My additions to Lady S

I directed most of my attention to a marathon writing session and creating the journal. However I did make some small additions. I created Egyptian looking water lily motifs using cut out corner punches, hand altered, and some gemstones to make her gown more special, added a scarab beetle charm to her wrist (genuine Egyptian given by Jayn's friend whose Mom is from Egypt - sorry no photo) and hand sewed a gallibaya that I think would fit the doll if she were not already dressed. Altered Gallibaya's are mentioned in the journal, as the clothes that Lady S is now wearing for comfort when not in her fancy costume.

Lady Sebastian's mysterious journal

I found this picture of a cat lady from the right era of Lady Sebastian, and I swear she looks just like Talitha!

There is definitely some kind of conspiracy going on to prevent Lady Sebastian from tracking down her father and the Lost Temple of Sekhmet. I'm convinced that the month she lost, apparently spent in the temple, is amnesia from post hypnotic suggestion.

She continues to search and find artifacts and fabric swatches along the way. Meanwhile her journal definitely looks like it has been unearthed by someone years later.

I believe I know how Lady S's story ends...it involves fulfilling the prophecy at the temple.

Serenity Oceana

Serenity's face is so beautiful and her body is so interesting. Yet I still felt she wanted arms to enhance the centaur aspect of her body. I gave her arms and attached her wing/fins to them. I also added some raggedy lace fins to her tail - she reminds me of the sea horses at the Long Beach Aquarium of the Pacific. They are really lacy and raggedy.

I glazed her eyes with dimensional glaze for shine, but I didn't want to fool around with her face any more. I gave her hand cut scales made from a milk bottle, that look rather mother-of-pearly, instead of using sequins.

So many "Serenity" quotes had already appeared in the journal so I did some searching and found some words I like.

Here's my favorite:

"I pray to be like the ocean, with soft currents, maybe waves at times. More and more, I want the consistency rather than the highs and the lows." ~ Drew Barrymore

Raisa's heartbreak revealed.

...but you have to read her letters to understand.

Raisa received a beaded headband, beads on her skirt and torso, flapper necklaces and stickers explaining her Continental tour that her mother and father devised as a way to tame their smitten flapper.

Inside her box I made a scrapbook of this period of her life with her friends, her music and her enjoyment of swimming.

In the journal you will find an explanation of Flapper culture,

one of her favorite ragtime songs,

and the letters from Johnny and another person that are all she has left of her great romance.

 Plus an extract from a very early (1904) feminist tome, Raisa's mother's favorite, which seems to suggest that we haven't really come that far after all. Raisa's mother wanted her daughter to make better choices than being a young bride - but she didn't really understand Raisa or Johnny.

Audacity swims on from Robyn

Audacity given gemstone barnacles, arms and wearing a crocheted shawl with anemone crystal charms.

The story in her journal:

When Atlantis, the island paradise, fell and sank, the Queen struggled to save it. She called upon the magic of her antecedents, the Gods and Demi-Gods of Ancient Greece. She called out especially to the Lady of the Sea, whom she had dared to call her Sister.

Amphitrite, the Sea Nymph, wife of Poseidon lately called Neptune, was a jealous creature. More woman scorned than Goddess, she joined Hera in lamenting the weakness of their consorts, ever dallying with mortal women. Atlantis had become a haven for Gods clothed as men, walking through glittering streets and listening to the intoxicating music of humanity.

Amphitrite knew the Queen was saucy and beautiful. Her stories intrigued, her singing enthralled. It was only a matter of time before this upstart, like Amymone before her, would bring besotted Poseidon to her bed.

The Goddesses were never able to direct their resentment where it should properly lie, instead taking their various vengeances upon the unlucky mortal women. Powerful and raging, Amphitrite with Hera and Athena’s help, struck down Atlantis and it sank into the sea, hidden by powerful magic from all. They named the Queen, “Audacity” and punished her with amnesia and the form of a monstrous octopus.

She glides and slithers on the sea floor amongst the enchanted rocks. She no longer knows herself or her name – but she knows what she is – the queen of somewhere. She knows her confinement is somehow unjust – the caprice of some Gods – undeserved.

