Viking doll

This guy is in California at the moment, making movies.

He's got a papier-mache head and soft stuffed body. His arms and hands are felt (the first time I've ever made hands with articulated fingers; it wasn't as hard as I thought it would be) and the rest of him is fulled wool fabric, remnants from a costumer's stash, which I receive on a regular basis from a friend. The tunic has hand embroidery around the edges. The belt, sword sheath and shoes are polyester suede fabric; the shirt is cotton (another remnant-- a coarse homespun-looking fabric called Osnaburg, I think) and his "chain mail" shirt is crocheted from silver-gray nylon crochet cord. His hair and beard are natural llama wool. This is the first beard I've ever made for a doll. I learned a lot. :o)

The helmet and sword are made from Crayola "Model Magic," similar to the Amaco "Cloud Clay" I used on the Sam Vimes doll last July (see earlier post). They're painted and varnished in acrylics.

He was made for a fund-raiser for the National Novel Writing Month challenge.

Day 11 of National Novel Writing Month

Someone has figured out that if you start on day 1 and write only 1667 words per day, you can easily make it to 50K in 30 days.

I am a bit behind, having only 5843 words so far, but even so I should be able to finish in a month if I type a mere 2325 words per day from now on.

It isn't too late. Want to join me? There may be a novel in you--and if there is, it is one that no one else in the world can write.

Irish dance dress with new detachable collar

The Stardust Irish Dancers will be performing at a Celtic festival in a few weeks. This is the dress they will wear. The Celtic-style applique motif on the detachable collar/bib was designed by the teacher; the collar itself was designed by me and I did the sewing. Unnamed Irish dancer models the outfit, which looks OK except you can't tell how hard I worked pressing the whole thing, and the shoulders look much nicer once they were actually basted down instead of just being temporarily secured by hidden safety pins, as here.

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My non-functioning cell phone

I have two cell phones. One functions in the usual way--I can make and receive calls with it. The other is non-functioning; it still works for everything except the one purpose for which cell phones are meant to be used. Why do I keep it? Because it makes a great "reminder" calendar, alarm clock or timer! It has up to four different alarms that can be set with all those different ring tones, which not only clue me in to something I don't want to forget, but also (by the use of the different ring tones, which I have mentally assigned to different purposes) tell me what it is I'm trying to remember!

Any "reminder" having to do with husband has one ring tone; things pertaining to each child have their own ring tone (WHO is it I'm supposed to be picking up after play practice this afternoon?) and kitchen-related things such as bread coming out of the oven have a ring tone of their own. I'm an artist/craftsperson, so art-related events have their ring tone as well. You can see this is a very useful cell phone even though I haven't made a real phone call with it in something over three years.

But I lost it last year. I really thought it was gone for good, that I had lost it far from home and would never see my little NFCP ( non-functioning cell phone) again. You see, I couldn't even call my own cell phone to find it...it's non-functioning and doesn't take calls.

Then, many months later, husband was searching under the bed for something of his own he'd lost, and there was my little NFCP hiding in a dark corner. (Shows how often I clean under the bed.) Of course the battery had long since run out of charge, but that was minor--just plug it in, and within a few hours I had charge again, good as ever.

Just to keep this from happening again, I set an "everyday" alarm to ring at a time when I'm usually around the house, 3 pm. As long as it's in the house, no matter where it is, I will find it at that time of day. Even if I'm not searching for my NFCP at that time, the alarm is a convenient reminder that the afternoon is half over. And theoretically, if the cell phone was ever lost somewhere outside the home, someone else might find it at that time of day and I'd have a chance of getting it returned to me.

The main problem with this clever system is that I occasionally, just once in a great while, walk out of the house to do errands with the wrong cell phone, the NFCP, in my pocket. It makes a wonderful clock and alarm/reminder, but it's not all that great at taking urgent calls from loved ones at home.

Novel, The King and Queen Game, is almost finished

This is my 2010 NaNoWriMo novel, and I have "finished" (if such a verb is anything but ludicrous in this context) the major rewrite I've been working on since the end of May. I am considering posting the book in its entirety as a PDF file on this here blog, once I'm relatively satisfied with it (or at least tired of looking at it). I might do it even if no one writes back to beg me to do so, but any begging emails will definitely help lead me in that direction. You never know--your positive criticisms might make the difference between a splendid, inspiring novel and one that is merely mediocre!

Sam Vimes is travelling to Wisconsin

There's a Discworld convention in Wisconsin this week, and Sam Vimes is attending from east Tennessee--or at least, a doll representing him will be. Actually, there will probably be quite a few individuals representing Sam Vimes at this convention, but I am guessing this doll could be the smallest.

He's got a papier-mache head, like the Chris Baty doll, but he's dressed in quasi-medieval clothing and armour from the fictional Discworld. I tried something a little different with him, something I've never done before: I made his armour and a few other accoutrements from Cloud Clay, an air-drying modeling substance that resembles marshmallows more than anything else I've ever handled, before it dries. When that happens, it becomes firm, yet flexible and very light, like those sheets of coloured craft foam kids make things from in VBS. It doesn't stick to anything but itself, so I modeled Sam's helmet and armour directly on his head and body and they fit nicely. When I painted them with metallic-coloured acrylic craft paints, they look quite realistic, and my fingerprints and wavy edges just look like really, really battered armour...

My Script

According to Script Frenzy's validator machine thing, I have written 136 pages of a script. For some reason, this blog won't currently let me add my winner's icon as a Gadget, so here it is as a graphic: