A baby Kestrel....

Today my son Brendan found a baby bird under his car.  Being an animal lover like his mum, he brought it inside as he was worried that the poor little fellow might get run over in the road.  It turns out that it's a baby Kestrel.  Kestrels are quite common where we live and we often see them flying about over the olive groves looking for their next meal.

Brendan put the kestrel in an open topped box on the terrace in the hope that it's mother would come looking for it, but nothing...not a peep. :(  No sign of mum and not a sound from the little birdie!

Brendan has been trying to give it a drop or two of water using a syringe, because in this heat it wouldn't take long for it to become dehydrated.   Virginia, Brendan's fiance, found a small cage so that it can be protected overnight, and they've been making enquiries with a friend who hunts using Birds of Prey; apparently Kestrels are a protected species and if you're found with one you can be fined up to €3,000!!!!  So tomorrow they'll be taking it to the Guardia Civil in the hope that they'll know what to do with it.......

Now if it had been an African Grey..........

UPDATE:  Brendan called Seprona in Sevilla,  which is the part of the guardia civil that deals with animals and they asked for a photo of the bird.  It turns out that this little one is an
cernicalo, which is a Kestrel, but it isn't a 'common' Kestrel but one that is a protected species in danger of extinction!!!!  So they are coming to collect it tomorrow morning!  

All's well that ends well!!!

"Have you anything stronger?" says little baby Kestrel....(Brendan's photo).

Back to blogging.....

The last couple of weeks have been both busy and relaxing.  Busy because my mum and brother were over here on holiday for two weeks from the UK and relaxing because apart from the usual cooking etc., I didn't really do any sewing at all!  In fact I didn't have any dolly time whatsover, which I suppose is good in some ways......although I have to say that I do miss my dolly sewing!  So yesterday my family left to return home and I am now playing catchup.  I immediately got back to my commissions list.......I apologise to those waiting, but hope you'll appreciate that I want to spend time with my mum when she visits as I don't see her very often!!

I made 6 ra-ra skirts since yesterday, and tomorrow will start on the tops and socks to go with them, they are part of a very big commission that I have for a lady in the US.  I will add photos on here as soon as they're done.

In the meantime, I bought a cute outfit on Ebay for Ellie, my Dianna Effner Little Darling, and thought I'd share some photos of her wearing it.  It is by the very talented OliveOil*53 and is perfectly made!  It consists of a pretty dress made in owl fabric, striped knit socks and hairbow.  Very cute!

A few weeks back I said that I was more than happy with my Sasha/Gregor family and had no plans to add anyone to it in the near future....famous last words!!!   I did keep looking out for another earlier English Brunette girl, but the constant threat of falling hair put me off a bit......then last night I ended up buying a new girl on Ebay!!!  However, she is not at all what I was looking for, but I fell for her sweet face......she is going to my mums house first as the seller only ships within the UK, but hopefully she'll arrive here in Spain in a week or so and I will share her on here!!!!

Hope everyone is having a lovely summer so far!

A new wig for Bailey...

I ordered a new wig for Bailey, my (once) brunette wider faced Sasha from 1971 and it arrived this week.  It's a Monique Gold Roxie, size 8/9 in Nearly Black.  The wig is, as expected, lovely and soft, the fit is perfect over her stubbly head, and the colour is not solid, it has a mix in there of very dark brown with the black.  So far so good.

However, I'm really not sure if it is 'her'!!  I think it makes her look more boyish than the previous wig she was wearing which was actually a Prince Gregor wig!  I wonder really if I'm trying too hard to recreate the girl who came here about this time last year.....I had so wanted this wider faced girl (as Kendal will vouch for!) and then all her hair fell out!!!  And yet so far even a long dark wig hasn't hit the spot with her.  Oh well I will have to see if I can work with this one...I'll leave it on and see if it 'grows' on me!

This is quite a good representation of the colour, taken in natural light:

I might have to 'feather' or trim the fringe a bit:

It does flick out nicely, but is it too much?

 Back view....it doesn't have grey tips, that's just the light catching it.  Bit of a DA going on here I feel!

 Those 'feathers' need taming a bit!

I do think this wig would work well for a boy too!  Perhaps one of my boys will end up with it!

