We went to Michaels this afternoon, and we bought another ball of the variegated cashmere - the other colour I'd considered for Peach. Jan's put it away until our camping weekend up north so I'll have something to do while he goes kayaking. Smart move, or I'd have already started knitting!
I finished Peach's sweater set earlier this week, and I'm not sure I like it or not. I went through an entire box of fabric looking for a good colour for her jumper, and ended up with the exact same fabric as Lonnie's. So now the two of them are like girls wearing their school uniforms - long-sleeved white top, blue jumper, black tights and Doc brown boots - but school dress code isn't strict about sweaters or jackets the students wear to and from school. I thought I'd photograph the two of them with two props I picked up on our recent trip - a "metal sculpture bike" and a musical instrument in a case.
We went to Michaels this afternoon, and we bought another ball of the variegated cashmere - the other colour I'd considered for Peach. Jan's put it away until our camping weekend up north so I'll have something to do while he goes kayaking. Smart move, or I'd have already started knitting! Decided to take up Marianne's challenge to try photograph a watermelon seed fight. I managed to find a few seeds in my "seedless" watermelon, cleaned and dried them and put them in a little bowl. However, Jan all groggy late last night loading up the dishwasher, noticed the bowl on the kitchen table, and thinking it was empty, put it in the dishwasher. So this morning when I was going to take my pictures, the seeds were gone. And of course, they had come from the last slice of watermelon. So, I found a few apple seeds in some cores in the compost container..... How did I manage to make the seeds stick onto Elin and Erzulie? Eye wax. Iplehouse always uses so much of their pink eye wax to hold their doll's eyes in - way more than they really need - so I have a small plastic box where I keep the extra. The eye wax is a bit sticky, so is perfect for making my dolls hold things. A bit pressed discreetly into the palm of a hand will help hold a utensil or prop. And in this case, a tiny piece holds each seed in place.
Today is "National Watermelon Day", the day to eat some watermelon, so I sliced some up for the girls. Two of them are behaving like well-mannered young ladies, and are delicately eating slices from the smaller melon, but Nami.....well... she went straight for a huge chunk of the larger one before I'd even finished slicing it up! Good grief! Where's your manners girl? Next thing you know, she'll be spitting seeds at everyone!
Someone on DoA commented on my "Nude Day" photo and asked how I was able to pose my dolls running with just one foot on the ground. Simple - it's my wire doll stands.... They fit around my doll's waist and then I poke the stand into the ground and hide it behind a leg. For the naked girls I had to be a bit more creative and bent the waist support around the girl's necks, hiding it with their hair. You can make stands like these too. Just go to my Tutorials page and scroll down - it's the last Tutorial on the bottom of the page. I love these stands!
Anyway, Nami wanted to demonstrate what she can do with a little help from my stands.... I finished painting and varnishing my watermelons last night, so this morning when I was cleaning everything up and putting everything away, I though maybe it was time to finally use that brush cleaner I bought several years ago. I thought I'd start with my best brushes, since they needed the least work, so poured some of the Winsor & Newton Brush Cleaner and Restorer into a glass jar - about an inch - and put in all the brushes. The instructions on the bottle said to remove acrylic paint I'd need to soak the brushes for several hours. So I covered everything with plastic - in case there were any fumes - and went to finish knitting my doll hat. When I came back a few hours later, the brush cleaner had "wicked" it's way up the brushes and had started dissolving the paint on the handles. It was one giant sticky mess of bubbling paint, with all my nice brushes stuck together into one big mass. My Stevenson brand brushes were the worst affected and the blue handle paint was everywhere. What a giant mess!! I managed to pull all the brushes apart, getting blue paint-covered hands and arms in the process. Then taking the entire roll of paper towels, I took the brushes and cleaner out on the porch and spent the next couple of hours meticulously cleaning up my brush handles. I poured the last dirty liquid into the back of my garden - I wasn't going to put it back in the bottle or pour it down the drain. Now my "good" brushes look like this.....maybe it's time to buy some new "good" ones. I don't think the brush cleaner and restorer did much of anything for the actual bristle part of the brushes, but it sure made a mess of all the handles - and I wasted my whole afternoon trying to clean everything up. I sure won't be doing that again! Forget trying to clean and restore brushes - I'll just buy new ones when I need them! With that brand new Michaels store about to open mere minutes from my home, here's another thing those 40% off coupons might be good for.
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AuthorMartha Boers is an award-winning Canadian doll maker and costumer specializing in fantasy and historical-style costumes. Archives
April 2024
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