The wicth is ready

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!*grin*

Hi!!!!!!!!!!!!

I am back!!*smiles*

We had a wonderful Christmas and I am still enjoying the company of my sis and her children however , my hands can never stay still. I confess I have been working more than any other time.

I don't even know if *work* is the right word.... I love to make *things* so very much is hard to feel that what I do is called work.*grin*

I am in the midst of marionettes making, miniature work, and FINALLY I have a wood stove installed on my main shop so the final molds for Patitadolls can be made.( that will be coming up next)

I plan to weekly post my progress.Although I have few other characters ready , I choose the witch to do my first post because she is one of my favorites.*grin*

Costuming is a lot a fun but sometimes stressful because I not always have the right vision.

When I was thinking of the witch , I want to create something different than the black-dark-moody costume seen at most plays.

I figured , if the witch is approaching snow white she should have a combination of a poor woody lady and somehow a fear looking as well.

I think this is it. I am always afraid how the young children will react too but I think she will be fine.

I will finish all the costuming before I start the stringing each marionette. I already know that when i string the witch I will let her have a permanent curved back.I think that will give her a nice characteristic, don't you agree?

Rehearsal starts soon....

Today, we cleaned up our living room and made space to set half of the theatre . We set up only what is necessary because the theatre is quite large when we add all the curtains.

My children were eager to get the sitting in. I am working on the outfits and I can gladly tell you that I have completed 5 of 14. I plan to work as many hours as possible this week to get ALL the costumes done.

Jackie , our tea cup chiauchiau has no glue what is going on...grin...I am getting anxious to get started but I confess to you that I still have much to do before that.

*The marionettes that you see on the farm back are not Snow white*

Snow white costume

I am currently working on all the marionettes outfits. Prince is ready and Snow white is almost done. I plan to show one at a time , once a week , starting in January. I still need to make the hands and feet and that will be the next thing after they are dressed.
After Christmas we will be setting up the theatre and I our living room will be transformed into a *real* theatre.... pictures will follow. This is very special for our family as we all work together. I hope you stay around and check out our updates!
Merry Christmas!

Bodies are ready~

Just a quick post after so loooooooong to show you that the marionettes bodies are now waiting their heads , hands and feet. Then next ,will come the costume. I have been divided with so many things ... mold making ... miniature work..... and I had *plans* to have all the cast done before the end of the year but it will not be possible. We are schedule to perform on end of march so our rehearsal MUST start sometime on January. I will have all done by then - I promise!*grin*

Backdrops

Welcome to my *studio*

I love my barn ....grin... it serves us well as milking parlor but the loft also has a perfect space for painting.

The 4 backdrops are ready but I am now extending the sizes to fit the theatre properly. Here you have a good idea how big our theatre is in comparison with my size.

First scene- forest

second scene - 7 dwarfs room

Third scene - Wicked queen chamber

Fourth Scene - palace garden

New faces , hands and body progress

I managed to finished 2 new dwarfs. they look so much younger and different from the others and I like this look so much more ...sigh...but I will have to happy with what I got now,grin!

When I work with the costumes , I will then add hats on them.

Sorry for the bad picture.... I just want to show you the fiber glass hand , already painted with a first coat. I haven't made any others , not even the other hand 's mold because I need to finish one first to see if I like it. I *really* like fiberglass as medium, it is hard like a rock.

Kate started to carve.... she will be making all the legs and arms.... she needs to *hand- carve* 112 pieces..... yep, she will be busy for while. when ever she is not playing or composing , you can see kate with her carving knife sculpting these darling legs!

It is always a celebration!

*** I had some problems uploading so if you kindly would click on picture, you will see the right photo***

Today we received the program for the George Batte Jr. Fine Arts Center. Needless to say that this makes my children jump up and down. It all becomes very real to them ( and to me too,grin) when we see the program.

The Fine Arts Center offers incredible entertaining and the shows are first class. I am so proud to be part of this and a little nervous now.... I always get like that.

The program is beautiful but if you never been at the theater you don't know what you are missing. The Wingate University theatre is gorgeous and reminds me when I was in Italy and visit the cathedrals .....

Yes ! It is time to celebrate. the children and I will have punch and dress up tonight while our victrola plays some oldies..... life is good , no?*grin*

I invite you to see what else is presented at the theatre, click on link below please:

http://www.wingate.edu/Culture/series.aspx

Prince and the others....

It has been harder and harder to post . I am so sorry about that. I love to work with the theatre and to talk about it. I am working on the marionettes but very slow, because my time is 90% devoted to the patitadolls and I honestly wish that I could have more hours in my day.*grin*
No, there is time for many things, if I don't sleep much of course, smiles, but I am trying to manage well.
I am closing my 7kidsfarm and I will no longer make soaps. I just don't have the time. And I will probably not sculpt , only for my dolls and the marionettes. I am no longer taking commission work and computer time is limited too because I have many projects right now.
I am a mom of 7 children and with a husband that delights in my company ,grin, and visiting my friends and their blogs has been more difficult just because I don't get to come to the computer until late at night but I always manage to take a peek at your blogs, so please , if you are not hearing from me lately don't think I am not visiting you , I am , just for a shorter time.


My daughters will be working with the wood carving for the bodies. I am so excited about this because I have done most things alone but now I will have considerable help.yes!

Almost forgot... here is the prince. I didn't think to make him handsome but rather gentle looking . I think he is nice looking thought. *grin*

The Captain is here!

Yes! I am finally done with the captain dwarf. He has been sculpted for while and now that he is ready , I regret not have taking a picture of him prior the glasses and the hair were added.

