Blog Archives

Missing Him

2/28/2022

While Baron was away, Naomi busied herself working on her wedding gown....

It was the perfect time to work on it, since there was no chance that he'd see it....

But she missed him terribly....

...and even more, missed not knowing where he was, or what he was doing...or when he was coming back....

At least back in her own time, one could phone or text....

...but here there was nothing....

It was hard not to worry, so she tried to distract herself with her sewing....

Baron and Rex continued on, and came across Winston and Willie walking down the road. The knights got down off their horses and after acknowledging Winston, Baron crouched down so he wouldn't tower over Willie...

"Good day Madam. I'm surprised - and pleased - to run into you on this snowy day?"

"Well sonny, Winston and I are just out for a walk.."

Winston was feeling a bit awkward.
"You do know that he is Sir Baron, Captain of the Royal Guard??"

"Yes, of course...."

"I'm well acquainted with both of these young men. They are my favourite two knights..."

"It's such a lovely day, that Winston and I are just taking a nice walk down to the village."

"Well, then both of you are in good company..."

"It's nice to have run into you today. It's been a while."

Narin & Narae

2/26/2022

Baron and Rex were still out on their winter patrol of the kingdom...
...when they came across two people on the road....

"Good day..."

"Good day, my Lord..."

"How are the two of you doing on this cold, wintery day?"

"We are doing well sir..."

"In fact we are heading to the castle...."

"We are going into service there..."

"Well, good luck to you then..."

"And we'll be on our way..."

Wedding Gown Progress

2/25/2022

I'm still working on Naomi's wedding gown - along with a duplicate for a friend. After making the underdresses, petticoats, and lining the overskirts, it was time to address the sleeves for the over bodice. Each sleeve would be made up of at least three parts; the basic sleeve, an embroidered gold satin puff, and an embroidered puff of the fine skirt fabric...

The wrist edges of the sleeves were finished first. I originally used a different gold trim, changed my mind about it, so had to pick everything apart in order to add the new trim and the narrow lace ruffles. The reworked version looked so much better....

The most time-consuming part was embroidering a vine motif along all the pale yellow satin ribbons I'd sewn onto the gold puffs. The embroidery was intended to mimic the vines embroidered on the sari fabric. Each puff took three evenings to embroider...

I don't usually have a plan for exactly what I'm going to use, so will lay out the parts every now and then to decide what direction to go in.....

The pale yellow puffs are meant to mimic the pattern on the bottom of the skirts. I made the first four out of the sari fabric, lined with a sheer cotton, and had hoped to use a fancy stitch on my sewing machine to do the diamond patterns, but it was a disaster and I had to throw them out and start all over from scratch. This second set still has the pale yellow sari fabric, but it's lined with regular white cotton. And all the lines had to be embroidered by hand....

Making progress on the embroidery and beading....

With all the puffs finally finished it was finally time to start building up the sleeves. First the pale yellow puffs were basted in place, along with the cream trim, then it was stitched on the machine. I like to baste every single row because I want everything to sew perfectly on my machine, and I don't trust only using pins. It may be a lot of extra work, but the result is always worth it.

After gathering the gold puff near the top, I added seven loops of pale yellow picot ribbon, and then a row of gathered white muslin to represent the 'chemise puffs'....

A bodice with the sleeves sewn in....

Close up detail of upper sleeve....

And Bianca checking the fit of an unfinished bodice, over the underdress....

I prefer to do as much embellishing of the bodice before the skirt gets sewn on, as it's a lot easier to handle without all the skirt fabric getting in the way. But I can only take beading so far, and keep it well back of the seam lines, because my machine hates sewing over beads. Anyways, even though things are finally starting to take shape, there's still lots to do

Behind the Scenes

2/24/2022

With the Forest Dweller Christmas story having come to an end, it's time to take a look at some Behind the Scenes secrets.

I started by creating a huge set with a living room at one end, and a kitchen at the other. I didn't have much in the way of furniture the correct scale, since the standard quarter scale would be too big, yet dollhouse scale would be too small. So, I tried to use in-between size furniture for tables and chairs, yet used some of the smaller, quarter scale stuff around the walls. Fireplaces can be any size, so it was in the middle, with my 'Victorian' wall on the the living room side, and the 'Woodcutter's Cottage' wall on the kitchen end....

Taking a closer look at the living room. I included a piano and harp since I was originally intending to have everyone singing together, but changed my mind. They were never used.

I loved the kitchen end of the set. It was also a better scale.

I had been photographing my tiny gourds for another project and was fed up with all the holes. The gourds had come strung together as a garland, and each one had two big holes. So I decided to fill all the holes with Apoxy and then hide them with paint. Yes, it was quite a bit of work, but I was fed up, and with the way time flies they'd be done in no time anyways. So, worth the effort....

When I got to photographing the second set of guests travelling in the snow, I wanted to do something different, so asked Jan if he could make me a small wooden door - which he did. I panted it, and added a doorknob and leather 'hinges'....

I placed the door against the base of our crabapple tree, and added some trees and props, to create the front entrance to Chip and Jo's home.

In the kitchen scenes I mostly use existing food props, but sometimes I'll use unbaked polymer clay to help create more 'realism'. Like when Muffy was making a pie. The rolled out dough and pie crust are unbaked polymer clay, while the raspberries are existing baked fruit. After the photo shoot, the unbaked polymer clay gets put back into my supply container.

