Christmas with Max and Juno

It's that time of year again.

Christmas.

Living Room set

I've been on a real 1/6th scale kick recently and my poor ponies have been abandoned for the time being in favour of my dolls. I'll get back to them soon I promise, but for now the girls have taken over!

As seen in my last post about them, Max and Juno now have a sofa, but it was hardly a living room! After perusing Pinterest for inspiration I decided to make them a fireplace to go with it, and an assortment of walls and flooring options. It would probably have been sensible to make the walls and floor first, then the fireplace but when have I ever gone for the sensible option?

I hunted around for a suitably sized box and eventually found one in the form of packaging for some bath products. It was just the right height and depth, and despite the sides being relatively thin, it was made from very sturdy card. I found some tileable brick patterns online and printed out a few pages for the back and side which were affixed with double-sided tape.

Holiday in the Highlands - Part 6 - The Journey Home

Sorry, I know this holiday spam has been pretty huge but I took a LOT of photos. XD

As ever, the week seemed to have gone by far too soon and I really wanted to stay longer. Luckily the weather behaved beautifully for us, so our journey back down to Glasgow was a good one.

Holiday in the Highlands - Part 5 - Waterfalls, Ardtoe and Monster Midges!

Part 5

I've got all my dates and photos mixed up a bit so I'm kinda guessing which day I did what, haha. Oh and apologies for the terrible formatting - I always try to centre the photos but instagram apparently doesn't like it. D:

The next day brought with it better weather and for virtually the first time we could actually make out the cliffs of the Small Isles in the distance.

Holiday in the Highlands - Part 4 - Glenfinnan, Rain and Trains

Part 4!

This time we were heading for the famous Glenfinnan Viaduct, which is probably best known for its appearance in Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. 

Glenfinnan Viaduct, Scottish Highlands  #scottishhighlands #Glenfinnan #glenfinnanviaduct #scotland

A photo posted by Christine Sutcliffe (@lynkhart) on Sep 8, 2016 at 8:18am PDT

Holiday in the Highlands - Part 3 - Mallaig and Camusdarach!

 Part 3!

We finally got to Mallaig, and after parking at what felt like the other end of the entire town, had a good wander about the harbour.

Holiday in the Highlands - Part 2 - Beaches, beaches, beaches!

Part 2!

Once we'd unpacked we travelled a few miles over to the tiny little fishing village of Arisaig.

Holiday in the Highlands! Part 1 - Glen Coe

This is going to be a pretty massive story so I'll probably split it into a couple of posts so I don't overdo it on the photo front! I've been meaning to post this for months but it took forever to sort out the photos and then I went on another holiday and took even more, so it wasn't exactly a priority, lol.

Despite having been born and bred in Scotland, I'd never managed to make it over to the picturesque west coast of the Highlands, though it had always been one of my most coveted holiday destinations. This year we decided that our September week's holiday should be spent up north rather than our usual jaunt in Dumfries and Galloway and wow, was it worth it!

(Apologies in advance for all the instagram spam - I took a LOT of pics this time round and most via that, haha! If you'd like to look at the photos without my commentary, they can all be found here!)

Ugly Christmas Jumpers and some much needed furniture...

Long time no blog yet again! I've got the computer mostly sorted now but I've been in a making things mood recently rather than a computery one so I've hardly been on the PC since we got it back!
I've been sorting out all my photos from my holiday to the Highlands a few months ago so I'll be doing a couple of posts on that soon as there's a lot to show you all!

I have been busy though, and surprisingly for me, looking forward to Christmas.

Most years I'm a bit ambivalent about the whole thing as it always reminds me of the year I was really depressed and spent most of the festive season in tears, but this year I'm really looking forward to it. A lot of that is due to Max and Juno - I really want to set up some festive scenes with them so I've been busy hoarding all manner of accessories and bits and pieces in advance, not least their clothing!

I've made a few jumpers over the years but always found doing the sleeves really awkward...right up until I realised I was sewing them in a needlessly complicated way and since learning the right way it's changed my life!

