Some Dotee Dolls

I have Alice Cooper hosting a radio show blaring in the background. Old and obscure rock and roll is what Alice plays of a weeknight, every weeknight on the FIX. 

I've been sitting on my bed, getting snippets of thread everywhere making little critters to hang up somewhere. I'm not looking to hang them in my own space, but that they go live with someone else to love them! I make it and then set it free! 

Yellow Haired Blue Dotee

She's got gold colored eyelash yarn for the hair on her light blue turquoise fleece body. She has stringed pearls for legs (dotee's don't have arms) and wooden blue beads for her eyes. I made her yesterday!

There's a box in my closet full of material for whatever reason. I save velvet, silk and cordurory because I have dreams of making a quilt of each type of fabric. It is only a dream though. I don't see me cutting out 3 million squares of  material and sewing it all together by hand. I'll keep saving those three though cause they do make good dotees and stuffed animals! 

My friend Helena gave me a present for my birthday with a big marron colored ribbon attached to it. I saved the ribbon and made the following dotee 's body out of a length of that ribbon. I like how she turned out!

Brown Hair Pink Hearts Dotee

I am not overparticularly fond of the color pink, but I have had that pink silk blouse in the silk box forever! I used to wear that shirt...I cut one of the sleeves off and used the material from that sleeve to cut three dotee bodies. I've still got one to sew together. I cut hearts to cover up some boo boos with the black thread in the ribbon dotee. She has two pink buttons for eyes and black beads for her legs. She's kinda freaky looking with all that brown hair and her ghostly appearance from the ribbon being see through netting with glittery swirls. I kinda like her though! Not a good picture of her, sorry. I made this one today.

Some more pink to nauseate us that don't like pink all that well. 

LOL

The Pink Ballerina Dotee

Someone sent me the varigated version of her eyelash yarn hair. I cut all I had, about three or four yards, thinking there wasn't going to be enough hair... I still have about a dozen strands left for another dotee. Her tutu was found in the ribbon drawer already a nice little circle of lace. She has stringed pearls for legs and wooden beads for her eyes. On her chest is a length of novelty yarn sewn on in a coil with pink embroidery thread. There's a ribbon beside a red sequin sewed on with pink embroidery thread also. I sewed this one today.

I dug around in the ribbon drawer to find some more embellishments for these dotees. That was quite the adventure as the ribbon drawer is filled to overflowing. The ribbon drawer contains strings and fibers of all kinds, not just ribbon. Yesterday was yellow hair day. I still have enough of that blue turquoise fleece fabric to make a dozen or more dotees from.

Yellow Hair Pink legs Dotee

I sewed eyes from fabric in yesterday's experiments. I like the look of them this way, but today I took the easy route and used beads. She is made from fleece with eyelash yarn. There's bound to more yellow haired dotees in the future. I have whole skein of it! Her legs are pink novelty yarn, chenille like. The swirl on her tummy is a cotton string in white with green wrapped round sewn on with pink embroidery thread. The swirls wraps around to her back where a circle is formed. Her eyes are light green cashmere and dark green velvet sewn on with black sewing thread. I made this one yesterday.

I am not a good seamstress. Part of these little guys' character comes from the fact it looks like a five year old sewed them.

There is no glue involved when making dotees. Everything is sewn by hand.

Cotton Hair White Rose Dotee Angel

She's made from pink silk, cotton string for her hair (this stuff was originally intended to be used in making rugs). She has stringed plastic pearls for her legs. Across her chest is a red ribbon sash. On her tummy is a white ribbon rose atop a little round fabric thingamabob quilters make. I have no idea what that thing is called. They're generally about 2 inches across. This one is about 3/4 inch across, made of cotton fabric. She has blue wooden beads for eyes. She has two goldtone metal wings also.

Striped Owl Dotee

I made this ugly critter yesterday. His eyes are way too big! He's made from some striped cotton fabric I yanked off a canvas some time back. It was glued around the edge of a gallery canvas. Nothing on the canvas beneath. Useless with this fabric on it! His eyes are turquoise blue fleece, dark green velvet and natural color wooden beads. I have a good bit of that dark green velvet on hand too. It used to be a little girl's dress. This guy's feet are made of light green cashmere. His beak is velvet. His hair, eyelash yarn. He wasn't any easier to sew together than the green owl I showed you all in yesterday's post.
I still have another owl to sew together though as I cut three of them at the same time.

things I've learned in sewing these dotees:

hand sewing silk is a pain in the ass

wooden beads make great eyes

eyelash yarn makes great hair

eyelash yarn isn't as much of a pain as I thought it might be

I figured out what to do with all those stringed necklaces I've been hoarding

fleece is easy to sew by hand

cotton is easy to sew 

dotees don't always need mouths

I don't want to collect dotee dolls, I just want to make them

You will see more Dotees in the future. Count on it!

