Sunflowers, Dolls and …

This morning I went out in my garden and the sunflowers are blooming! So pretty, this is the first time I have planted sunflowers so I don’t know how long the flowers last, but I will plant more, I just love them.

Sunflower 1

I have been working on my art dolls and will hopefully complete one for the Hoffman challenge again.  The challenge fabric is the Mandalay collection and this year I purchased the main challenge fabric and the accompanying fabrics.  It is a rather busy print collection and I have finally decided how I am going to proceed, it took me awhile to come up with a vision for this doll.  I have to admit it has been a bit of a  struggle and I think it is because there is not one solid fabric choice and that made my head spin! Once I was able to find a solid fabric I began to visualize the costuming for the doll.  I did spend a great deal of time painting the faces.  I really do not like a seam going down the center of my doll faces and I guess I could  “skin” them, but that is so frustrating for me.  I instead like to use a clay over cloth technique and then finish the face by layering with gesso and sanding in between each coat of gesso, similar to the technique I learned in the Byzantine Icon class   This creates a very smooth and nearly flawless finish.  Once the base is completed I paint the features.  I use the same technique for the hands, which is really a challenge because they are so tiny.  I have one more set of hands to complete, for the pink body and then I can really start to put these girls together.  The costuming is the most fun.

Art Dolls

Art Dolls

The Coke Bottle Santas are selling – I have five left and it is not even close to Christmas, although someone posted that there are only 20 Fridays until Christmas 2015,  yikes – I wish we could slow the time down a bit.

That’s all for today -thanks for visiting!!