I Missed One

Yeah. I missed posting last weekend.

Sorry about that.

Turns out I have been sick, and I haven't had a lot of energy for anything. Have no idea what is wrong, and I have had to spend a lot of time at the doctor's office. My doc won't release me back to work either.

I have been doing a little here and there, trying to find things I can do that won't push me.

I have gotten a little farther on my doll head, but not much. I can't seem to control my hands all that well when I am pushing the needle through. It is kinda scary.

Anyways, I have fished out a few bottles, and cleaned them up. I have a cool bottle cutter that does most of the work for me, so I am going to try that this week, if I can get some minimal help.

I also have some other half baked ideas to pick from after I get my bottles used.

I have hooked my tablet back up, and  played with it a bit. I might have something to share in the next couple of weeks.

So, I do apologize for the short post with no pics, but, God willing, I will be around a little more often until I can go back to work.

Talk to you soon.

Hair.

I just want to post a quick update...

I know I should be done re-rooting by now, but it turns out that the package of hair I got wasn't enough to finish the head. So after I posted last week, I ran out of hair. I have the head over halfway rooted though, and I expect that I have about 2 more hours of work left to put into the rooting.

I know the picture makes it look like she has less than half a head of hair, but trust me, she has more holes on top of her head than she has around the back of her head.

I desperately need a thimble though, pushing the needle through her little vinyl head is tearing my thumb up. LOL

I have procured another bag of hair, and I hope to finish her in my evenings after work this week. My goal is to be ready to style and set her hair by Friday. I hope I can get that done and paint her face up next weekend. I suppose we shall see.

I am starting to think she would make an awesome steam-punk character...

2015 is Here!

...And so is my first check in of the year.

I have still been struggling with sick, and holiday business, and work. I haven't completely neglected my creative endeavors though. 

I got my darning needles. LOL

I have started re-rooting one of my doll heads. I am working on giving her a nice full head of red hair. I can see that I need to work on finding a better technique, and have already tried a few. I don't know if her hair is going to turn out better than it was, but I am learning a lot about what I shouldn't do, and a little about what works for me.

I think a large part of what is going to work for me is going to depend on the type of hair I get. For this go-round, I just got what I could get at the local hobby store, but they didn't have much in the way of selection. That stuff seems to tangle  and kink up really easy.

I also have a new set of watercolor pencils, I just want to do faces, but I really need to get the hair set before I do the face-up. I am trying to be patient.

I also have a couple articulated bodies to use for the head when I am done with it. I have decided to wait on buying bodies online, until I can get good at remaking heads.

I am having fun, but really, I want to get back to sculpting my own from scratch. My hands are still pretty ravaged from the season, and from work. I doubt my recent bout of illnesses have helped either, but Spring is coming up pretty fast, and I know I'll be doing better then.

THERE IS NO WHITE!

I have been window shopping this week! I spent most of the week watching different doll bodies on E-bay, and hunting down places to outright buy new 1/6 scale bodies.  I found some on Amazon, but for the most part, the prices are not very attractive to someone who isn't 100% sure what they want.

I have a few articulated Barbies in my box, that I might separate their bodies from their heads for starters. I want some bodies a little less 'in-fashion' though. I want my gals to be able to support their own weight. There are some pretty cool looking female muscular bodies out there, and there are bodies with actual cleavage as well. There are so many ways to rearrange and mod dolls that I just can't imagine being happy with a doll that is all one brand... I want to make frankendolls!

Well, back to the faces; I got to go out and buy soft pastels yesterday, they may not be soft enough though. I couldn't find any sealant that I was comfortable to spray on the vinyl doll heads. The brand of watercolor pencil I wanted was sold-out as well. So, I can't do things the right way... But when has that ever stopped me.

I didn't want to wait. I was ready to be putting faces on tiny heads this weekend, and damnit, I wasn't going to change my plan!

I started digging, and I found an old pack of Crayola watercolor pencils I had from way-back-when. I dug out my paintbrushes, and I looked around for other things that might be of use. I found lots of stuff I forgot I had, but not much that would be useful to me in this endeavor.

So, I take everything to the table, and start lining everything out. I pick the most generic head out the lot to start practicing on. I get a cup of water, some paper towels, and some Q-tips. I sit down, open my box of pencils, and reach for the white... AND THERE IS NO WHITE! WTF!

I can't believe it. A frickin' set of colored pencils and no WHITE! I was pissed. I looked at the box. It is only a set of 8. I look again to see there is no brown or grey, either. What the hell... Well, at least there is black. I guess I shouldn't expect so much from a box of pencils I got years ago as a free trial attached to a 96 count box of crayons.

I went ahead and dug out my acrylic paints, because that is what people use for the classic Barbie look, and they are adequate, but I really wanted to avoid actually painting on her face. I am better at drawing and blending.

I was determined to get somewhere. My first try is always a bust, and I want to get my initial bust out of the way. I always have this anxiety over trying something new. Can I even do it? Will I ruin something? Will I be able to make it into what I envision? etc.

