Spring is here!

We're having nicer weather now and getting out into the garden a bit. The kids are learning the ordinary childhood joys of picking wildflowers, making mud pies and hunting snails while I try to whip the garden into shape. (But of course, I have no idea what I'm doing, so it's slow going at best.)

In doll news, Donatina got put aside, so I could do an emergency sewing job for a friend. But I have been working on her. I thought it'd be quicker to draw her new eyes in Photoshop, for some reason. When I realised that it was definitely not going to be quicker, I kept going anyway. Just for the sake of trying something new. Then, when it was time to print them, it ended up taking a whole day to get my printer working! I had bought home brand cartridges. And even though the printer recognised that they were installed and the ink tanks were full, it wouldn't print with the ink in them! Frustrating.

Anyway, I got the eyes printed in the end. I changed them, so they aren't purple because I wanted them to contrast with her hair more. I've glued the eyes back together, but I thought I'd give the glue an extra day to cure before I tried to get them back in. Also I probably should have marked the domes and bases somehow so I would know which way to reinsert them. Donatina may end up cross eyed but at least I know, for when I do the others.

I also got some of the Disney Animators dolls. Since there aren't any Disney Stores in Australia anymore they can be hardish to find, and more expensive than they should be. I like their faces. I like how many of them look pensive, especially in comparison to the manic grins of the Jakks Pacific versions. But I do plan on repainting them. . . If I don't just freeze with a panic attack over the idea of just how many plans I have. I've also decided I NEED a Merida. She'd make a great Pippi Longstocking!
I've got to say, I'm a little disappointed with the quality of the Animators dolls. Given they're over sixty dollars, anywhere I've been able to find them, I thought they'd be better. Rapunzel's eye paint is sloppy and Tinkerbell's fringe looks like it was cut with a knife and fork. But then I discovered that in the Disney Stores they're roughly the price of the standard Jakks ones and, well, yeah, the quality matches that price.

I'm going to stop now, before I start rambling about ALL THE PLANS! Which will ultimately sound insane and then make me feel bad, when I don't follow through on most of them.

My Grocery Giveaway entry

Xanadu is having a giveaway of miniature accessories on her blog. Entry is open to anyone that posts a picture of their little dolls and links to her post.

I'm a little late to the party and I'm not sure my entry even counts, because some people wouldn't consider Mordecai a doll at all. But here's my picture called "Waiting."

I used my Rement Pose Skeleton because I found him in a box of dollhouse stuff last night and I'm so excited about him no other dolls count to me right now!

My machines

 Ok so at this point, I have some new toys that I haven't tried out yet. The Giant Husband has taken the kids to visit his parents today so I'm going to pretend I'm not scared of new things and try them out. And also introduce you to my good friend Naomi.

This is Naomi. Naomi the Janome. She's a Janome Sewist 525S. I have had her for. . . Probably nearly twenty years! I spent hours at a Janome shop before choosing her. The woman recommended this one as the best beginner machine they had, that was simple enough for a beginner to use, but wouldn't be grown out of too soon.

These were actually a really popular machine. They were used on the TV show "The Great British Sewing Bee" and were apparently a very common machine in trade schools. They stopped making them a few years ago. I think the current equivalent is the Sewist 725s which honestly looks like someone took the 525s and made it look ugly and dated. Mine isn't a pretty machine but the 725s looks like it's from 1978.

And it's only in the last six months that I've even tried some of the features. Like the overcasting foot or finally gotten the automatic buttonhole to work! I could never get the buttonhole function to work, then a few months ago I got fed up with my crappy buttonholes and spent all night googling. I discovered that problems with the automatic buttonhole are common, but I also discovered lots of fixes, including one that worked! YAY!

Occasionally I consider replacing Naomi, usually when someone has shown me, or talked about, their flashy machine with twelve thousand stitches, sixty billion types of buttonhole, and a prettier case. But she works perfectly. (Partly because she had some parts replaced just a few years ago.) And other than decorative embroidery borders or patterns, she really does everything I could want. And I like doing hand embroidery.

So instead of replacing Naomi, I bought her some presents! A twin needle pintucking foot, that I can't try out because I still haven't bought a twin needle. A gathering foot, because I hate gathering. And THIS terrifying contraption . . .

The Janome Ultimate Ruffler! It can actually be used with most modern sewing machines, not just Janomes. And it makes frills and ruffles. You can adjust the size of the ruffle.

