Merry Christmas!

I had a very nice day today. I hope that all of you reading my post did as well. I reminded myself ever so often that the celebration of this day is not all about the gifts, the food, or even the gathering of family and friends however wonderful they all might be. It is all about the celebration of a child being born over 2000 years ago. A child whose name was Jesus. I have much to thank God for every day. But the most important one is that He has forgiven me of my sin and is my friend on a day to day basis. And it is all because a child was born in a manger so long ago who grew up to pay my debt.

And yet, we still love to give and receive gifts. We draw names with our children and their spouses now to be a more thrifty in our celebration. And my husband and I ended up with both our daughter and daughter-in-law. I would have said "both our daughters" but then those who know me would have said "What..?" My husband built a very nice wall shelf unit with a towel rack underneath for my daughter in law to put in her bathroom. (My idea... I noticed that she needed one.) I think she was happy with that. I wish I had taken a picture before she left. But I didn't think. My other daughter received a collage of portraits I had made of her little girl Lillianna. I was very pleased at how it turned out and now that she has it in her possession and it need not be a secret I can post a picture of it here. It is at the top.
I started out with photos that I scanned in and then spent hours editing in pnotoshop. I did NOT use any 'sketch' filter which is what people have been thinking. There is no way one of the filters will do this. I used a different technique to get it to a stage where I then printed it out onto watercolor paper and then used pencils to finish it by hand. She was pleased with it. I scanned the finished product in and have already printed another one of the completed sketch out for myself.
I had great fun making Christmas ornaments this year and plan to continue doing so all through the year next year.
Merry Christmas!

Christmas is almost here.
I have been working hard on lots of little Christmas ornaments to give as gifts. I love making Christmas ornaments. They are little works of art that people take out to make their holiday more special. They pause to remember who gave them the ornament and when. I have ornaments that I made over 30 years ago. I love to look at them and remember making them so long ago. I always say, "And these are older than my son."
I also enjoy wrapping them in a special way so that they seem to be a little 'more' than they really are. The package can make something inexpensive seem more special and costly.
I made Christmas Penguins from egg gourds, Santas from dried Okra, and little mice stuck in raisin boxes.

New Doll

It seems like a long time since I was able to post about a new doll I have made. But I am almost done with the doll I started at the Susie McMahon workshop I took in MD. She still need her unders and another more simple day dress. Maybe a coat and hat. I am very happy with her.
I love the new technique I learned for the hair. I worked hard on the dress which is made from one fabric. Although it looks like different matching designs i pleated the vertical lines to make the dress look like it was made from different fabric designs. I like the blue better around her face. The trim is all vintage or antique tatting. I do like her but I am willing to part with her so she is up for adoption.

I also am still waiting to dress the little pressed felt face doll I have made.

I love how she turned out but I will never make another one like that. It was really difficult to press the felt in the mold when I think I can get the same results by gluing the felt over a sculpted face.
I am also working on some really cool paper mache Christmas Carolers. Which I hope will be done before Christmas.

More Digi Stamping Fun!

I have joined a new community of artists who do digital art. Making cards, crafts, scrapbook pages, and embroidery. I have created digital art for years and rubberstamped so i thought this would be another good outlet for those small works of art I love so well.
Here is another card I have made using one of the freebie digi stamps. This digi stamp image was created by "Mujka Chic" and is called "lonely tree". I did manipulate the image and edit it. I added background with photoshop brushes and script which says "Silent Night, Holy Night, All is calm...." all around the border. I printed it, layered it on brown card stock and then printed another tree which I cut out and layered on top of the first tree. Then highlighted the tree and bits of the snow with glitter.
You can see the digi stamps and papers at My Grafico. There are pages of freebies that are fun to look at. including brushes for Photoshop CS. Having an older version means i can't use them. DRats!