I've been too under the weather to go out to the artroom to work on the cane or the box. The can needs a bit of sanding on the snake to make it nice and smooth so it will take the acrylic paint well. 

The box is still drying. Should be quite dry by now! 

My plans for the box are some relief pictures on at least one side of the box, probably three sides though. I've never done relief pictures in paper mache. I've no idea what I am getting into here. The snake on the cane was an experiment. I'd never done anything of the kind ever in my life before I put that snake on the cane. No fear though! LOL

Let the muse run wild! You might end up with something you hadn't even dreamt!

I should have progress pictures of the cane and the box for the next post. I really need to do some more ATCs also!

You all behave yourselves!

Go get some hugs! Go give some hugs!

Peace

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Only Took Five Days to Make it Right!

Hello!

Last post I was going to show you a picture essay of the pile of junk being baled but the pictures wouldn't load. Today, I could care less about that pile of junk so we will look at the artwork completed since the last post instead!

Enjoy!

Cotton Top Dotee

Carnelian and Red Jasper Tree of Life Pendant

Hairy Blue Dotee

Green Velvet Piggy

Green Velvet Owl Dotee

Green Dotee

Coffee 

4x4

markers on scrapbook paper

Green Dragon Eye

ATC

markers on cardstock

Green Eyed Zen

ATC

markers on cardstock

Teasing the Eel #2

ATC

markers on cardstock

The beginnings of my newest altered cane! 

Not a whole lot happening in my world unless you want to hear about my newest ailment! 

All is good! My newest ailment is gout. It won't kill me so all is really good!

Thanks for dropping by!

Perhaps the baling of the junk pile will interest me in the near future and you'll get a long picture essay of the process. It is fascinating to me, not so sure it would be to others though. 

Be good to one another! 

It matters!

Peace

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A Little Bit of This, A Little Bit of That

Pictures won't upload into the post.

The font is changed in the editing portion of the site.

I'm a tad bit flustered when things don't go like they are supposed to as to concerning this wretched PC!

Looks like there will not be a little of this, but a whole lot of that!

I'll try again later to do something with pictures for this post. Kinda ruins the whole idea of a post when I had planned a picture post for today! No pictures and the post is pretty well a moot idea!

Maybe later!

A Little Bit of ART to Share! Where the devil is my muse?????

Hello Everyone!

Thanks for stopping  by the blog that doesn't get updated very often! 

My muse has flown the coop! She shows up for short bursts and then she's off again! 

Not much to report this time around either. Storms came through since the last post. Nothing serious though. A bit of rain has fallen sans stormy weather. I've been gifted with dead rodents from my furkids. And I've just been taking it as easy as I can take it! Been to a couple of ballgames and a birthday party this past week and I am wore out!

Here's what the muse has come up with since the last post. I didn't take a picture of it, but the laptop bag is now sewn together, just waiting for a strap/handle of some sort. Still working on that in my head.

Enjoy!

Red Fabric Paper Book

3x4 inches

manilla drawing paper pages

3 signatures of 5 sheets each

sewn with purple embroidery thread

I made the binding a bit tight on this one and the book doesn't close all that well. I'm thinking a red button for a closure is needed on this one if I'm to sell it.

Pansies Book

4.5x6 inches

manilla drawing paper for pages

5 signatures of 5 sheets each

sewn with green embroidery thread

I'm quite pleased with the way this one sewed together--not too loose, not too tight.

I do feel as though I cheated on this one and calling it art is a bit of a stretch. I didn't do the pansies on the covers! The back cover has pansies on it too. These are rub-ons.

Mountain Lake Scene

Fingernail Polish Painting on Vellum

4x6 inches (roughly)

I wasn't sure just how painting with fingernail polish would work on vellum, but the results were quite pleasing! This will eventually end up as a book cover I think...either that or a postcard. 

This one took about half an hour to do. 

I've a large box full of many different colors of fingernail polish. I don't paint my fingernails very often, but if I want a cool color or something just funky, I got it covered! 

Little Green Dragon

4x4 inches

markers

I'm thinking I will cut this guy out and put him on a book cover.