Fitting it to your machine for the first time is a bit fiddly. There's two screws you need to adjust to make sure the needle goes through the hole. I kept knocking it out of place as I was retightening the screws and had to start over. But once you've got it right, that's done forever and next time you can just snap it on like a presser foot.
There are two adjustments you can make to your ruffles.

This screw adjusts how much fabric is picked up in each pleat.

This lever controls how often it pleats. Every one, six, or twelve stitches. There's also a star setting that never pleats.

And here's my test run on a scrap piece of fabric. I kept the pleats the same size but it shows the difference between one, six, and twelve stitches between pleats. (And of course that will change as you change the stitch length too!)

With a little bit of practice, I can see this being incredibly useful. Right now, though, it is an absolutely terrifying Frankenstein contraption to use!


This beautiful beast

Is Odette the Overlocker. She's a Brother 2504D. When I bought her, I used an incredibly sophisticated selection process, that went rather like this "I have money. Which overlocker is half price at Spotlight?"  (Actually none were and I had to wait a few days for one to go on sale.) According to reviews I've read, this model is easy to use and even thread, straight out of the box, with no experience. I'm going to take a moment to psyche myself up, then I will test that theory.

I like the way this illustration shows which thread each bobbin does. It seems bobbin 3 is the only thread that will ever show if you're doing seams, which is good to know.

There's also this helpful threading illustration inside. And while threading these two bits is a fair bit more complicated than my sewing machine, the other two threads are so simple, I didn't even look at the instructions. I did have to go get my desk lamp though because I couldn't see to thread the needles and there is no automatic needle threader.

So, not feeling even a bit confident, I grabbed some scrap fabric and did a test run.

These are two different stitches and I can't remember which ones! I'm so helpful. I already have three complaints about this machine. 

The cord to the foot pedal is quite short. Yes. It reaches the floor. Just. There's no give at all and my table is not high. 

Two - the inbuilt light is not very bright and only lights up a very small area. 

Three - My eyesight sucks. I don't want to hand thread needles. I wish there was some sort of needle threader, but then again, if you can't thread a needle maybe you shouldn't be trusted with an overlocker anyway. I guess I'm going to have to start wearing my glasses for sewing, which I'm supposed to do any way.

Despite that, Odette is a beast! Holy cow! I already love her! She also has nets to go over the spools if you're using tangly thread and adaptors so you can use ordinary cotton reels instead of cones.

Finally there's this beautiful thing, which despite what it looks like, is not a crack pipe.

An airbrush! YAY!

And of course, you can't use an airbrush without

A compressor.

I actually found choosing an airbrush was hard. Most of the stuff I found online was either marketing nonsense (which I tend to ignore) or written by the sort of hobbyists that have their kit, it's the only thing they've ever tried and they're convinced everything else is rubbish. Ugh. Eventually I stumbled across this site Don's Airbrush Tips which may not be the most professional website but everything is explained simply and without bias. I've actually kept it bookmarked for troubleshooting later.

My airbrush is the Iwata Eclipse HP-CS, and my compressor.  .  . Ummm.  .  . Just says "Air Compressor" on the box and I don't remember what it is.

A little tip if you're ever looking to buy an airbrush. Don't just look in hobby shops. Airbrushes are used by hobbyists, artists, beauticians, cake decorators, tanning salons, a bunch of places. And I found that between these sorts of shops, the prices varied wildly. I bought mine from a candle making shop - of all the shops I could find, they had it cheapest. I found that places that made a big deal about being for "Airbrush Artists" were selling it for nearly TWO HUNDRED DOLLARS more! So I'm pretty glad I chose what I wanted, then searched for the name, instead of just googling "airbrush"!

I've been pretty excited to try this out but haven't been able to because the Giant Husband went all Darrin Stephens and "forbade" me to use it unless I wore a face mask, which I didn't have. I argued that I wasn't using anything fumey. He said I probably shouldn't be inhaling acrylic anyway. So, I meekly said ok, and didn't mention that I'd been spraying Mister Super Clear all week, without a face mask.

So yesterday I picked up some disposable dust masks and today I tried it out.

Nothing fancy. Paint, thinner, water, one of the kids medicine syringes for measuring out water, a little jar to mix in, and toothpicks to mix.