Workshop with Susie McMahon

I spent the past weekend in Maryland learning some new techniques for creating dolls. The teacher was Susie McMahon and the host was Rose Gibbons. Rose hosts doll workshops on a regular basis. And Susie was in the states (from Australia) teaching workshops around the US. I was really blessed to be able to participate in the one at Rose's house.
My doll is very close to being done and I will post a picture of her soon. If you would like to see some of Susie's dolls check out... http://susiemcmahondolls.blogspot.com/

More Fair Stuff

Here are more pictures of items that won ribbons at the State fair.

I'm inspired. I attended a workshop in Maryland hosted by Rose Gibbons (who is a wonderful hostess!) and taught by Susie McMahon ( who is a wonderful teacher and artist.) I learned some new techniques and can't wait to keep trying them out. My doll is on her way to being done. I have to let her 'hair' dry, which will take a couple of days.. and then I can paint her. Painting the face is my favorite thing because that is when they really come to life.
If you have never seen Susie McMahon's work you need to check it out.
http://susiemcmahondolls.blogspot.com/
This is my doll before I put her in the dryer.I also took a few pictures of the things that won ribbons at the fair. For some reason my pictures have not been coming out very well. Some are across the top.

New things to do

Well... I participated in my first blog hop. It is one for card making lovers. I saw some cool things and learned about new techniques. If you are interested in stamping you can see the new "digi stamps" and cards here.
http://shellymc2.blogspot.com/2010/10/all-new-dude-time-doodles-come-hop-with.html
I am looking forward to making some cards again.
On another note. I hope you all had a happy Halloween. I am looking forward to November and all the family fun and creative things that will be bringing for me. My first cool thing is that I will be going to Tennessee to my sister's mountain home. I will get to play music with a man who played in my father's bluegrass band when I was young.
Then the next weekend I will be going to a doll workshop taught by Susie McMahon. What wonderful dolls she makes. I hope I will learn something new.

I picked up my State Fair entries today. I will take pictures soon and post some of them.

I recently discovered digi-stamping. I used to be a rubber stamp demonstrator for a major company and only quit because I was spending more money than I was making. At one point I started designing stamps and have sold a few of my Hammered Dulcimer designs. Now I am getting interested in finding ways to use my graphic art and previously designed stamp images as digi stamps.

That is one of my images above. It was part of a "Quilted Cuties" series I had made. There are seven already created and never distributed.

The way I understand it people can purchase images online to download and then use like they would stamp images to make cards, scrapbook pages, crafts. I took this image and colored it using photoshop and then layered it over backgrounds, used a star brush and a little of my graphic talents and made this card. It is strictly a digital card so there are no embelishments that I would normally put on a card.


At any rate... we will see where this leads.

Woah! It has been a long time since I posted anything. I have been really busy keeping my new little doll baby Lillianna. What a wonder to see all the new 'first's. In fact, today she rolled over by herself for the first time. Of course, no one was there to really see it because she was in the bed.

I also had another exciting adventure when I was able to see my second little granddaughter being born the end of September. So I am doubly blessed this summer. Plus gaining a new 7 year old granddaughter when my son married her mom. So this year I gained 3 new granddaughters.

Emily, the 7 year old, and I put more things in the craft competitions at the State Fair this year. I won 10 (or 11) ribbons and Emily won 3. We were very happy.
Here is my little Savannah Rose. She is now 3 weeks old. Today we discovered that she has "Cat Eye Syndrome" in one eye. We are praying that it will not be a problem for her.
I do not get to see her as often as Lillianna, but maybe as she gets older she will want to come and play with her cousin that is only three months older.

I am still working on dolls, just not as often. I have a few to post so maybe soon I will be able to catch up.
In the mean time you have to see this picture..

I have been having a great time holding my newest little dolly, Lillianna. She mostly sleeps when I hold her. But I am looking forward to the time when she can coo and smile and all those sweet things that make us use funny little voices and smile with funny faces and squinty noses and eyes.Here is the latest picture of her.
I have also been working on some felt doll faces. The technique is not quite as efficient as I thought. And now I am thinking of trying something a little different. The detail in the faces are not what i had hoped for.oops, baby is here. It's lovin' time.

