Time for a break.

Well, Noel Night came and went.  I had fun, and sold some dolls...it wasn't like a doll show in any way, and I wasn't really prepared for that, but it was fun all the same.  I got to dress up silly, and quite a few folks asked to take my picture. (Edited to note: that fan I'm holding is not a prop.  Menopause, lots of layers, and a crowded antique mall make for one hot momma.)

The display was nice, but I think I prefer a doll show, so dolls are down where people can touch them.

This is Patti, the proprietor of the store, and the store's namesake, Emma.

But now that all the hoopla is over, I've got three commissions to get going.  I will wait til after Christmas, because...I've got to clean my studio!  I needed to clean it after the doll show in October, but then I got slammed with commissions (yes, it's a good problem to have) and never was able to just stop and spend a few days reorganizing.  It'll take a week now...it really is that bad.  I'd post a photo, but I don't want the Horder Police to come and haul me off.

So, I'll peck away at it this week, listen to lots of Christmas music, and hope you all are having a wonderful season full of family, love, and blessings.

Noel Night

There's a lady in Chandler AZ (about 2 hours from me, south east of Phoenix) who has an antique store within an antique mall.  She actually has five booths, all put together to make one shop, so to stay she has a store is not overstating matters.  Carries the most fascinating mix of antiques, Victorian themed art and clothing, architectural scavenges, and folk art.  I could stand there all day and not see all of it, so much detail.

Well, she found me at a doll show and asked if we could talk...the result of which talk was that she'll now be carrying my dolls in her store.  (I think I already posted this news, but didn't go back to see.)  Each year, the antique mall has an event called Noel Night, during which all the merchants have a sale and stay open late.  There's a restaurant which has great food, and music, etc., and it's apparently a pretty busy night.  Patti asked if I would make a particular doll for Noel Night, and of course I did.  Her name is Victoria Noel, and she's 28" tall.  Cloth and clay, as usual, and wool hair.

I've got three more dolls in the works for this event, and hope to have them all finished in time!  I'll post them when they're done.  But in the meantime, here is Victoria (Patti wanted an "attic fairy").

Back to work!

I have no excuse for not blogging, except that I haven't taken photos lately and it always seems boring to post with no pictures.  Having joined the Iris Society in our area, I discovered that June and July are the busy time, with lots of volunteer hours getting ready for an iris sale this month.  So there is that.  Not sure it qualifies as an excuse, but I have enjoyed digging and playing in the iris.  :~)  Otherwise, it's just housework, appointments, square dancing, and general busy-ness.

But I have at least been working on dolls.  I went in there and started counting to see how many in-progress dolls I have going.  Embarrassing, but I have twenty!  I know I should finish the first ones before starting any more, but the most recent ones are mostly Izannah type dolls for the upcoming doll show.  There will be three sizes--22", 18", and 15".  So I have lots of tiny thumbs to sew in the next few weeks.

Maybe I'll take some hand sewing with me when we go to see my son get married in Oregon in August.  It always takes longer than I think it will, so it's best to plan ahead, right?

At any rate, I did get a couple of photos of these that I started in the last few weeks.  I work a few hours every day, adding clay to each of them and setting it aside to dry for the next day's additions.

I'm really hungry for autumn weather, so I have a feeling the fabric choices for these bitties will be fall colors.

Cheers! 

A new doll finished, and eyes.

Looks like I will be having further eye surgery.  First there is a retinal scar tissue issue.  But in order to correct that, there will need to be first a cataract surgery.  So...two eye surgeries in two months.  I don't like the idea, so I don't think about it a lot, but I do look forward to seeing well again.  It has begun to effect my work, so, that won't do.

Speaking of work (or play?) I finished this girl.  I call her Rosa.  She is 25" tall and her hair is very silky.  I enjoyed making her jewelry this morning (even a ring!), and I'll be making shoes for her in the next couple of days.  (I guess that means she's not really finished, doesn't it?)

Hope you all have a great week.

 

Elspeth is dressed now.

She's a very patient girl...just hanging out in the giant purple recliner while I ignore her in favor of finishing other dolls.  Today she got the rest of her unders, and is ready to go.  Willie had to check to see if she approved of everything, of course. 

Hello 2016! And goodbye Rainbow Clown.

This one is headed to Arkansas today...to a very nice lady who has a collection of antique clowns.  Rainbow will be in good company.

I've listed a lot more dolls in the Etsy store, and in the coming weeks I plan to put some of them on sale at a 20% discount.  The plan is to clear out the ones that don't fit in with a focus I'm trying to develop, so while I enjoyed making them, they're just too bright or sparkly to fit with what I'm aiming to do.

Also, all the Painted Ladies are listed, because they asked me to list them.  :~)  Not really--I just need to stop holding back from Etsy in order to keep stock for doll shows.  If they sell, they sell, and I'll just make more.

Here I go again...

I haven't put up a single Christmas decoration yet.  The floors need attention, as do several other aspects of the house cleaning detail.  Forgot to water the flower beds today, (should never have found out it's "supposed" to rain this weekend).

I did manage to walk the dog and go get meat for the freezer.  But the rest of the time?  Working on dolls.  Some that I had already sculpted and MUST finish, and others...well I can't seem to control myself and I keep starting new ones.  Right now I have over ten dolls in various stages of progress.  Hmph.

Here is one I finished painting today...she'll get her arms and legs sewn on tonight and some clothes in the next day or two.  Her name is Elspeth.  She's not quite an Izannah doll, but has some of the face, I think. 