Her inner audacity is unchanged. She grows crystal gemstones in anemones from her chains – to buy her freedom one day and join the quest for her true self. Meanwhile she knows she must be bold.

Anneelaw leaves Robyn

Maybe what Anneelaw loves is to write with her powerful pen. I just liked the sentiment on this charm, and the way it looks hand written.

Anneelaw has a translucent "lampshade", with some wire sewn in for support. I tried to make the eyes the same colors and shape as the eye in the hand. Together (in profile) they make a kind of cubist portrait. I like that this is removeable - it just slides over the glass bauble on the stand.

However I don't think this must stay this way. Perhaps someone down the line will want to stuff the head or mount it higher.

Here's wire and glass beading, picking up the colors Arlee selected. My thread of her life is wire.

Here's a crochet copper band of buttons, some bling. It's waiting to be something - a headband, a necklace, a belt, or just something to adorn the box?

Front page of my journal folder.

Journal pages. Some of the tie dyed paper I made with Jayn - I particularly like the center that has the look of shattered prismatic light.
I have to say that I couldn't get any tool up under the center to move the bolt holding the glass knob. I may have done something different had I been able to take it apart - but maybe not.

Anneelaw WIP's

I don't understand why these saved as black and white images from my phone - but it keeps the anticipation going a bit longer.

I have to say I struggled at first with Anneelaw. I found it hard to work out a sense of scale because of her enormous hand. However I went back to Modernist principles and examined the materials. From there I got the idea of working with wire and glass which reminded me that this was a lamp in another life. I am thinking about translucence, prisms, tangles of wire and most of all the movement of light through our thoughts.

Onoma photos

Onoma the alien warrior poet has brown mottled skin and a tail. The armor laced over the body and tail is made from recycled milk bottle plastic, but I hope will become embellished in time. It is meant to be removable and to fit over whatever garments Onoma wears (or perhaps under them as will be determined).

Here are the journal pages.

And here is the transcript of Onoma's story in easier to read format:

Ganymede’s Epihelion 4407

In the outer quadrant nova dust cloud.

Mineral Transport and Salvage ship,

Stone Traveler

Security Officer’s Personal Log:

My first days on this ship have been quiet. Captain Di Seca has tasked me with examining the backgrounds of the new grunts, as he calls the workers on his crew. Their files are nothing unexpected. Of course I also have opened his file. There is nothing unusual there either, as far as I can tell.

The Captain was acceptant of the strange brevity of my own record. I cannot tell him any more than is written – my sudden awakening amongst the detritus of what must have been a great battle, salvaged in the wreckage of the Flagship of Perone, no uniform, no insignia of any kind, no memory and evidently no-one to miss me.

Yet I have a sense of destiny, and the instinctive skills of a warrior that I have no recollection of learning - but that the moves are in my muscles, the clarity of strategy in any situation burns in my mind, and then there is my physique. I have learnt that my race is that of the legendary Dragons of Estavan IV.

There is little written of these ancient and courtly people, other than fragments of their poetry and such complex musical compositions as they have allowed to travel into the populated universe over the last several centuries. The way to Estavan IV is lost.

So I search for clues to my presence in the fleet of the Perone, part of a trade war, with the abilities and skills of a mercenary - and amnesia. I demonstrably know enough to let me be hired on as an officer in this industrial merchant vessel that has the longest and furthest flung pattern of any ship other than the explorer/colony mega ships that will move beyond the galaxy rim. For those one must have family units. They are worlds unto themselves.

I search the galaxy for others of my kind, for what might be my home. I search within for that elusive poetical sensibility that has been touted as the hallmark of my people. To that end, I plan to write poems, and perhaps release the secrets of my own life from behind my eyes. I’m stuck with Galactic standard dialect, for unless I hear otherwise, this is the only language my amnesia has left me.  I can only read translations of my native poetry.

As for the music, well the musicians I have met express eloquent admiration of the technical dexterity and complex ideation of non-harmonic multi-scale songlines – but I find I’m drawn to an old Earth (Sol 3) musical tradition called “Blues”.