I diluted the paint down to the consistency of milk and, without even practising, painted the hair of this young lady.

And I'm not sure if it's what I was doing was easy (it was), or all the pre-reading I'd done on Don's site, or if I'm just some sort of natural but it wasn't hard. She's had two coats now and it's pretty even. I'll have a look in a day or two and decide if I think she needs a third coat.

It's probably going to be a while before I'm brave enough to attempt anything more complicated than blocks of colour (like this hair) or blushing but I'm going to have a lot of fun with this! I think the worst part is going to be cleaning it!

(Also if you're wondering. I forgot about the face mask when I did the first coat and now the back of my throat tastes like acrylic paint. So, yeah. Airbrushing needs a face mask even if it isn't fumey.)

Now after this insanely long post, hopefully I still have time to clean up all the mess I just made, before everyone gets home!

Oh dear!

That's it! I am never speaking again!
Every year in April, I do this thing. I announce that the hot weather is CLEARLY over for the year and put all of our fans in storage. Guess what happens next? A week of thirty degree weather. Without fail.

This year, at the start of August I said (maybe even made a big deal about it) that we'd had a really mild winter, most days had been fifteen degrees, or just under. Yeah. Go me. The temperature dropped overnight and didn't hit ten degrees again for over a week.

We all had colds. Eventually I said "Yay! We're all better!" The next day, I came down with a terrible sinus infection like I've NEVER had before.

Eventually, I said (even posted here) "Yay! I'm all better!" Within twenty-four hours, I got an ear infection! (My immune system sucks and I'm pretty run down.)

A few weeks ago, I was talking to the Giant Husband. I said Tiny would start walking sometime in the next month but not for at least two weeks. Guess who started walking THE NEXT DAY!

Two days ago I said "Looks like the bad weather is over for the year." Suddenly the weather forecast predicts the temperature won't go above thirteen degrees for the next week.

This morning, I said three things.

"It won't rain today, I'll prune the roses this afternoon." It's pouring! I could try to prune the roses but I'd probably drown.

"I don't worry about the baby's naps. If she doesn't fall asleep at lunch, she falls asleep watching Hoopla Doopla." (Her favourite tv show.) Guess who refused to go to sleep. Yeah. Instead of being asleep by one thirty, I had to trick her into going to sleep at three! Tired babies are fun.

"The Giant Baby has been such a good boy lately! I'm really pleased with him!" He got cross because the baby wasn't asleep because I let him play with my Shopkins while the baby sleeps. When he's cross, he's naughty.  He flushed half a dozen tea towels in the toilet! I made him clean up the mess. (I helped.) Then when we were putting the towels on to wash, he threw laundry powder all over the laundry, then wiped his nose on my clean hoodie that was hanging in the laundry! Oh! Such a good boy.

Yeah, so I'm pretty sure right now that in future, I should really just be quiet.

Deconstructing Donatina

Out of my Kindi Kids, I declared Donatina to be my experiment doll. I like her least of the four and she had this weird thing going in with little strands of hair sticking out of her eye sockets.

To start with, here's a look at her construction.

Her torso size looks like it would fit big Lalaloopsy clothes. But there's no way her giant ham hands are going through sleeves made for a twig armed Lalaloopsy.
She has a bobble head, which is actually a fun feature. And her eyes are inset but from the start, I assumed they were disks like the Royal Reflections dolls have, rather than orbs.
Her hair rooting is pretty rubbish. There's about a finger's width between the rows, so any hairstyle will have to be fairly similar to her original hairstyle or she's going to look like she's got Alopecia.

Here you can almost see some of the little strands of hair that are caught between her eyes and her eye sockets. There's more I haven't drawn arrows to but those are the ones that showed up best. (And even those didn't show up very well)

The base of her head where her neck joins on, has a hard plastic ring set into it. This is part of the bobble head mechanism. A little squeezing showed that the ring was wider than the hole in her head. "So it has a lip?" I thought  "A little heat should make that workable." And it was going to take heat because the vinyl of their heads feels pretty hard.

So, I dug out the obscenely expensive hair dryer I bought ten years ago, and used maybe twice but other than making the baby cry it really had no effect.

So I boiled the kettle and dug out a mixing bowl big enough to fit a giant head in. I was a little apprehensive about doing this at first and kept thinking that water might damage her eyes, but then I remembered that the entire point was to get her eyes out because I hate them.

