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Out in the Snow

2/23/2019

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Our granddaughters come over every Saturday morning, and today Rachel brought one of her dolls along so we could take pictures of her in the snow. We gathered any props we thought might be fun, including stuff for making a snowman, but the snow was far too hard and icy to make one. So this is what we ended up with.....

​Feeding the birds....
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Trudging across the snow to the sledding hill...
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Sledding....
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"Wheeee!!"
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Odds and Ends

2/23/2019

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Yesterday morning I went for dental surgery, so spent the rest of the day just doing some odds and ends. First I decided to try 'fix' my Phairby's dress. I wasn't exactly pleased with how it had turned out, and wanted to see if it could be salvaged. This is how it looked before I started....
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First I wet the fine silk overskirt to see if it would create more in scale looking gathers, and get rid of the 'pouffy' look. When that was successful, I removed the bow at her waist at centre front, and decided to try camouflage that plain dark pink trim along the edge of her overskirt. Which meant beading. Lots and lots of beading. With super tiny beads. So, of course her bodice and sleeves needed matching beading too. As well as her hat.  I think the whole thing looks a lot better now....
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When that was done, I had to sew several pillows closed. When I went looking through the box with velveteen for a backing for the needlepoint pillow, I came across two printed velveteens that I thought would make nice pillow too. So had cut, sewed, and stuffed them. They just needed to be sewn shut.

And a few weeks ago we had come across a little wooden box, at Value Village, that had a tiny needlepoint carpet glued to the top. We bought it for the carpet, removed and washed it (it was badly stained) but it needed a new backing. So I hand stitched that on yesterday as well. 
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So with all the odds and ends done, I can move onto a new project, or two......or three.....
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Willie's Gift

2/22/2019

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Willie had been waiting patiently until the game was over, so she could give Winston her gift....
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"I have something for you!!"
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"Is it time to open the gifts now??"
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"Here you go.......Happy Birthday!!"
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"Wow!! Thanks!! Just what I always wanted!!"
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"Errr.......what are they??"
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"It's wing de-icer!! So next time you have to go somewhere in a storm, you can still fly, instead of having to walk. This one is for snow, and the other is for sleet."
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Pillow Time

2/21/2019

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I've been working on dozens of Pet Pillows that will soon go up for sale, and needed to take some promotional photos to show how big they are in relation to the dolls.....so.....
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"Does he look familiar??"
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Peach and Leona were busy stuffing the pillows....
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"I think Rags likes this one!"
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the Winner!

2/21/2019

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So with Effie keeping an eye on Winston to make sure he wasn't cheating....
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...they were soon down to just two - Ringo and Chloe.....
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Round and round they went, trying to stay close to the seat.....
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Then Winston turned off the music, and turned to see who got the last chair....
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It was Chloe!! 
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Chloe was the winner!!
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Back to the Party

2/21/2019

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With Winston being out, Narae allowed him to be in control of the music....
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Soon a few more elves were out, and there were just four left....
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But Effie, who was still a little sore over being out, was watching Winston....
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..and noticed that he was sneaking a look...
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...and seemed to be watching for when it would be a good time to stop the music....
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"Hey!! You aren't allowed to look!!"
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"That's cheating!!"
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1 Comment

Making a Wig Cap

2/20/2019

8 Comments

 
My David is going to get a handmade wig, which means I have to make a wig cap.  Now, while he's still unpainted. So I started today.

I really don't like making the wig caps. I came across a wig-making tutorial by Whispering Grass a while back. Her wigs looked impressive, and her technique looked simple enough, so I tried it. But it was anything but easy - mostly because tulle doesn't exactly have much 'surface area' for glue to adhere to, and I was having a terrible time getting the tulle to lay flat on the head. But I persisted, came up with some techniques of my own, and have now made several hard cap wigs based on her technique. I've managed to come up with some tricks to make it as simple as possible, and without getting my hands covered in glue.
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So, I decided that I'd take photos as I made David's wig cap, and his wig, and turn them into an illustrated, step-by-step Tutorial, so others who try the tulle method won't have quite the same challenge I did at first. 
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Victorian Needlepoint

2/20/2019

4 Comments

 
Nyssa came over to see what her Mom was doing....
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"What are you making it for?"
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"It's going to be a new pillow for our sofa."
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4 Comments

Musical Chairs Continued

2/19/2019

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They continued playing Musical Chairs, and soon Nami had plenty of company on the sofa..
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They were down to just eight people, and seven chairs....
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Round and round they went...
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Narae turned off the music....
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...and everyone scrambled for a seat...
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...and this time it was Winston who was out of luck...
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1 Comment

Needlepoint Pillow

2/18/2019

4 Comments

 
I thought it would be nice to make a 'Peacock' pillow to go on the sofa in the 'Peacock' room, so went looking through my drawer of Aida cloth to find something to embroider it on. However, I came across a miniature needlepoint carpet I started some 30+ years ago for my daughter's 1/12th scale dollhouse. Well, there's no point in finishing the entire thing now, as nothing else would get done the rest of the year, plus I have no use for it, so I decided to just finish The Center section and make it into a throw pillow for the doll's sofa....
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The 'lazy' part of me keeps eyeing the part around the outside of the basted pillow outline, thinking how nice it would be if I could just 'Photoshop' all those wasted stitches into the pillow proper - then it would be done already.  But no. This is going to require a LOT of actual, physical handwork.
​So much for all those other things I had wanted to do this month!
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    Author

    Martha Boers is an award-winning Canadian doll maker and costumer specializing in fantasy and historical-style costumes.
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