As for Christmas decorating?  I might get it done this weekend.  Maybe.

Angels

Sometimes when I am thrift shopping, I come across odd wooden shapes that catch my imagination.  There's a nearby shop with a nice craft section--constantly updated with new stuff because we live in a geriatric demographic, and there are, to be frank, a lot of estate sales from crafty old ladies.

Consequently, I have way too much craft wood, and need to just go make all the things I imagined!  In this one instance, the little wooden cone suggested a skirt--no real challenge there--but I felt compelled to make an angel doll for the upcoming PFATT Marketplace in early December.  Too late for holiday things when they sell Christmas stuff before Halloween, but here she is, never the less.

She looks a little like my granddaughter, Jennifer.  Her wings are cardboard, w/ paste and clay.  Her hair is wool yarn.  Along with old sheet music, an illustration of Mary and Jesus, and some old lace, she turned out all right.  I still have to attach her sparkly halo, but didn't do that before I took pictures.
I hope all of you have a wonderful Thanksgiving, and much to be grateful for.

Tiny Rachel and Feline Willie

I cleaned out my studio...no, that's not true.  I cleaned out the old not-likely-to-succeed projects in my studio.  Nobody was more surprised than me to find myself suddenly finishing an Izzy that had been waiting around for a year.

But here she is, watching TV with Willie, our torty cat.  Both girls appear to be enjoying a little down time.

I really enjoyed working on Tiny Rachel--I call her tiny because I've gotten used to working with the 21 / 22" Izzies, and Rachel is only 14" tall or so.  But she was fun, and I had fun experimenting a little on a different finish.  Not something I plan to continue, but I like the result on her, so I'll leave it.

The dog-cat show continues on pretty much a daily basis.  Only now sometimes they invade Phil's space while he's at work (he works from home now that we've moved--just works online at the same job he had in TX).  So every day is Bring Your Pets To Work day for Phil.

Schultz and Willie play like this at least once a day, sometimes several times, if they feel feisty, or Schultz hasn't had a good walk in a while.  :)  If he doesn't start it by going "terrier" on her, then she starts it by jumping out from behind a corner, Ninja Kitty style.  I'm very fond of this time.

Y'all have a lovely weekend!

Do you or don't you?

Question for the artists that share my little world. Julia Roberts asked Brad Pitt in The Mexican: "When is enough enough?"

When do you decide whether to give up on a project, to throw it away and not allow it to eat any more of your time? Do you ever get to that point with a project? The "right" answer for Julia was "never"...but that was romance. This is art.

Do we go with our heart, or listen to our head on some things? Jus' ponderin'.

I have a lot of doll projects in mind, and yet there is a shelf full of Works In Progress...in varying degrees of completion, from just a head to all-it-needs is arms and legs and a dress.  But not all of them appeal to me.  Some of them feel like a chore that, even if completed, will offer very little reward of satisfaction.

In some cases, enough really is enough, and I'm learning (hard lesson!) that to sacrifice time and energy for those particular projects is to take away from future growth as an artist.  I'll be honest and ruthless, and once in a while a little sentimental. 

So...when is enough enough for you? 
Do you ever scrap a project and refuse to allow it more of your time?

Phoenix Doll Show (postmortem)

My good friend Martha reminded me I hadn't posted about the doll show.  (Thank you, m'lady--I did forget that I hadn't done it.  To-do lists can fool you into thinking you're more efficient than you are.)

I'll start with saying Thank You to my lovely husband, who helped me so much.  I won't bore you with details, but thyroid issues have had my normally abundant energy flagging to the ground, so that I'm dependent on many hours of sleep and naps to get through a day.  The good news is that this situation will be corrected in the next months, so I'll once again be slinging a pick-axe to dig flowers (or at least managing my own doll shows!)

I spent two days and some money making new backdrops for the set-up.  Apparently I didn't spend ENOUGH money, because once I got the things to the event, and tried to set them up, it was a total failure.  Epic.  The backdrops are even now on their way to be recycled.  Lessons learned are painful, but they still count, right?  Despite that initial "wobble"--and the hubs is amazed I didn't fall apart, given my...retentive...nature--things progressed and I did indeed get set up.

Having rented three 8 foot tables, I'd been worried I wouldn't have enough dolls to fill them up.  This was not a concern.  In fact the husband grumbled a few times; "I can't believe she thought she wouldn't have enough!" upon finding yet another bin full of dolls to put out.

My sweet mother & father-in-law came to see me at the show, as did a couple of my nieces.  This was a special treat for me, as up til now I've always been too far away for them to see me "in action".

For a first show, I did remarkably well, selling several times the amount of my show expenses.  There was good feedback, and it appears I was the only doll artist at the show, the rest being dealers of antiques and one-timers selling off estate dolls of a loved one.  Lots of business cards went out, and I had a request to speak at an upcoming doll club meeting.  This bodes well for future shows at this venue, and I was encouraged.

The lesson I learned about the setup: my backdrops were too high, but I still need something to frame the dolls and set them off from the general chaos of the show.  (New ones in planning now.) Lastly, don't get too wrapped up in the decorating...make it look nice, but clutter only distracts.  

Hope your week will be a lovely one!

Nekkid rag dolls, and a pattern to dress them.

Valley of the Sun Doll Club--our gracious hostesses!

Me, w/ a weirdly prissy face and my show apron (uniform).