Once, I get my first fail over with, I always have ideas on how to improve. Normally, I have an even more exciting vision than I first started with, and there is this general creative rush that is just as awesome as adrenaline, only probably not as bad on my heart. It gives me something to think about during those moments through the day when I my body is in auto mode, it gives me something to envision at night, I dream about what I could be turning my work into...

Anyways, I went ahead a painted the whites of the eyes on. I made the eyes smaller than they were originally, a bit more lidded as well. I then used my watercolor pencils to make the irises and the outlines. Missing white, brown, and grey pencils meant that I had to leave shading detail out; detail that I really wanted to include with the pencils, but hey, I started my damn project.

I then tried to use my pastels to do the make-up, but without the sealer, it just wouldn't work. The pastel did stick to the white paint, which I have tucked away for future experimentation, but that was not what I was going for on this go-around. I had to abandon using them this weekend.

So, I penciled basic red on the lips, drew thicker, darker, lower brows, and did a simple purple shadow on the eyelids. Nothing at all like I envisioned, but I have a basic grasp of how it feels.

There is still much missing from the face, such as, the light/life points (white dots) in the eyes, lip detail, and white teeth, blushing, and shading. There is no keeping the face the way it is. I will  just wipe it clean, instead of finishing. I did start to get a feel for it though, which is good.

I have a more detailed shopping list now. Apparently, it is all stuff I will have to get online. I hate that, but it is probably better in the long run. I will probably save money, I know I will have more of a selection to choose from.

Hopefully, I will have enough time to get somewhere and find something that will allow me to do some more testing Christmas day, while everyone else is occupying themselves with their new stuff. If not, I guess I will break out my acrylics and brush up on my dry-brush techniques, maybe that will be close enough to the pastel effect I want.

I suppose I should start seriously considering what hair to put back on her as well...

Have a Merry Christmas, just in case I don't get back here before then!

End-of-the-Year-Weekly-Update.... Dolls

I decided to start going through my crafty stuff. I am trying to decide where I really want to start... Where I actually CAN start.

I am working so much, that it is hard to take on something that will keep me out in my garage. Besides, it's cold out there right now.

That leaves me only a couple options to choose from right now. Sculpting dolls, or customizing dolls.

I really want to revisit sculpting. I tried this week, but my hands are so dry and cut up from work, that I mess up whatever I start. My dry skin leaves groves where I try to smooth the clay, and it gets in my cuts and burns like acid... It sucks. I don't seem very good at using only tools, I need my fingers.

So I have decided to do better at taking care of my hands. YAY! GO ME!... I will be wearing gloves when I am handling sharp material at work, and I have been using lotion at the rate of an adolescent boy. I already see improvement, but I have a lot of ridges left in my hands and fingers, that still need to heal.

So, like I said, I was going through my crafty stuff, and I found this big tub of Barbie stuff. I have a pretty big interest in looking at customized Barbies, and I have told myself in the past that I was going to try it, so I guess it's about time.

I have so many heads without bodies, that it's perfect.  I am prepped them for my work tonight.

I picked out 3 floating heads to start with.

One is an '80's head. It was the red-head from Barbie and the Rockers... Don't ask me how I remember what heads were what Barbie, I just do...

One is another '80's head, from Safari Barbie...

And one is a head from a princess Barbie I bought for my daughter 4 or 5 years ago.

I have decided that I want fresh pallets... I even wanted to get rid of the nasty, rat nest hair. So I started by cutting the hair. All the tutorials I read say to cut the hair as short as possible, and then pull the hair from the inside of the head through the neck hole, to take it out.

My scissors did not want to get very close to the tiny scalps, so I  used one of my leg/pit razors to actually shave their heads. You know? They aren't kidding when they say it takes patience. I was just about ready to cut their damn skull caps off.

The newest one seemed to have a glue coating on the inside of her head (Which no tutorial I read prepared me for!) It was a mess. The old red headed one had mass amounts of hair. I was amazed so much fit on it.

So, I went from scissors, to tweezers, to scissors some more, then pliers, then the Lady Schick, to pliers again, to tweezers, to a sculpting scraper, to some more tweezing. I finally threw up my hands and boiled the damn heads, which I didn't see in any tutorials for pulling hair, but it made my life a whole lot easier when it came to getting the rest of the work done (Not to mention getting rid of the gluey stuff inside the brunette's head). I finished off with pliers.

I finally got all of the hair out. Next I just took acetone and wiped off the faces. Once again, the tutorials are not exaggerating when they say it takes a lot of elbow grease, and a lot of patience.

After I removed their faces with acetone, I washed the heads off very thoroughly with soap and water. Acetone is not good on anything rubbery in the world that I know of, and so it makes me wonder that some tutorials that say to use acetone nail polish remover don't mention a thorough wash down when you are done using it on a doll head...

I hope to do some blushing and painting on them through the week.

While I am working on the heads, I am hoping to find 1/6 articulated bodies to put them on. I don't want classic Barbie bodies. I am thinking about trying an Obitsu, or Volks body for them, if I can them cheap enough on E-bay or Amazon. I figure I will be doing some shopping this week for this project as well.

