"I'm Late! I'm Late!" said the White Rabbit

Do you ever get that feeling? The feeling that sneaks up on you and leaves you feeling all panicked and flustered?

I don't feel like I've had a minute to myself in ages. Even feeling rushed to have a shower or eat a meal. But there's no real reason I can think of other than I'm a little off my track at the moment. I have so much to finish and I just don't like it. So many dolls waiting for the final bits and pieces. Things I'm waiting on for some through the mail, finding time to just get my head down and work, and my never ending list of things I want to send with Cerridwen to Linda in Florida so we can get to the next stage of our huge double doll project are just a few. And then what do I go and do???
Decide it's time to start my next sculpt batch :S
I'm Nuts!!!

With me I find sculpting dolls in batches works better for me. I always have a huge list of dolls I'd like to make so I know who roughly half of them are. The rest I like to let just happen, not concentrating too much on what I want them to look like but just letting the faces come together as they want. I'm not lucky enough to have my own studio so you can imagine the state of my house at the moment. As my husband said it looks like forensics have been in and gone nuts with the finger print dust.
I try and get them sculpted, dried, sanded and painted before stringing them together, adding labels so I know who's who and then I can put them away in a box till it's their turn to be dressed and finished.
My poor dear patient husband really doesn't like mess, and me being me just doesn't notice the rows of dolls on the table tops and cards of limbs stood out of kitty reach on the radiators. He's very good to me.

This weekend I worked like a banshee sanding every limb and body and face to smooth perfection. Honestly I can't feel my finger tips but it was worth it. So this week will be all about the paint :)
My Lucrizia Borgia here is getting very fed up of waiting for her lace from China (My fault as it was an amazing deal). But she's looking better now she has some hair, and her eyes are just looking perfect now.

My little seamstress is coming along and her story is growing in my mind day by day. Next she needs something in her hands to sew and a basket of the dolls clothes she makes in her spare time from the scraps the tailor she works for lets her keep. He's a very kind and religious old man that doesn't want to see her having to work the streets like other girls have to.

These four little horror dolls are still waiting for their little coffins as I've found them quite hard to make. It's not the shape or size or even getting them all together that's holding me up, but the lack of proper tools. I really need to invest in a good small precision mitre (and a few other tools too) so I can do these things properly, but they are on their way.
The two little zombies are still too neat and tidy so need to get messed up and dirty before I add some blood and gore :) And the little vampires are almost there.
If your interested in any of these little dolls please just let me know and give me the kick up the bum to get them done. Finished as they are they will be the usual £20 each, and if you'd like them with the coffin they work out to £35.

I'm looking forward to getting home to painting tonight. I love to process of layering up the paint and colours to bring them to life :)


It's a bit of an odd thing to add here now at this point but I just wanted to make my position clear on one little thing. I had an odd situation this week that had a bit of an odd outcome. I found someone on a social media site using one of my photos of one of my dolls as a profile pic, and I felt rather hurt by it. I hadn't been asked and no tags were given to link it back to me. I e-mailed to try and explain that it wasn't that I minded but that I would have appreciated being asked. And asked them to please tag the photo back to me, explaining that (as we all know) it's hard to keep track of our pictures on social media and as it's of my artwork I try my best as you never know which second or third or forth hand party will pick them up and use them as their own.

Am I right?
I believe I am right, and know others will agree. I have asked to use other artists photos for use here and have always given a link to shop or blog or whatever the owner would like. And I have granted the same permission to others to use my photos too. Most of the time I come across one my picture when no-one has asked me they have always normally had a link or at least my name, or even if it's just been a doll related thing somehow.
I don't want to be mean. And I'll always try to be accommodating. If I'd been asked in this case I would probably have said yes so long as a tag was added.  But it's not ok to just take other peoples photos to use as you please, so please don't do it. Please give credit and ask the person first. I know it seems like I'm making a big deal out of what was probably intended as a compliment. But some of us are just small artists, making things because we love to do so and giving away a small piece of our heart every time something leaves us to go to a new home.

Social media doesn't allow us to lock our photos, and most of them insist that the pictures used on their sites are somehow their property, but everyone can see that that just doesn't work.
As an artist our only way of advertising is to send out photos out into the world with the hope that they will be noticed. It's just wrong to take them, and it hurts. Please remember there are real people behind the cameras lens.