Focus

If there is a Holy Grail I've sought in all the decades I've made art in one form or another, it's been focus.  It seems always to elude me, except for that very specific kind when I'm deep in the middle of one project.  But in the general sense (feeling oxymoronic this morning), focus eludes me.  Focus actually stands just outside my peripheral vision and, with thumbs in ears and tongue sticking out, taunts "Nanee nanner nah nee! Yoooo can't catch meeeee!"

Focus has much in common with my younger sister at seven, apparently. 

Do you have problems with this concept, with being able to see the direction you want to go, and just...go there?   Do you draw a map first, or do you follow some innate focus that leads you?

A Gourd Art Doll and...

a sewing box.
I finished this Greiner-type Lady the other day, and now she is up for adoption.

I should make one to keep, perhaps, given the constant state of my end table...it's covered in threads, snips of fabric, odd buttons, and three--count them!--three pin cushions.  An un-picker, the larger stuffing fork (I'm still looking for the small one), a couple of crochet hooks, and probably four or five spools of thread.

Yes, today I'm working on cleaning house instead of making dolls.

You heard it here first.

The Izzy Dolls are DONE.

I finished an absurd amount of hand sewing this weekend, along with the beginning sculpts of six doll heads, cutting out six cloth doll bodies (along the lines of the Greiner dolls, which will only match one or two of the head-sculpts) and a teensy bit of crochet.  It was a lovely weekend, and I am sorry to see it go.  (I enjoy my hubby being home, and we have separate work areas from which we shout conversations back and forth.)

So here are the last photos of Enid, Odessa, and Vernon...(double click to zoom).

Jester Pete made it!

According to Daryl Cook, (who is sharing a 37th anniversary with his Lady Katie, and who makes the most incredible dolls at Woodstown Whimsies) my gourd doll Jester Pete made page 62 of the Fall 2011 Art Doll Quarterly.  Woohooooo!

Now, to patiently wait for my copy.  I'm not yet enough of big shot (wink wink) like Daryl to have earned my advance copies.  But here's to you, Pete.

Jimmy Dee Brown

I have this picture of my Daddy hanging in my hallway.  Took it down to scan it for a listing, because it was the inspiration for a doll.  He was eight, and this was late 1940's.  Silly boys.

The "real" Cowboy Jimmy...

Second Izzy Doll Finished

I still need to sew the last two snaps on his blouse, but Vernon is otherwise finished as well.

The husband, when I first made this one, said "Why are you making one of them a dude?"  He really objected to a boy doll having the hour-glass shape of the Izannah Walker doll body.  But once I finished his blouse and knickers, Phil relented.  "Okay.  You did manage to make him a dude."

First Izzy doll finished.

Well, I'm discovering they're never really finished.  This must be the very epitome of a doll...because I find myself seven years old again, wanting to make her new clothes and a hat, an apron maybe...she and her brother Vernon and sister Odessa have taken up entirely too much of my time and attention, but I can't seem to object.

Well, here's Enid (and her doll Rosa).

Rabbits!

I have always wanted to try my hand at patterns.  I really stink at following them, but I've designed them for ages.  Of course, there's a difference between making a pattern for myself and making one so somebody else can follow it.



So I figured I'd start with an easy one. 

Two separate listings, one for PDF

 
and one for a print pattern.

Yay patterns!
 
 

A giveaway!

I love roses.  The real things, naturally, but also the big luscious cabbage roses that soften a room with old fashioned garden romance.  One of my favorite blogs-- 52 Flea --is celebrating their 700th Post with a giveaway.  And not just any ol' giveaway.  Cabbages and Roses has offered the prize.  Hello?  A book and some of that same vintage inspired fabric that makes a room feel romantic.  I want to win.  But I also like their blog enough to make some noise about it...and to be perfectly mercenary about it: the two concepts are not mutually exclusive. :~)

So go browse, be inspired by their incredible taste and beautiful photography.  That's why I go there...they make me want to have tea in the garden, followed by an afternoon of flea-market junking.  A girl can dream, right?

The 11th already?

Time's fun when you're having flies.

I posted two new listings this morning.  One was made this winter...a work that made the husband raise his eyebrows and doubt his wife's sanity.  

"Good Bones"

The other I finished a couple of weeks ago, begun as one of those "extra blobs of clay" that turned into a head drying on a stick because I can't throw ANYTHING away.  But I liked his face, so I finished him, and now he's Birthday Boy.

"Birthday Boy"

I hope you have a great week and all the talking parrots your heart desires.

Izzy babies!

I finally got the stockinette over the clay, got them painted, got their arms and legs on and the "second skin" sewed over it all.  Never realized how labor intensive they were!  Now for clothes.  I spent yesterday watching old movies and hand-sewing a shirt for the boy out of a linen handkerchief.  I probably should move on to machine sewing, and will soon, but I love hand sewing.  It's more like sculpting with fabric...

Izzy Babies!

Enid (left)

Odessa (middle)

Vernon (right)

Waiting for their clothes!

Happy Independence Day and Goodbye to Wimblie.

I like saying Happy American Independence Day.  Feels good...and is more specific than Happy Fourth of July.  Let's just hope somebody doesn't decide it's not politic to say that.

The hubs and I spent the day running errands, taking the Fat Boy to the dealership for a tuneup...checking out a house we have an offer on...getting new glasses at the eye doc's.  We got home and I discovered someone has offered to give Wimblie a new home.  So Goodbye Wimblie.  I hope you like Ohio and they give you a soft, quiet place to live.