I'd seen plenty of doll jumpers made from socks before and even made a couple, but it wasn't until I watched one of MyFroggyStuff's brilliant tutorials on Youtube that I thought about really Christmassy jumpers. I saw a really cheesy pair at the local charity shop, so I grabbed them to go along with a couple of other things I already had that I thought might come in handy. The red thing at the top is the knitted cover for one of those reusable handwarmers which I haven't used yet, and the red jumper below it was a tree decoration from Poundland last year which needed just a little work to fit properly. The blue patterned socks are printed ones from the £1 shop, and as they are very stretchy I thought they'd be better for something else entirely...

 

 The rough pattern was cut out and sewn up...

...arms added...

...until finally...

I used some super slim velcro for the back which is thankfully almost unnoticeable.

As you can see, the blue socks made some excellent leggings!

The jumper decoration's sleeves were sewn shut at the ends and were a little short for the doll so I made some cuffs from another sock and closed up the back with poppers. I used some black fleece to make fingerless mittens but I'm going to have to get rid as they've started to stain her hands! D:

The hat is made from yet another sock and the scarf is just a long rectangle of very thick knitted fabric sewn together.

Max's white hat was falling apart at the seams so she got a new one too which suits her a lot more I think. (also socks. XD) She's not really the novelty Christmas jumper kind but I think Juno will bring her round/bribe her into it eventually.

As you may have noticed in some of the pictures, I also made some cushions! I bought a fat quarter on holiday with lots of brightly patterned deer with the intention of making one of the girls a set of pajamas but they're too close together in the pattern for me to isolate one for the front of a top so I've had to improvise.

I really wanted a sofa for them though as so far I only have one chair and I'd like to do some proper christmas scenes with them later on. Sooo, I dug out some cardboard boxes and started experimenting...

I'm not happy with it really as it's too shallow for them once the cushions are on and the armrests and back are too low but never mind, it'll do for now I suppose.
 It's more of a loveseat than a sofa but meh.

The table was a quick make using a rectangle of balsa wood, some cork sheeting, paper straws and some plastic gems painted silver for rivets to give it a kind of industrial feel. The background and flooring is all scrapbook paper and I really want some more as it's really effective!

I also made a quick cushion from some scrap fur fabric I had knocking around.

You'll get to meet this newbie in a future post!

That's it for now, though Juno is a total enabler and when I saw these socks in Poundland the other day I knew they only had one possible future!

Yes, Max, you will be made to wear at least one of them, sorry!

Narri the Khajiit

While I haven't played through much of the game as one, the Khajiit race in Skyrim is one of my favourites, so it was inevitable that I should eventually get round to making one in 1/6th scale.

I have returned!

As of tonight I have a reasonably functional PC (I say reasonably, as I'm still adding in all my files and programs again which will take some time!) so I hope regular blogging can recommence in the next couple of weeks!

To whet your appetites, here's a pictorial preview of just some of what I'll be posting about soon...

 

 

Rather an eclectic collection I know, but I hope you'll enjoy!

An unfortunate abscence

I've been a very quiet blogger recently and unfortunately will remain so for a while. It's not like I have a lack of things to blog about, in fact it's the opposite! I went on a wonderful and extremely photogenic holiday in the Highlands last month, I've done some doll customs, made some new minis and all sorts of other things, all of which I'm super excited to share with you all...but there's a problem.

My computer died last month.

It had been acting up for a while, but finally became impossible to use when the desktop wouldn't load and the system got caught in an endless loop of dialogue boxes opening and closing. We took it to our local computer techs who pronounced it, and said to take it back to John Lewis, where we bought it, for repairs as it was still under warranty. Only problem is, John Lewis wouldn't take it until the drives had been wiped because of security regulations, so it had to go back to the techs to copy the drives and wipe the PC, then back to John Lewis...who then said it was so problematic they were going to have to send it back to the manufacturers!

Arghhhhhh.

I only have a PC, (I don't like laptops) so at the moment my only connection to the Internet is through my iPhone, which is fine for the most part but there are certain sites it doesn't get on with, and Flickr is one of them, so although I can upload my photos to it, I can't copy the img codes for posting on here or on forums!

I'll be away for most of October so even if by some miracle the computer gets fixed in the next week or two, I won't be able to do anything about it so it's super frustrating!

I've become much more active on Instagram as a result, as its one of the few places I can actually do something with my photos, so if you want to see what I've been up to recently, or just ogle some shiny scenery, I can be found here!

https://www.instagram.com/lynkhart/

Hopefully I'll have a functional PC soon - I certainly hope so anyway, I'm getting withdrawals!

