Plans , plans...

OK , some new things are playing around in my very busy mini-brain...That brain usually works in overdrive, anyway.


I ordered some doll kits, from several favourite artists, one from Nancy Cronin, which she taught at Sturdbridge ! Here she is : she looks wonderful and I imagine she will be a very good friend to my cat- lady.
The cat- lady is collecting as many friends as she does cats , by now. How could it be otherwise ?When I have the opportunity , I will introduce her and her friends and foe/ neigbour....

I designed a cat for Joan fom Canada , who came here for dinner last week, with her husband. So will stitch that one , soon. Will show it. First ,though , I need to stitch another kitty, a redhead, who is very resistent to designing...

Meet two doggies...

I finished two cushions today, both of which I designed.
They are thought as presents for their owners by friends of Corinne Anderson ( a very famous lady, president of the IGMA ), for whom I also stitched two cats.For the friends, I mean.Everyone still with me ? OK....

Meet here : Zachary Taylor and Woody , beautiful Cocker spaniels.
I must admit that Woody first had me nearly beaten, as brown tends to draw to lilac and green in the design program that I use. One pic of him was very black, but I got word that he was really chocolate brown. A photo-editing program ( simply Picasa , freely downloadable ) helped me to get the colors right and I proceeded from there- and hey presto ! There he was....

dressing a doll

Today my pupil and I went on , started to dress her second doll.

The first one is this one , dressed in blue. Dafna had decided she wanted a Regency style doll , so here she is.
Barbara Davies from the UK made the doll for her.


Since then , she is starting to get addicted ( well, we had decided to do two dolls , anyway , but I think I am detecting some interest in future doll dressing , we talked victorian , and I seem to remember a conversation about a ballgown ??!!...)
So today the new doll ( also made by Barbara Davies, thank you Babs !)got her shoes, her petticoat and pantalettes ( beautiful word that, don't you think ?)
Halfway through the afternoon I sent some pics to her mom, who was hard at work, to let her see that her daughter was hard at work ,as well, and I told her that I had crammed Dafna with cake .
We had a great time !


We hope to get on with it in one or two weeks time, it will also be a Regency doll , but with a more elaborate skirt and bodice. And a bonnet !
The pattern was published in Dolls House Projects , made by Sue Jarvie.

Meet Tommie

Tommie was a great black cat , who , alas , went over the Rainbow Bridge a short time ago. Of course , his mom and dad were very sad about this.
I offered to make a stitched portrait of him.
His dad was ( fortunately ) delighted and made this wonderful frame .
Isn't he lovely ? And the frame is really great !!!

His mom donated money to the Vet Van , my usual fee :0)

Meet Zachary Tailor

This is Zachary Tailor , a cocker spaniel , living in the USA. His portrait and one of his brother ( a chocolate brown ditto ) are meant as a birthday surprise ; they were oredred from me some time ago.

Since I am stitching the other portrait on the selfsame silk gauze, I will wait finishing both of these till I have stitched the second one.
I like this one , though !

Today...

I finished a small project : a sweet little doll, called Lolita , from an on-line tutorial , made by Dana ( who has been generously giving her time and talents to lots of other mini-doll lovers via her site : http://www.minidolllist.com/ and yahoogroup MSATminidolls@yahoogroups.com since umpteen years).

At first I had some trouble, as the arms did not fit very well , but Dana sweetly sent me a new set of arms, which arrived yesterday. So this morning saw me taking the "old arms "off and attaching the new ones, which fitted great. After which I really needed to get her a wig. It took several attempts, but here she is !

I went to the fair in Soest and brought home :

some more birds ! Crows , to be precise.

Why crows ? Well , I need them on my "Highwayman "( that grisly pub, where the usual customers are rather rowdy , if you must know , and sometimes travellers with some more money are stupid enough to enter. That is the last time they were heard of.
I will later show how that is contrived, but will get on with my cat- lady first).

I have some crows standing around there , together with a cat. Now is the cat stalking the crows or the other way round ??? However, all crows had broken legs by now, having fallen off ( they are hard to glue on this house ), so I really need to relegate them to the kitchen- pots.Boiled crow ? Crow-stew? Hmmmm.....

Here are the "old "crows when they were younger.