I soaked her head in a fifty fifty mix of freshly boiled water and cold tap water. It was a little disconcerting because she kept floating, so I had to hold her head under, which really felt like I was drowning her!

And I discovered that Moose were right when they said the heads aren't removable. There is no way that sucker is coming off! Because the bobble head mechanism means that, that isn't a plug with a lip at the base of her head. The mechanism is a cylinder and extends as far as my thumb in this picture

There's actually a narrower piece that extends even further! But I couldn't feel it until I softened her head.

At this point I went to pace in the garden and think (I said I was taking the dog to the toilet, I was actually going outside to swear without the children learning fun, new, words) I figured I had three options. One - make a cut in the base of the dolls head to see if that gave enough room to pull the mech out. Two - cut a hole in the back of her head and remove her eyes that way. Which would be fiddly given the hulking thing I'd be working around. Or three - abandon eye removal and just paint over her eyes. I'm  an idiot. Clearly.

I had left her face down in the mixing bowl. When I got her out, I squeezed her head and her eye sockets gaped a bit. So, I squeezed a bit more and her eye popped right out! YAY!

And spent the next three hours telling the Giant Baby to leave them alone.

The eye chips were harder to take apart than I expected. But with the help of my trusty craft knife, they popped apart, pretty easily.

And the glitter wiped off amazingly easily.

And now for the embarrassing "I've jumped the gun!" part. I can't actually put her back together because I still have no idea what I'm going to do with her! I mean at this point I mostly need to know what colour and style of eyes to give her. And I've got nothing.

So I'm off to seek inspiration.  .  .

Catching up

 Now I have a wonderful space for making and a bunch of new toys, and I haven't had a chance to use it!
Partly because I'm an idiot. I had money to burn and the Giant Husband encouraged me on spending it all on stuff for my room. Sooooo I bought an overlocker. But I forgot to buy overlocker thread. So I couldn't use it. I bought a twin needle pintucking foot for my sewing machine. But I forgot to buy a twin needle. So I can't use it. I bought some Jo Sonja's paint for airbrushing. But I forgot to buy any flow medium (thinner). So I can't use it. Best of all, I bought an air brush and compressor. I had assumed the airbrush would come with an air hose. It arrived first and did not come with an air hose. So I ordered one. The compressor came with one.
Since then I've been too sick to function. I've still managed to get a fair amount done with the storage in the wardrobe in my room. I got two cheap, galvanised shelving units from Bunnings, and a bunch of cardboard postage boxes from Officeworks to store stuff in. And I've got most of the stuff I forgot to buy, except a twin needle. And I need to dust the dollhouse and get the furniture back in.

I also have plans. I have a large Lalaloopsy that used to be my niece's that I'm turning into a witch. I'm thinking what to do with the Kindi kids. Donatina has volunteered to have her head ripped off. And she wants to be a genie. I don't know what to do with the others yet. I have a sundress in my head that I want to make for Tiny. Then I want to start working on some half finished projects, I have around the place.

I got some of the Capsule Chicks by Moose. They're little blind bag, fashion androids. They come in 5 capsules packed inside a little vending machine - which the Giant Baby has claimed and is in love with.

They're pretty cute. I love their faces. They haunt me, but after a while they all start looking like Ellen DeGeneres to me. They fit together kind of like a Nendoroid or Cu Poche, with great articulation. On the downside the pieces in each pack  are randomised, so you get enough pieces to make a doll but the pieces don't necessarily "go together". For instance the girl on the right has mermaid legs and a halo. So she's an Android-mermaid-angel? That sounds like something the Giant Baby would make up. And they don't come with standard checklists. Instead they come with these "fashion magazines".

I find this format confusing and would much rather have some sort of list that clearly tells me what goes with what.

I've also kind of got a new Cu Poche. I bought her head and hair when I bought my first one. Her outfit came free with my Alice. Then I figured I may as well buy a body and have a whole doll!

That's an actual tiny zipper on her jacket! Which is cool but also I NEVER want to have to do up a zipper that small again!

That's it for now. Hopefully now that I'm feeling better, I can actually start doing stuff!

Something Special!

A distant cousin posted this on ancestry.
It's my Great-grandparents with their three oldest daughters in about 1920.

Look how short those skirts are! And what enormous bows!

The little girl with the doll is my grandmother.