a photo of her that shows up all her "glitter". I'm working on a fourth while trying to get my house in order for company starting next week. Then friend Jeff(Grasshoppa) is coming down from New York to give some of us a class in decorating emu eggs!!! And he's promised to come and play a bit in my studio working with alcohol inks, etc. Toooooo much fun!

Sculpt is finished

Well, I think she's finished! I trimmed her hat with apoxie roses and some beads on the other side. I dyed a silk rose and gave it a coat of PearlEx gold interference and varnish...that's at her waist or thereabouts. She looks very demure, but I think she must be pretty bold to wear that LOW cut gown, don't you?

Candlestick sculpt progress

I had fun dyeing fabric and playing with Paverpol and now she is dressed and waiting for embellishment. I'll use some Apoxie and beads for that I think, and maybe some natural materials.....we'll see what she demands!

Fairy bust painted

Now she has her gold paint and texturizing medium, plus a little black shading which doesn't show in the picture, but makes a big difference in real life. Now she'll get a bit more paint colors here and there, a little sanding, and some Paverpol draping. Plus wings, eventually! (They may take awhile)

WIP Fairy Bust

This is my work in progress from Jean Bernard's online class. The head is sculpted from Jean's "Mother" mask mold, and the body is sculpted from Apoxie Sculpt clay. It sits on a wooden candlestick embellished with more apoxie and will be painted gold and further embellished with texturizing medium and draperies soaked in Paverpol. Way too much fun! Jean is a delightful, generous teacher and her classes are always intriguing. I work WAY out of my box learning her techniques!

Round Robin

Now there's something in this post Katie! *smile* I had to learn how to post photos.....again. This is the cover of a journal for a new round robin I'm involved in with 7 friends. We each made a head and torso of a doll, or some semblance thereof and will send it off with the journal to the others to add to and embellish to their hearts content. It's always fun to see what comes home again at the end!

Grandsons' escapades

It has been an eventful month for my dear grandsons. First, Alex in Virginia, twelve (almost thirteen, mind you), had a fall and broke his collarbone. As grandmas are prone to do, I was very worried about him because it was very painful. We don't like to see our loved ones in pain, even if we "see" them from a distance of a couple of hundred miles! But he has seen an orthopedic doctor and been given a good prognosis, so maybe his entire summer won't be a total loss. He's going to Boy Scout camp to work on his merit badges, but just won't be able to participate in many of the more vigorous activities. And he may join the chess club at his local library, I'm told. Mom and Dad are seeing to it that he isn't awfully bored during his recovery!
And now the younger grandson in New Jersey, Kenny, who is nine years old, has just begun a six week summer camp experience on a college campus up there. First time away from home and having a great time. They get to choose which activities they want to participate in each day so it should be a lot of fun for him. So far he has chosen wrestling and archery. And he's learning to swim. He spends 5 days and four nights at camp and goes home for weekends. I'm so anxious for this to be a positive experience for him!

Musings

Saturday musings~~
Sometimes it's fun to do something just for the fun of it! My Red Hat Egg Lady is from an online class with Kathryn Walmsley and she really isn't an egg. She's an egg-shaped gourd the size of an extra large chicken egg. Her face is sculpted in paper clay and her hair is apoxie sculpt, as are her legs. She was too shy to lift her skirt for the photo, but she's wearing a beaded bikini under her tutu with beaded fringe you can just see peeking out under there.
She's pretty smug about her risque outfit..........

Musings

Okay, I discovered how to do this! Here are photos of my Victorian Rabbit from an online class with Sherry Goshon. She's made of doe suede and stands alone without the aid of an armature. Her blouse is made from an antique petticoat I've had in my stash for a long time waiting for just the right project on which to use it. Her apron is from a linen hand towel I've had for awhile, as well.
Isn't that a sweet gentle face? It's a face mold created by Sherry which I covered with doe suede and painted with watercolor pencils and blushed and highlighted with decorator chalks. Such fun!!! I have white velvet to make another rabbit, but who knows when I'll find the time to do that!

Musings

If I can figure out how to add photos to this page again, I'll show you a couple of things I've finished since I last posted.

Catching up

Well not really catching up. Just getting back to the blog. I've been working more in clay this winter. I've loved my cloth dollmaking, but missed working in clay after having been a potter for several years. It's so much nicer working in polymer and air-dry clays, less mess, shorter and less labor intensive finishing times, etc. And less studio space required for working, too.
And I did another egg! Grasshoppa(Jeff) had a challenge for his students, and wonder of wonders, my egg won! How surprising and how nice! I received a lovely crystal bowl on a golden stand as first prize and some nice encouragement from the judge....and Jeff. I hope to do more eggs soon.
But my first love this winter has been the sculpting. Working with some online friends, learning as we go, has been very motivating. I've taken a couple of online classes and hope to have the results from those classes to show soon. I work slowly, but I work!!!!