Mountain Scene

Fingernail Polish Painting

cardstock

1.5x2 inches

This one will end up on a matchbox shrine I think. It's a bit small for a book cover!

Yellow Turban

ATC

markers on cardstock

White Bunny

ATC

markers on cardstock

Boy and A Candle

inspired by a painting of the same name by Gerard Sekoto

markers on cardstock

That's about it for the muse for the time being! 

I do have more little books that need to be sewn together and that should happen sometime in the next few days. Maybe a couple of them will be sewn today, who knows!

Be good to one another! It matters!

Peace

831

XXI Days to a Habit

Just some shots of my sketchbook pages. I started the XXI Days to a Habit notebook and haven't actually worked in it for 21 days straight. But I have filled a few pages~! These are the pages filled on my first really serious venture into this project. I've since filled more pages and added things to some of these pages too. There are also a few pages of writing in that notebook now.

Sorry you have to see them sideways. I don' know how o chang ha......Damn i!

m kboad has a fw issus a h momn and fuss o wi a fw chaacs. hmmmmmm migh b a bi had o undsand.

nl h picu!

Abit hard to understand????? I can't even decipher it and I wrote it!

i will fix problem 

Problem Fixed!

My keyboard bit the big one all of a sudden! It worked fine a couple hours before I tried to do this post. This morning I dragged out my old keyboard that I kept just in case....good thing I did keep it! It has issues as well so if you run across a typo, it might be that I just don't know how to type this morning or it may be the sticky keys on this keyboard. My friend John surprised me with the keyboard that died yesterday. It arrived in the mail! I've had it a year, maybe 2. It served me well! I do however see a new keyboard in my very near future!

Alright, back to the XXI Days to a Habit!

These pages are out of order.

I have a url for the site where this idea comes from but I'll have to go hunt it up and put here later.

http://theartstudio.ning.com/group/sketchbookhabit

I will add this link to the sidebar as well.

The premise of the XXI Days to a Habit is that if you do something, anything, for 21 days straight, you will have formed a habit. I didn't make it 21 days straight with my project but I have made this a habit.

There are no finished pieces of art in this book. It's all practice runs, so to speak.

Just let your mind and hand work in tandem and see what comes out on the page!

I don't know how to turn things rightways in Paint. The sketchbook was too wide to fit on the scanner bed with both pages being upright so...we have to crook our necks to see them.

I used collage for some pages.

Markers

markers and pencil

markers

junk mail collage

there's now another junkmail collage on the blank page pictured here.

Pencil, marker, ball point pen

pencil

this was a fun lesson to do! You make a list. Two minutes on the clock, write whatever comes to mind and when the time is up, spend a half hour or so drawing what you wrote on your list. There wasn't enough room on the margins to draw EVERYTHING written. There are no rules, just do what makes you smile!

magazine cutout and marker

magazine cutouts and markers

top page is tea stained. I made a cup of tea and used the tea bag to put a bit of color on this page. There are drawings in pencil on top of that tea now. The idea is use the patterns made by the tea (or coffee would work too) to draw what you see. I seen a mermaid in there and a few other things as well. Don't have that book in front of me right now, so not sure what's on this page.

The other page is a color study. It took 'forever' to do this page!

Go check out Suzette's ideas, she has some good ones! Then get out your sketchbook, send your logical thinking mind to the other room and draw, draw, draw!

Be good to one another! It matters!

Peace, my friends!

831

Already the Middle of May....Where Has Time Gotten To?

Hello Readers!
Not much to report here in the art department. I've put the 365 Project on the back burner. Haven't given it up completely but I've not been keeping up with it since the 22nd of April either. I have a few things to show you today, and those will be put on the 365 Project--just keep plugging along with it-eventually (hopefully) I'll have a muse invasion one of these days and will get caught up again. Maybe even ahead of the game! Who knows?
The muse has not been in abundance here of late. I have lots of projects in different stages of completion but nothing has been completed to speak of! Well, except the things I'm gonna show you today.
Might as well get on with that!

Orange Fish

Box Canvas (Breeze2)

acrylic paint, fibers, watercolor paper for the fish colored in markers

it measures about 3.5 inches square by 1.5 inches or so.

 I told you all about the box canvases in the last post. I've got a good amount of little boxes ready to make more box canvas art in the coming weeks. Just need to get the muse in on the game plan!

I was organizing my bookmarked favorites the other night and came across a tutorial for these steampunk pendants made from polymer clay. These two are what I came up with.

