A Few Little Crafty Tasks....

Hello and welcome back to my lockdown world!!  Things remain the same here except that the lockdown is now being extended until the end of the month....I suspect it will be extended again after that, but I'm fine with it, as long as it keeps us all safe.

I have spent so much time on the internet and chatting on social media, but I have managed to read a few books on my Kobo and now I've actually done a few dolly things too.

Firstly I finished an outfit for one of my Kaye Wiggs girls that I'd actually cut out back in January.  I put it away when my son was coming to visit and had every intention of actually sewing it when he left on the 7th February.  Well that never happened but finally I started and finished about a week or so ago.  Here it is being modeled by Layla....

The outfit consists of a knit fabric hoodie with separating zip, a cap sleeved striped tee shirt and a skater skirt with attached leggings.

Another job that I've been meaning to do for ages is some partial re-rooting to one of my Sashas.  This girl is called Destin and she has been with me for almost 6 years, she is a Gotz Sasha Slate Eyes made in Germany in the mid 1960s.  She has nice thick hair at the back, although the ends are a little dry, but at the front on top it was a little thin.  I just happen to have here the perfect match in hair for her.  It comes from a modern Gotz doll that I used to have.  I cut off her hair and kept the hair before wigging her.  So the hair has been waiting to be used for this particular Sasha for maybe two years!!!  So I did that a few days ago and the hair really is the perfect match for her existing hair.  I didn't do too much, as I said above, her hair was thick at the back and I didn't want to overdo it, but I filled in some thin hair plugs and added just a few more.  Here she is before:

And here, showing you her new look:

Beautiful spring outfit is by Sarah Williams AKA Vintage Sasha
Orangutan is from IKEA
Socks by me and
Beautiful leather shoes by the late great Jean Jensen.

Finally,  I took some photos of Bailey, my 1971 wider faced brunette (rewigged) as she'd not been in front of the camera for ages.  I used my friend's camera to try it out....I didn't take many photos but thought these show her as she actually is....

Well that's all for now, so I will sign off and hope that you all remain safe and well.  

Big hugs

Sharon in Spain xx

If you go down to the woods today.....

I've been meaning to buy some photographic backdrops for years....I mean literally YEARS!  And finally about a month ago I decided to have a look on Ebay and see what is available.  I was pleasantly surprised to see that the price has come down considerably....when I first started looking many years ago, I'm sure the prices started around the mid $20 mark and because I thought it would be nice to have several, the price kind of put me off....after all, $20 is $20 more towards a new doll, right?!  🌝  Anyway, having had a good look at the hundreds of different designs available, I decided to buy a couple showing natural environments and the first one arrived today.

Firstly I was amazed at how small the package was, I was expecting a big fat envelope, but it was a reasonably small flat plastic bag and inside, the 3x5 foot backdrop was folded down to the size of a greetings card!  Of course all those folds meant a whole lot of creases, but could it be ironed as it was quite 'plastic-y'?  I took a chance and ironed it on a hot heat setting but using steam and not letting the iron rest in any one spot at all.  The creases came out quite easily and the backdrop wasn't damaged, it was now ready to use.

Because I like taking my photos outside in natural light, I guessed the best place to put it was over the gate on our deck.  I put the 'decking' part of the backdrop flat on our existing deck and the 'forest' part up and over the gate.  As soon as I did that, so the breeze picked up and the darn thing was blowing all over the place.  On to Plan B.  I stuck it to the gate posts with several pieces of 'poster tack'......had the dolls all ready,  posed them quickly and got the camera ready.  The wind then pulled the backdrop away from the gate and the poster tack, straight over the dolls, throwing them face down on to the floor.  Thank goodness they were sturdy vinyl Sashas, so no damage done.

On to Plan C.  This time I went outside the back door and fixed the backdrop to the closed door, using the poster tack to stick it to the doorframe.  This worked much better as we were out of the breeze, however we were now more in the shade so my camera wanted to use the flash!!  

Finally I got some photos of various dolls, I used several sizes so that I could see which dolls worked best with the backdrop. 