Lake District Live newbies!

Yeah, yeah, I know this is ridiculously late! XD

I bought a few new faces for the Julip yard at this show. I went in hoping for a new Welshie as its my favourite pony mould, but the first one I grabbed at with glee was a Pit Pony.

I've since named him Domino (original, I know) and he's seriously cute.

I ordered up some fake grass samples the other day to experiment with and while they're only tiny sections and mostly too out of scale for Julips, they do come in handy for ponies!

Propped up against something they make rather good hedges too!

As per usual I made him a rug/headcollar set after I got home and he's been spoiled with this very squishy fleece number.

I wasn't sure about the colour choice at first as I usually like piebalds in red or navy blue but I think this dark teal suits him.

At the show, Heather had actually grabbed the only welshie on the spares table to pass to me as she got there first, but I thought she had claimed it for herself so I had a moment of angst until I realised she was waving her at me, lol.

This little mare is the reason this post has been delayed for so long! As I was going to pay for her, Laura warned me that as she had literally just been finished the night before, her paintwork was delicate and I should wait at least a week for everything to stabilise before I styled her hair or anything. That suited me fine as I knew I could work on the pit pony in the meantime and all was well. Well, at least it was until I flipped her mane over one day to see how it would look on the other side and realised there was a bit of paint missing on one ear! I must have caught it when I fiddled with her mane and could have kicked myself for not being more patient. Laura was very good about it all and offered to take her back immediately but I held off, as I wanted to see if it would stabilise and as it was only a little bit missing I could touch it up. It took a few weeks of cautious picking with a fingernail every now and again to test but eventually it stopped peeling and I was able to fill in the missing section with acrylic. You wouldn't know it had ever happened to look at her now, but I'll still be extra careful with her just in case!

She was nameless up until a couple of weeks ago when I posted this pic on facebook (yep, the Pokemon Go! bug has bitten me!) and a fellow Julip collector told me that I absolutely had to name a Julip Pidgey now and well, it stuck. XD

She really is the most wonderful shade of chestnut and I adore the colour of her mane and tail. (even if it really doesn't want to lie flat despite the amount of products I've put through it!)

I now have three chestnut welshies and I'm not quite sure how that happened, lol. I'll need to take a photo of them all together to show just how different they are, despite being similarly coloured and on the same mould.

As well as the ponies I had a bit of a splurge at the animal table too...

I saw Richard putting this one on the stand and I don't think he was there for ten seconds before I'd claimed him! He's easily the nicest Julip dog I've ever seen and almost everyone else at the show agreed! I named him George after the pub we were staying at (The George Washington) and also because I felt he needed that kind of traditional humany name. He got a smart leather collar too as soon as we got home and I think it suits him perfectly.

Laura said they made him a twin as he turned out so well and I think he's being cast so more can be produced which is really nice as I think it will be a really popular addition to the line! I've always loved Fox Terriers and Airdaley types so I'm super pleased to get one in Julip form!

In truth I'm more of a cat person than a dog person and I really wanted some of the walking cats at the last show but I wasn't quick enough. I more than made up for it this time and ended up with two!

Brother and sister pair Alfie and Edie were too cute to separate so I just had to get both. Hey, I don't make the rules!

Alfie's stripes were the first thing that drew me to him - I'm a sucker for a nice ginger mog!

He's got such a mischievous expression too, like he's plotting all manner of shenanigans.

Edie was slightly less stripy with a shorter tail and more rounded features...

...but had a really sweet expression. I think she's definitely the lap cat of the pair - more interested in settling down on the sofa for a nap than hunting mice and getting under everyone's feet ala Alfie.

Both enjoy exploring the long grass in the fields though.

Alfie's probably plotting to catch my other two newbies, yet more bunnies for the collection; Ash and Puddle!

I spotted Puddle first but because Julips get lonely without company (again, I don't make the rules, this is just fact!) I was forced to find him a friend and thought the little grey one was quite unusual.

I need more bunnies like a hole in the head but they're just so addictive I can't help bringing back more at every show! 

I'd quite like to order up some in wild rabbit colouring so I can use them in scenes and things though, so that's something to think about for the future.

Anyway, it won't be long until the official Julip Live in October which I'm *fingers crossed* going to so assuming I can actually save some pennies by then I might have even more to introduce!