 First Poem

For though I am alone

What is left but Unity?

If I am the last of my kind

So then I am my own beginning.

The screen is wiped clean.

The whole universe is now my home.

Onoma's Journal

I'm still finishing up the journal - want to add some more images of the doll to it, but I have started Onoma's journal as a science fiction story.

Here is a transcript of the journal entry:

Ganymede’s Epihelion 4407

In the outer quadrant nova dust cloud.

Mineral Transport and Salvage ship,

Stone Traveler

Security Officer’s Personal Log:

My first days on this ship have been quiet. Captain Di Seca has tasked me with examining the backgrounds of the new grunts, as he calls the workers on his crew. Their files are nothing unexpected. Of course I also have opened his file. There is nothing unusual there either, as far as I can tell.

The Captain was acceptant of the strange brevity of my own record. I cannot tell him any more than is written – my sudden awakening amongst the detritus of what must have been a great battle, salvaged in the wreckage of the Flagship of Perone, no uniform, no insignia of any kind, no memory and evidently no-one to miss me.

Yet I have a sense of destiny, and the instinctive skills of a warrior that I have no recollection of learning - but that the moves are in my muscles, the clarity of strategy in any situation burns in my mind, and then there is my physique. I have learnt that my race is that of the legendary Dragons of Estavan IV.

There is little written of these ancient and courtly people, other than fragments of their poetry and such complex musical compositions as they have allowed to travel into the populated universe over the last several centuries. The way to Estavan IV is lost.

So I search for clues to my presence in the fleet of the Perone, part of a trade war, with the abilities and skills of a mercenary - and amnesia. I demonstrably know enough to let me be hired on as an officer in this industrial merchant vessel that has the longest and furthest flung pattern of any ship other than the explorer/colony mega ships that will move beyond the galaxy rim. For those one must have family units. They are worlds unto themselves.

I search the galaxy for others of my kind, for what might be my home. I search within for that elusive poetical sensibility that has been touted as the hallmark of my people. To that end, I plan to write poems, and perhaps release the secrets of my own life from behind my eyes. I’m stuck with Galactic standard dialect, for unless I hear otherwise, this is the only language my amnesia has left me.  I can only read translations of my native poetry.

As for the music, well the musicians I have met express eloquent admiration of the technical dexterity and complex ideation of non-harmonic multi-scale songlines – but I find I’m drawn to an old Earth (Sol 3) musical tradition called “Blues”.

Onoma's First Poem

For though I am alone

What is left but Unity?

If I am the last of my kind

So then I am my own beginning.

The screen is wiped clean.

The whole universe is now my home.

Prince Charming leaves me

In a big stretch for me, I have made a doll start that does not include a face, or even a head, and further is not cloth. Plus it's a guy, at least named as a guy. The lower torso and legs are made from a wire armature, covered with batting and then plaster bandage ("rigid wrap"). Originally I was planning a polymer clay skin, but I changed my mind for a couple of reasons.

First the plaster is very acceptant of acrylic paint. Second it is porous enough for white glue. Finally it is hard, but can be pierced with a biggish needle or bodkin without cracking.

Three wire loops emerge at the waist which I hope will prove useful for the rest of his body.

He won't stand alone at this point, but I am prepared to attach him to a stand once he returns. I have some wood pieces saved that I will treat to match him.

The journal is a loooong scroll, playing on the idea of a medieval prince or proclamation a la fairy tales. I have used pages from an obsolete Writers' Market and non-woven interfacing. Both sides have been treated with acrylic paints. Jayn helped paint the outside.

The content has been cut using images from Cricut with my new favorite glue, Zig 2 Way glue. I crocheted two different varieagated yarns together for the tie.

I'm envisioning a long hanging banner in the end (but don't let that dictate the alignment of your entries), and I'll add some weights to wooden end pieces. If there are charms or objects that become part of his accoutrements, maybe they can be hung on the banner too.

The main message on my scroll is "Let's Play". I'm looking forward to learning what "Prince Charming" means to all of us.