Here's hoping for spare time.

I didn't die...

I did lose nearly everything material.

First it was internet.
Then it was other stuff.
Then it was my house.

The last month of 2013 was a downward spiral of loss. We started 2014 by moving in with my parents, and contemplating our next move. There was no internet at my parents, so I lost touch.

The year of 2014 has been one of rebuilding.  My husband and I now both found 5- 4:30 jobs (supposed to be 7-3, but overtime pay is nice) ... at the same place. A new home, which is not much bigger than our last one, but it is a better home. We have 2 working vehicles, and a son that is old enough to watch the daughter, so there is no childcare expenses. The last 4 months have entailed settling into the new home, replacing the items we had to sell off, reestablishing services, the last of which would be internet and phones.

All-in-all it has been a pretty successful year.

I don't have the time I used to have for creativity, but that doesn't mean I don't have the drive. I am trying to figure out how to balance my creative drive with my daily responsibilities.

So, today, I am stuck at home with an injury. The doc said I can go back to work tomorrow. I actually have an opportunity to sit at my computer for a few hours and go through those things that I don't have time to go through when I work 10-12 hours a day for 6 days a week. I have been wanting to organize my sites and social networks again. After losing real internet for 9 months, it isn't easy remembering old passwords and even what social sites I have accounts at.

As it stands, I never successfully sold anything on Etsy, although I had several inquiries, favorites, and shares (many of which was sent after I lost internet). I had a lot of feedback from other sellers, which most consistently consisted of raising my prices *shock*. I am quite confident that I could have made a sale if I had been able to stick with it.

I did manage to keep a few of my projects while suffering the loss of so many others. I kept the items I had initially listed on Etsy, since I had hoped that I might find a way to keep up with the store. I also managed to keep my craft tools.

I sold off my collection of beaver wood and drift wood though, with the exception of 2 very small pieces. I might still do something with them. I had to get rid of my rough hewn wood and various outdoor projects as well.

I have many other opportunities to pick up where I left off, though. A smaller opportunity pool might just be what I need to help me stay focused. I named my Blog and Shop Assorted Diversions, because quite frankly, I have a tendency to get distracted, or diverted. LOL... I still have the opportunity to do so, but finished projects might actually seem a bit more frequent with less diversions to choose from.

SO...

I have a small collection of glass liquor and soda bottles, I hope to make some interesting things out of them.

I also have a large collection of used CDs. Apparently people saw what I was doing and decided I was just the right person to take theirs off of their hands. No complaining here. So far, that is what I have had the most feedback on... But then again, it is what I showed off the most in such a short time.

I still want to pick up where I left off with PET bottles. I actually was inspired to an awesome idea a few days ago to cross over what I have done with CDs onto plastic jars. It need a bit of tweaking, but it shows promise.

I also want to try and return to making my own very small articulated doll (not baby doll)... That was one of my diversions that was aside from here, but it is crafty, and someone might just be interested in seeing what I do. So, on occasion, I might just show some of that of here.

Of course, there is always the likelihood that I will find more diversions to choose from, but for now, I am going to try and steadily get some presence back, work on what I already have, learn what has changed in a year, and relearn the things I never knew long enough to retain. I don't have the luxury of time or desperation to dive in head first this time around. I am going to try to be better about planning, and taking one step at a time, and finishing one thing before I start another.

I am going to commit on weekly Blog updates until the end of 2014, and with the beginning of 2015, I hope to reopen my Etsy shop and have weekly finished projects, which I can list in my shop. By the middle of next year, I hope to have tutorials on how I make stuff, and maybe even by the end of the year, I can have video tutorials for you.

We shall see how this goes. :)

See ya later.

Years Are Like Falling From High Places...

... When you are at the beginning of your fall from something high, you have time to think about your options... But as you progress through your fall, everything starts to speed up; Your point of impact seems to rush towards you, faster and faster... and then your realize... You severely misjudged just how much time you actually had to work with.

Well the holidays are upon us, and so is sick season, and that time of year when whatever computer I have starts to act wonky.

I have been dealing with sick for the last 2 weeks. 

Last Thursday, my computer's hard drive started warning me of bad sectors... It is still under warranty, so Samsung is going to fix it, but I will be without my computer for 2 weeks.

I never could get motivated to recover the work I lost to my dog's nervousness disorder, but I have been spending a lot of time being miserable, or taking care of my daughter when she was feeling miserable.

Hopefully we are past the sick part of the year, but to be realistic, there are still two people in the house who have managed to stay healthy so far....

In the mean time. I haven't been completely useless... I have been doing some crafting that doesn't require much standing, or breathing of fumes, or the use of power tools. None of it will end up in my Etsy shop anytime soon, and it can't be considered recycled, but I did make 'em. Some of the pics are older, but they are all related...

You can check out my jointed dolls in my Flicker set...
http://www.flickr.com/photos/42043690@N05/sets/72157638029738143/