Voo Doo Doll

I love this embroidered doll from the summer issue of Marie Claire Idees. I only get the magazine when we go up to Seattle to visit J's sister when she is at the Market. There is a magazine store/booth there that carries a wider range of foreign magazines than our local B&N. Hopefully we can get up there soon so I can get the Autumn issue as well.

I have been seeing these dolls everywhere it seems, but mainly from Hilary.

unfortunately the magazine didn't include the pattern for the doll, but the embroidered ribbon you see criss-crossing her. Bummer!

I have a pretty good stitch encyclopedia, but I borrowed a better one from the library. Here is my first attempt. I drew her with a disappearing pen that uses water. You can still see the blue where I haven't gotten it all out yet. She's got collagen in her lips apparently. I need to cut her out, sew her and stuff her. Next time I will be adventurous and use more than just black embroidery thread. Perhaps also I will use something smoother than linen. I am thinking that I will stuff her with lavender and stick her in my underwear drawer.

Watermelon Baby Carriage

I seem busy, but I am not sure with what. These are two crocheted critters I made recently for a book proposal that await eyes and ornamentation.

Tomorrow we are heading to a baby shower and I have the task of carving a watermelon baby carriage! I have never done that before, so we'll see how that goes.

Dragonfly on a Hosta Flower

They said in that Naturscaping Garden course I took this past spring that Dragonfly watching is the new Bird watching.

I have my house back

Guest Season 2006 went off without a hitch and we had a great time with all the folks that came to stay with us. During that time our lovely kitty morphed into a Killer Extraordinaire. Seen in the photo is a little lizard, or salamander, I am not sure which. The week's death toll is:

Snakes: 6
Snakes brought in the house: 2
Salamander :1
Salamanders brought in the house: 0
Mice: 2*
Mice brought in the house: 2


She found a den of garden snakes over in a corner of our yard and brought a few of them in the house as a gift. Luckily snakes are somewhat slow in the morning and they don't move all that fast so they were easy to extricate. The mouse, however, was NOT slow and NOT easy to extricate. I will not go into boring detail about the circus that ensued when she calmly waltzed in the door and dropped a baby mouse in the middle of the living room. All I can say is that I hope it found it's way back outside and that I apologize for turning the heat up to 90 in an attempt to get it to leave the shelter of the wall heater. * About 10 minutes after I uploaded this she came in and dropped a (dead) mouse next to my desk.

While Mom and Dad were here I got to hit some of the antique/junk shops in the area and found some creepy doll parts:


I tried to convince Jeffery of the sculptural quality of the doll parts, but I don't think he was as enamored with them as I. I also bought a Devil toothpick holder:


He's got a little handle like a mug on the back of his head. I tried to take a pic, but the batteries on my camera vehemently protested to doing anymore work so this is all I got.