round robins and trees

Sunday was my local doll club's Anniversary meeting. The club has been together for 5 years. I have been with them for four, next month. There are currently only two of the original members still attending. We are a very small club, but that has meant we are very supportive of eachother, and we have had the ability to have more intense-or messy-meetings. Its hard to heat tyvek, or paint, or dye fabric with a large group. Last fall I suggested we do a round robin doll, since they hadn't done one since their first year, and I have always wanted to participate in a successful round robin. Everybody picked a pattern and made the doll body. Over the following months we each did something on everybody's doll. The first month it was sculpting the head, and coloring the face. Then costuming, embelishing, props and stands. Hair was done by whichever artist decided it needed done at that time. Every month we would bring the dolls to the meeting and pass them to the next person. Whose ever doll it was would have to leave the room, but the rest of us got to see what had been done. We also did a journal to go with the dolls, in order to tell the dolls story. The end results were varied, colorful, whimsical and fantastic. I will have to post pictures. Two of us were so inspired by the project that we talked our other local doll club into starting a similar project.

I have a new project going. part of my new years resolution was to do something artistic everyday. To achieve this I bought a pocket sized sketch book at Dick Blick, and some new pens and pencils. Since purchasing the book, I have been doing a small sketch everyday. My hope is that this will help me refine my face drawing skills, especially for eyes, and expression, and encourage me to trust in my ability to draw other things. Right now my fascination is Trees. The starkness of branches in Winter and the grace of each limb, has captured some piece of my imagination.
I wonder where others get their inspiration, and those lovely sparks of creativity.

melting snow

The best laid plans and all that. It has been a week. We had a blizzard on thursday which prevented my husband from coming home from his business trip and left us stuck, with limited resources. Luckily it inspired creativity both in the kitchen and the craft room. After a day spent doing lessons with the kids, including attempting to make a battery, we baked a cake and while it was in the oven everybody made sock puppets. The younger ones got frustrated trying to glue pipe cleaners for the hair they wanted. I showed them that they could put the pipe cleaners through the holes on one of those pin backs, and then pin the hair on. It worked great and I had less messy kids.

Inspiration

I had to have my gall bladder removed last week, and so I have on some rather strong pain medication. I always seem to get the most ideas then. When I can't immediatly execute them. I keep a notebook beside me and try and write down or sketch my ideas as best I can so that hopefully those visual ideas aren't lost after my recovery.

first blog

This is my first post on my first attempt at a blog. I have been making dolls for about five years now, and beading for only about 6 months. This is my most recent doll. She is an original pattern cloth doll with a painted face. She is a Japanese Geisha, which I made for a friend of mine. I spent about 3 weeks researching Japanese history and costuming. The face is painted with the nape of the neck left flesh, as is traditional. the make-up is limited to the grey and red near the eyes and the red lips. The Kimono has a false color to denote four additional layers. There is a full under kimono. The outer kimon has a padded hem and is lined in vintage kimono fabric. The obi has three layers in is also made of vintage kimono fabric. The hair ornanments are accented with coins, and she holds a fan of origami paper in her hand.