Firstly I took two of my lovely brunette Sashas, Stella (1969/70) and Willow (1969).  I think I took about 20 photos of these two girls but most were deleted.  Here is one of the better ones:

Next I took some photos of this tiny little Mariquita Perez Mini, she's approx 6 inches tall, made of hard plastic/vinyl, and has a shiny face....for those of you who've not heard of Mariquita Perez doll, they appeared on the market in 1940, being the best known doll of the forties, fifties and early sixties in Spain, Portugal and in some countries of Latin America. Nowadays it is still made in vinyl in normal version or mini, she also has a brother called Juanin. 

Finally I tried it with my two tallest ball jointed dolls, Hope and Layla by the Australian artist Kaye WIggs.  These two girls are 45cm tall, so I thought they'd be the best size for this backdrop:

I was quite happy with the photos, but learned from my mistakes.  

1)  I need to find a position for the backdrop that is in good light but out of any breeze;
2)  I need to position it so that the back edge of the 'decking' is straight, not seeming to curve upwards as in these photos!!!!!
3)  The dolls should be further forward away from the backdrop so that the photos have more depth;
4)  Definitely don't use flash!
5)  I must experiment with my camera settings so that I get less definition on the backdrop and more emphasis on the dolls themselves.

I'm sure I've learned more, I just can't remember at the moment!!!

I've come to the conclusion that the size of the doll is largely irrelevant with this particular backdrop.  I think the tiny 6 inch doll doesn't really look out of place with the tall trees in the background, I just need to work on her positioning in the photo.  Also, I think once I have worked on my camera settings, I can blur out the background a little so that the eye is drawn to the doll rather than the backdrop....I now know how to do that so will work on that for next time.

Well I hope you've enjoyed my little 'learning curve' and hope you'll pop back again to see if I can improve on these first attempts at using a photographic backdrop....maybe the other one will have arrived by then and I can share that one too :)

Big hugs
Sharon xx

My Kaye Wiggs girls....

Hope and Layla got some camera time recently, so I thought I'd share their photos on here.  Firstly I took Hope (sunkissed resin with faceup by me) to the local lake for some photos.  It was so hot and although there was a breeze it was like a hot hairdryer blowing on us, so we didn't stop too long before going to a bar for a cold drink!!! 

 

 

And Layla, who I call Louisa, has a new look.  She has had brown eyes 'forever' although she has tried some different wigs over the years that I've had her, but I thought I'd try her with blue eyes for a change.  I like the look although it's a struggle for me to not want to change back to brown, as brown eyes are my all time favourite!  Her wig is a Monique Gold Ellowyne-Rose which is made of synthetic mohair.  I cut it to this more managable length.

I hope you've enjoyed seeing my two Kaye Wiggs girls, thank you for visiting :)

Kaye Wiggs MSD sized girls....

Although I have taken some photos of other dolls over the last couple of days, I will share those at another time and show these older photos instead today.  The reason being, I was looking through my thousands of stored photos and saw these and thought that some of you might enjoy seeing them. 

These photos are of my resin ball jointed dolls created by the Australian artist Kaye Wiggs.  I have two girls in the MSD size, Hope who's resin colour is called 'sunkissed' and Layla who is in 'light tan'.  Both girls have human ears as opposed to some that come with 'elf' or 'faun' ears.  Both girls are approx 45cm tall with immature childlike bodies.

All of the outfits shown in the photos were created by me. I hope you'll enjoy seeing these photos!  And maybe you'll need to have a nice cup of tea and a comfy chair as there are a lot of them! ;)

Firstly we have Hope.  Because I like her name I've never renamed her.  She has been with me since July 2012.

 

In April 2014 I decided to remove Hope's default faceup and give her a softer look.  It was supposed to be a temporary faceup until I could get her done professionally, but I had so many people contact me to say that they thought she was lovely, that I decided to keep her this way!  Maybe one day I will get her redone professionally but for now I'm quite happy with this look :)

My other girl in this size is Layla.  Layla, who I renamed Louisa or Loulou, came to live here in June 2012 and I bought her secondhand.  She has a custom faceup by Forever Virginia.  I think that Layla has a slightly younger look than Hope, so she is the 'little' sister, although both girls are actually the same size.

I hope you've enjoyed seeing my Kaye Wiggs girls and thank you for looking!