For the story about Tiana's cookies, I started with a cookie cutter set from a doll accessory package from Walmart. It came with 'rolled out dough', a cutter, and the 'cookies' actually pop out.....

For the burnt cookies I rolled out some dark brown polymer clay and cut it with the same cookie cutter, then added a bit of brown paint to the cookie sheet, and added some 'smoke' in Photoshop.

Then another colour polymer clay for the properly baked cookies. I don't bother baking the various cookies, but just scrunch it up again afterwards and put it back in the storage containers.

I didn't have a complete story planned ahead in my mind, but just went along with whatever inspired me at the time. After the menfolk's games turned to strip poker, and they were all naked, I thought it would be fun to have them go take a sauna. But that meant I'd have to make one.

I took a small, square, shipping box, and transformed it into a small hut. Then took some calendar cardboard to fashion a roof. Then painted both, adding some fancy embellishment...

I varnished the roof and the base of the hut to help protect them against the snow. I didn't varnish the walls, as the corrugated cardboard reacted to the varnish forming unsightly 'ripples', and I didn't want those all over the walls. But the base and roof would be in contact with the snow.

Then I used duct tape to attach the wooden door, took everything outside, and created the scene in the snow....

The inside of the sauna was another matter. I really didn't feel like making a fake wooden interior, but then Jan brought a small wooden bookcase. I'm always up for anything that doesn't require a lot of work on my part, and this was the perfect size.....

He'd just finished making a new table and benches, and the benches fit perfectly inside, and we found some smooth stones. They were a bit big in my opinion but there was no choice since everything outside was buried under a deep layer of snow. So they had to do....

Then by taking a close up photo and adding some 'steam' in Photoshop, it looked perfect....

When it came time to shoot the dinner, I couldn't decide how or where to place the table. I tried several layouts, but the set with the living room and kitchen just wasn't conducive to having a formal dinner. So I took the entire set apart, and started from scratch and made a formal dining room instead. This time I used both Victorian walls. I moved the Christmas tree to the other side of the room, added a different carpet, and some more formal furniture around the perimeter.

The table was just the right size for all the characters, but it wasn't going to hold much 'food', so I added two sideboards for all the desserts....

With a set this big, the best photos are always the ones taken close up at the doll's eye level....

I wanted something more interesting after dinner, other than the guests just leaving, so came up with the idea of the ladies relaxing in a hot tub while the menfolk took care of cleaning up. But how to make a hot tub? I wasn't about to submerge all the ladies in real water.

So I took a cookie tin. I made a raised false bottom at a sitting depth for the larger ladies. Then I took two sheets of plastic wrap, and crumpled a third layer between them, and taped it over the top of the cookie tin. Then I laid out a row of parquet flooring onto a strip of duct tape, and wrapped it, with tape on the inside, around the tin, securing it with two elastic bands.

Then I cut small holes in the plastic wrap so I could slip in the dolls. Then sprinkled some clear beads on top to simulate bubbles.

I took everything outside and set up the tub under the bridal wreath bush. It had been a 'warm' sunny day, so the snow was very wet, and not very easy to work with. I had wanted soft fine snow that I could sprinkle on the tiny trees, but the snow was way too wet.

I hung three little lights in the branches above them and took the photos. Then to make it look more like it was nighttime, I had to darken the images and add lens flares to the lights...and some add steam...

I had considered that it might be fun to photograph the menfolk cleaning up after dinner, but I didn't get the idea for the hot tub and cleanup until after I thought I was done with all the photography, and I'd already cleaned all that up so I could set up the formal dining room. I really didn't want to have to set up that entire kitchen set again from scratch, so decided to just skip it. Making a hot tub was one thing, but forget redoing that entire kitchen!

*Anyways, the whole story is now up in it's entirety in Favourite Photos 2022....
A Forest Dweller Christmas

Good-Bye

2/23/2022

Finally everything had been cleaned up. The menfolk had divided up all the leftovers, each choosing their favourite desserts to take home with them, and put together a basket for everyone to take home with them...

Max and Maisie had had a really good time....

...as had Chip and Jo....

"Thank you again for hosting!"

"We all had a wonderful time..."

"You're all very welcome...."

"Good-bye, and good night! Until next time!"

the Hot Tub

2/22/2022

With everyone having had their fill of all their favourite desserts, it was finally time for dinner to end, and like every year, it was the men's role to take care of the cleanup. It had been their turn for fun and games while the ladies enjoyed working in the kitchen preparing dinner, and now they would do all the cleanup while their womenfolk had a chance to just relax.

The garden lights were turned on as they climbed into the hot tub....

"This is the life!'

"I think we all outdid ourselves today. That had to be the best dinner we've put together so far."

"Come on in....."

"There's still plenty of room...."

Dessert

2/21/2022

With the main course finished, it was time for everyone's favourite part of the meal - dessert.

Dessert was a much less formal course, and everyone was encouraged to get up and mingle....

With dinner almost over, the ladies were looking forward to their own special treat...

Dinner

2/20/2022

The menfolk rushed inside and got dressed as fast as they could, as they had developed quite the appetite out in the snow. Soon everyone was seated around the table....