Ellie at the coast....

We came down to the coast on Monday and although I've been busy all week as I have a huge commission that I'm working on, today I was able to make time to take some photos of my little Ellie.  She is modelling another tee shirt that I made from a pair of childs knickers that I got for just €1 from the Chinese shop!!  Because of the small size of the knickers,  I had to make a completely new pattern as they were not long enough to make the front of the tee shirt, so I made a 'yoke' and then the picture was the main part below that.  I really like this tee shirt, and so, it would seem, does Ellie!!

I don't think this girl can take a bad photo!  She looks like a real child to me in some of them!  I know that below there are a lot of repetitive photos, and we all know that that can be soooo boring, but I just couldn't choose!!! 

 

A little bit of surgery....

What I do like about BJDs is that when you get fed up with their look you can change them.  I'd been thinking that I was rather bored with one of my little dolls and maybe she should look for a new home.  The thing is though, she's been here a long time, since 2008,  and I felt a little bit mean sending her away.  So this morning I decided to give her a bit of 'surgery'!  She is an Elf Elly Eomji by Dollmore and is one of the tiniest dolls that I have, at 14cm, but she has a beautifully sculpted body and the nicest hands and feet I've ever see on a doll.  They really are very elegant and well done.  So I took her to pieces and removed her old elastic.....it was really loose and floppy which made posing her a bit of a nightmare.  Now I was going to document this process with photos and make a tutorial of it, but to be honest, once I'd started, I really needed both hands AND those of my hubby, to get her back together again.  The replacement elastic was so thin but it was very hard to get through the holes in her feet for example.  Then once she was almost put back together again, I needed the help of an octupus to get her head and headplate back on!!  I also hot glue sueded her, which for those that aren't familiar with this, it is basically that you use a thin layer of hot glue on one side of each joint, usually NOT on the ball joint bit, but that which it goes into....sorry, I have no idea what that would be called...and this helps with posing as it makes a bit of friction between the two pieces of resin.  I then put thin wires through all her limbs and her neck to help even more.  After that, I added extra blush to her face as she was looking a bit pale, and finally a new wig, which I glued on because wigs always ping off her tiny head...she wears a size 2-3" wig and some of those are even too big on her!!!

And here she is, looking very cute I think!!  Oh and I forgot to say, her name is Scout!

Here she is sitting on the steps on my dollshouse, she's the perfect size for posing with 1/12th scale things!

By the fountain in the front garden of the dollshouse:

Helping with the planters in the front garden:

 Posing on the front steps of the house:

It's a good job there's no water running in the fountain at the moment Scout!

 Playing on her skateboard!

Being carried around by a Giant!  Oh no, that's just me!  (Showing you just how small she actually is!)

Little Chocolate Thief!!!!

"Sam, what are you doing, what do you have behind your back?"

"Nothing!" (Innocently!!)

"Come on now dear, you have something hidden behind your back, what is it?.....tell the truth and shame the devil!"

"I only have THIS!"

 

"What!  Where did you get that?  It's NOT yours!"

"I know!  It's Lindt's,  but she isn't eating it, is she?"

"But you can't just take it, it belongs to someone else!"

"But...but....Lindt got it from Auntie Kendal for Easter, and Easter's ages ago....and she's not eaten it!"

"That's not the point, Lindt is saving it, it's hers and you can't just take someone else's chocolate bunny just because you want to!"

"But...it's NOT fair!  She's not eating it, so I thought I would!"

"No Sam, Lindt may not be eating it, but it's hers and you can't just take something that's not yours.  Now go and put it back in the box, there's a good girl!"

"That's right, I hope you'll not take something again that doesn't belong to you!  I know you're not really a bad girl, so come on, let's go and find you a cookie instead, shall we?"

Samantha is an Elfdoll Hana Angel, she's 20cm tall and a fully jointed resin BJD.  I've had her since June 2009.  I love how she has three different faceplates and two different sets of hands as standard!  

My chocolatey girl Lindt!

What's is life without a bit of chocolate?  A bit less fun me thinks, so I thought I'd share my chocolatey goodness with you, Lindt, my 1960s Gotz slate eyed brunette.

Outfit by me, shoes by Ruthsdoll.