tiny worlds

Now that the market is past, it is time for catch-up in all parts of my life! There were a few things that I finished up at the end of last week that never made it to the blog.

I made 3 more Tiny Worlds-

This one looks like a cabin in the woods to me. I tried to give it a foresty look.

Very fancy cups can be a challenge to work with. This one looked like it needed a snow scene to mellow it out.

I sold one of these at the Market, but will put the other 2 plus the one I made for the pattern, onto Etsy later today.

summer show schedule

I will be showing my work at the following places in the next few months-

Sunday, June 14- Boston Handmade will do a group appearance at the South End Open Market.

Saturday, July 11 (raindate Sunday, 7/12)- Boston Handmade Somerville Marketplace in Union Square.

Saturday, July 25- Boston Handmade at the Concord (NH) Arts Market

Sunday, Oct. 18- Boston Handmade at the South End Open Market.

other goings on

I had breakfast with Lilla this morning. It is such fun to spend an hour or two with someone who speaks the same language- you know, art and the internet and all. No explaining. We blabbed about our families, then moved on to show-and-tell. First me-

Then Lilla- she had all kinds of goodies from the artists she represents-

A wonderful way to start the day!

I’ve got plans for my long weekend. No, I will not be relaxing in a beach chair. I will be planting my tomatoes, making containers this way again. I might experiment with some wool sweaters- the cotton started to disintegrate very quickly although that didn’t actually cause any problems. I will be planting the following varieties- one plant of each- noted for my records.

-Carbon

-Bush Goliath

-La Roma

-Nepal

-Taxi

-Washington Cherry

And, I am hoping to make some major progress on my studio/former bedroom project. As of today, all the walls and baseboards are primed. The windows are close to being ready to prime… as you’ve probably noticed, I get overly obsessed with details and it makes getting a project like this finished practically impossible.

Lastly, in the best of all possible worlds, I will make myself some summer clothes. A skirt, shirt, jumper? We’ll see. I’ve got the fabric… that is the easy part!

the monday list

I listed the last four girls in my Etsy shop. I had to retake some of the photos. We are in for a few stormy days so I set up in my studio to be… which I have gotten off course on. Got to get back on that.

One reason (excuse) for not moving the studio project ahead-

I took over the empty space for this project-

I said yes back in January (?) when Susan from Artstream asked me if I’d like to participate in a print show. I spent a good amount of time questioning that decision in the last few weeks. It was a challenge that I wanted to accept and succeed with- to change medium and keep the same feeling/style to my work. I think I will be able to really judge these in a year or so- right now is too soon. They will be going off to New Hampshire as soon as I’ve matted them up.

handmade portrait

Are you wondering why I haven’t posted any finished dolls around here lately? Well, I got sidetracked. Last week I got an Etsy convo from Tara Young who does videos for Etsy. She does a wonderful series called Handmade Portraits and she asked me if I would be interested in being filmed for one. I thought about it for about 20 minutes- what would I wear, how could I lose 40 pounds in the next few days, is my studio clean enough, should I get a haircut… so many ridiculous worries- and then I said Yes, Of Course I’d be interested! I did a major cleanup in my studio and found enough floor space for her equipment. She arrived midday yesterday and we filmed all afternoon. She was back this morning and spent the day with me. Phew- exhausting!

Thanks (husband) Ben for taking some great photos!

We had a great time together and I think we both got a peak into the work world of the other. I don’t know when the film will be up, but I will definitely be posting about it.

Eleanor’s birthday blanket

she got it so now I can post photos-

I made a similar blanket for Julian for Christmas. Eleanor said she wanted one too, so I promised one for her birthday- and here it is- only a month or so late! It is made of cashmere knit samples that a friend gave me. (nice to have friends who work at a cashmere knitwear company!)  The edge is  cut-up cashmere sweaters. I put flowers over some little holes, then added more to make it look pretty.

I was inspired to make these blankets by Betz White’s book- Warm Fuzzies. I highly recommend it for all the technical info on working with recycled woollies.

shrink plastic tags

I’ve been working on cleaning up the studio. One of my clean-up techniques involves finishing projects that I uncover- not recommended to get the clean-up done quickly!

So, I found a pile of shrink plastic that was cut into strips and I had used to make one batch of tags from. Before I finished or put my mess away, I’d gone on to something else. I finished up the tags- that is how I put my signature on my dolls, in case you were wondering- and was left with a pile of pieces, too small for tags but so obviously useful for something.

I had a mix of clear and translucent plastic. I drew a rough drawing of a girl on a piece of paper and used it as a guide. I laid each piece of plastic over the sketch and drew with a thin sharpie marker.

Time to cook them up. This is where things tend to go wrong for me. I have tried a heat gun and the oven- neither has worked very well. I preheated the oven, popped them in and watched. As usual, I was getting  ones that shrink more in one direction then another, ones that curl and won’t go flat again, ones that started turning brown before they were finished shrinking. I decided it was time to do some experimenting. I tried different places in the oven since right in the middle was not so good. First- the rack in the topmost position. Nope. Then all the way to the bottom- where we have our pizza stone. >Play Trumpets Here< It worked- perfectly! All the curled ones flattened! All the ones that shrunk horizontally more then vertically, evened out! Unfortunately the ones that had overcooked did not un-brown.

Here they are on my fingers for scale. Now I have a gaggle of girls and I really like them. But, I am not sure what to do with them. Any ideas?