Large Steampunk Pendant 1

polymer clay, different little metal doodads, base metal chain, copper wire, a black onyx stone and powdered eye shadow to give it that color

It needs to be sealed with something. Eye shadow gives a great luminosity to the white polymer clay. I don't have any other color than white in polymer clay, so if I want color, I must be creative in obtaining it. I didn't have much to choose from in eye shadow color department. I could have sworn I had a big case with like 30 colors of eye shadow somewhere. I couldn't find it on my search though so I was down to only three color choices.

All those little doodads are from computer motherboards and the like.

Small Steampunk Pendant

polymer clay, eyelets, watchparts, a brad, base metal chain, copperwire and eye shadow

I made two polymer clay beads the same time I made the pendants. I have a few ATCs that are done that I have yet to scan and lots of projects in the works, like I said. There's the cane, the ART pennant, the house magnets, the goodie box for AFA, postcards, ATCs and the list goes on and on. Too many ideas running round in my head and not enough gumption nor time to complete them all! I will get some of these on this list done in a timely fashion, but postcards and ATCs are an on-going endeavor. I have a fish picture half finished on my easel right now. The fish portion of that canvas is in the livingroom by the recliner where I attempted to fashion that fish out of stryofoam with the heating tool. That experiment failed miserably! Still working on getting that fish to materialize.

Large polymer clay bead with metal eyelets stuck in it. Not a good picture of it by any means!!! The bead is about an inch around, with a large hole through its center. It has a bit of eye shadow on it as well.

Small polymer clay bead with incised designs and a coating of eye shadow for a bit of color. When you use eye shadow on polymer clay you do so before baking. Then they will need a coat of sealant.

I believe I will use the spar varnish I picked up yesterday at the hardware store on these beads.

ATCs have been in the works as well:

Divina

ATC

markers on cardstock

I forget what day Divina was done. Couple weekends ago though.

That same weekend I worked on my cane.

Here is the finished product.

I've gotten many comments on my cane. It was a boring old brown wooden cane to begin with. Now it's a topic of conversation wherever I may roam with it!

These lizard like creatures are along the shaft of the cane.

Except for this last one. He was done on watercolor paper in markers where the three above where done on copy paper in markers. I cut them out and glued them to the painted cane before covering them with glitter glue so they'd be sparkly.

I need to do a few touch ups to the crook of the cane and give it a good coat of spar varnish so it will be a bit more durable. I smack it on a lot of things using it.

I'm not sure what I'm going to do with the watercolor paper lizard. I've cut him out as well. I think he might end up on the front of book cover.

Flag Stamp Mushroom

ATC

15 May 2011

markers and stamp hearts on cardstock

there's a bit of glitter glue holding those hearts on

I punched the hearts out of cancelled postage stamps. I attempted to make those hearts into fish scales but that failed miserably. Seems to be a pattern with fish ideas not coming to fruition these days. A mushroom however, turned out OK. Not a masterpiece by any means, but OK in my books.

And then there's this damned robot ATC. I hate robots! I am never drawing another robot as long as I live! Least that's my story today! I don't draw good robots anyway. Look at that thing~!

Robot

ATC

markers on recycled flash cards

I had a perfectly good robot ATC go missing enroute to California. I had to replace that robot with another. I drew 16 robots that sucked big time before I drew this one that only sucks. The girl's been real patient with my muse not cooperating with robot drawing and I really need to get this ugly robot in the mail to her. I want to make the trade we made, right. She sent me the cutest little elephant ATC for that robot that went missing! So, I'm gonna send her this ugly robot along with two other ATCs in hopes of making up for what never showed up at ther door. Would tickle me pink if that other robot showed up sometime in the future but I really don't see that happening.

Stamp Zentangle

ATC

15 March 2011

markers on cardstock with a postage stamp

If I would have been thinking, I would have done the zentangle in the same color as the stamp but it was too late once I thought of that brilliant idea so had to keep on going with the black.

I think that's all the art I have to show....there will be more eventually. I have to do art. It's like breathing. Without it I'd be dead!

Projects in the works:

black star cane

art pennant

fish canvas

box canvas preparations

blank cutting

dottee doll needs a face

felt fish needs more sewing

house magnets need doors and windows

octopus painting needs finished

3 ATCs need colored

copper wire needs sorted and put away

and a whole boatload of other projects!

You all behave yourselves!

Throw some smiles out into the universe. You'll be amazed at what comes back to you!

Give some hugs. Get some hugs!

You all be good to one another! It matters!

Peace, my friends!

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