He is much a character I must say. I truly love how he turned up.

His glasses were made from welding rod. I love to weld ( my new passion) and thanks to my dolls I had to learn about it. The lenses have 3 coats of clear resin.

It still a little wet and today the humidity was high so i got foggy pictures, sigh, sorry about that*grin*

I did not forget about the hands. They are setting now. I have been working many hours daily while we are off school. I have been working with many things at the same time so it tales me more time to get one thing done but when I do, I get several done at the same time.

All my marionette will look very different when I start the costume. They will have hats or head pieces. I can't wait!

Marionette hands...molding process.

Okay, this is not a tutorial but an idea of how to make hands for marionettes. If you have questions I will be happy to answer it for you. Here I have my set of hands that I sculpted out of polymer clay and fired. These hands have a wire armature and I fired on the oven for one hour and at temp. 225. The tools you see are all handmade. I hardly buy tools because I am particular about my process and many times I spend MORE time preparing than the actually process. The mold is just an empty milk just that I cut on half and adjusted to the size I needed.I taped to seal it.

It is necessary to build a *body* around your prototype and find the *line* where it will meet the other part. Because I am using silicone as a mold making, I am much flexible about my lines because silicone will move for me . My shop is busy at this moment with tons of plaster molding as I have been working on my new dolls. I am making these mold inside my house so forgive me my poor lighting.

Here the clay body is almost ready. Now I need to trim a bit and fit properly inside the mold.

I also had to make a *pour hole* . that was easy... I just added clay around the wrist.

Silicone was poured. It takes about 10 hours for the setting.

Remove the mold. It looks great. No bubbles at all. I am happy about it. *grin*

Here I have the mold back inside the milk jug . I had to do some trimming. Then I placed the same hand inside . I did the pouring and now I must wait until tomorrow to see the complete mold.I will try my first resin hand tomorrow. I can't wait. This is my first time making hands this way.

Making marionettes hands and molds

I know it has been a while since I posted about the marionettes. I am sorry about that and thank you all of you that are interested in this art and to follow me. I know you have busy lives and to take your time to visit me and leave me comments is so precious to me. *Thank you*

Here is a picture of a hand ,that was at the time I took this picture, unbaked.

I have now a set of baked hands. This will serve me as a prototype, a test in fact.

I have, over the years, tried to improve in how the marionettes not only looks but performs. I will always admire and enjoy the *old time* wooden/plaster marionettes but now days we have a huge variety of options for mediums that dramatically improves the final results.

My idea is to make a silicone mold and use resin as medium to reproduce the hands. Why? Because it will be faster but will not compromise the looks plus it will be strong too.

Remember my puppeteers are children and believe me , back stage they *play* their own *plays* with one another and I am always telling them "be careful with the hands".*grin*

It will be more economical too. I like that. If this works, I will make a set of hands for the witch, one female, and probably one more male just to have the variety.

I don't like to use my camera when I am doing things because my hands are always so messy , but I do plan to take you to this process all the way.Perhaps you too one day will try to make a marionette for your own?grin. You will love that forever- I promise!

From large to tiny....

It has been a while since I posted here. My time is very limited right now as I am am spending LOTS of time with patitadolls. I have sculpted one more of the 7 dwarfs but I have not painted him yet. I plan to soon upload some of my backdrops too. They are huge.... 6 feet by 6 feet and all in oil .... the little picture that you see on the side of my template here is also one of my backdrops from last year ..... it is Cinderella's Castle and it measures the same size, so you can have an idea.... I plan to take pictures holding the canvas for you to see.*grin*
The pictures that I am showing you today is a tiny ( incomplete) dollhouse doll. It was a commission work . I have not sculpted many tiny dolls so this was a fun thing for me to do. She measured under 4" when she was standing and unbaked . The little cat is one inch long and 1/2" tall ....

First of the 7 Dwarfs

I don't think I have ever been as busy with my art as I am now. I have a doll show next month for my Patitadolls and it has taken all my time with the short time that I have to prepare everything on time however; I had sculpted this face few weeks ago so it was easy to paint and wig.

This is one of the seven dwarfs.... I am not sure which one yet ...perhaps Reed, I will wait until the others are ready to name each accordingly. I will add the accessories such glasses , hats ...when I have all the dwarfs ready.

I made a little audio video so you can hear the voices of the 7 dwarfs. When all 7 are ready, I will do another one with the faces and voices as they introduce themselves.

***** You may want to pause kate's music, so you can listen to the audio below****

All the audio was recorded at the Wingate University of Music, Wingate. The voices belongs to the students and faculties . I have a lot work to do with the audio . This is just at the *raw* stage, but I think you will enjoy to listen as much as I do. *grin*

Can you pictures them as you listen?

The Witch!

It is always fun to sculpt something out of the normal. I had an initial idea about the witch and I think I was able to make what was in my mind. In our story , the queen disguise her self to a witch appearance to hide her *beauty* . I didn't want to make a very ugly witch but my children reaction was a funny one. I am not sure if I succeed .... they all said ...ohhhh, that is ugly!*grin*

I still need to give her some eyebrows and some other details but because I am sculpting my first dwarf at this moment , I will wait until later on.

I will try to work on the hands next week. I plan to do something different this time. Although it will not be a tutorial, (nothing makes any sense from beginning to the end,grin) but I will show you how I do the hands, create a mold and cast with a medium that I don't believe anyone thought to use it. It will be fun and I hope you will follow me on my Magical world.*grin*