A new time

I have waited for this day for a very long time. As long as I can remember I have wanted to be a grandmother. Even before I ever wanted to be a mother I wanted to be a grandmother. Something about being the old lady on the block that made cookies and read stories to the children. The place where all the kids wanted to go to make crafts and have fun. And then go home later.
Well, it happened. I now have a grand daughter. She weighs 5 lbs and 9 oz. My daughter had her first baby last Friday. They named her Lillianna Leigh. What a big name for such a little thing. My cousin said that she hopes she will not be one of these children who cannot pronounce their "L's". If so, she would be saying her name is "Wiwwianna Wee". Got a big "waf" out of that one!
I did not know that I would have so many different feelings and thoughts about this whole thing of being a 'Grandma'. I feel old. I feel afraid for my daughter and all the scares and fears she will have to face. I feel afraid for myself, that I will miss something along the way.
But I always have this to fall back on. That my God is in control, He loves me, and He loves my children more than I do. He is good even when life is not. And this world is not the end.
I have to post one picture.

I have been wanting so badly to make some outfits for my Annette Himstedt dolls. Someone gave me some dresses that were made by a doll dress seamstress and I was able to alter those and add some accessories. I had a very cute baby sweater that I altered, a hat that I had to cut down and I made ear rings and a necklace to match. Doesn't she look sweet? I listed the outfit on ebay but is is not going for very much. Right now I will hardly get the cost of the dress, much less the accessories I added.
But it was still fun and I have a few more dresses to accessorize and alter. What a beautiful doll!

Whatcha' think? These two girls were made using blank muslim bendable starter dolls. You know, the ones no one uses because they are so plain. Well, I suppose some people must use them or they wouldn't sell them. Anyway, I've never used them. But I had purchased a couple at a craft/antique store and ended up using them as demos for face painting. Then I got into it and painted their bodies and the underwear.
The red head has felt hair and the blonde has baby yarn.
They were fun to make and pretty easy. Now if I could just find more! I can't find any more with the 'baseball' heads and the full straight unseamed legs! I'll have to take a trip to Tennessee and see if I can find anymore where I got these.

I love blogs. But I seen to always be to busy to work on mine. A long time ago I realized that I had way more things to do than I really should be doing. But it has been too hard to let any of them go. I enjoy all the things I do. But lately my health and my household have been suffering. I read recently that this 'thing' I'm going through can actually be a good thing as it causes one to review and renew their priorities and then cut out the things that could be causing stress and difficulties.
I have two children that are expecting children of their own. YEA!!!! Plus, I have a step grandson and a new step grand daughter. By Halloween of this year I will have 4 grandchildren where I only before had one. OH... this 'thing' I am going through is called the "change of life". Or, menopause and it is no fun at all.
All this said... I am going to have to make some changes in my life and rethink my priorities. It is hard for my brain to process too many things at once and I find myself loosing things, forgetting things and unable to process thoughts that before were simple. The few things that are not difficult anymore are making dolls, playing music, and taking care of the house and yard. Those things give me so much pleasure,,,, oh... and being with my family and doing 'grandma' things. So for those of you who follow my posts I just thought I would put a note in about what's going on with me. Expect more blogging, that's easy stuff.

My Newest Sweety

A few weeks ago I hosted a workshop with Judi Ward. We did the "Design Your Own Cloth Doll" workshop. Each of us made a cloth doll from a pattern we derived from a vinyl doll that Judi had taken apart. The dolls did not look just like the vinyl dolls. The object was to end up with a pattern that could be tweaked to create different dolls and it be our own.
My doll ended up with arms too long and a very skinny body.
But I finished her anyway and she turned out very lovely. I love her face and her long, lean, willowy look.
When blogspot decides to allow me to post a picture I will.