tephra | Entries tagged with bjd

Buttercup Miniatures did an Advent knit-a-long and I decided to join in using Lionbrand Amazing Lace yarn and US #0 (2mm) needles. I had no idea if the finished item would fit any of my dolls but I was sure I could send it to a friend with more varied dolls if it didn’t. I don’t have any male dolls at this scale so it was a gamble from the start.

A grey, shawl collared cable knit sweater on a pale wood background.

A grey, shawl collared cable knit sweater on a pale wood background.

I basically crossed every cable other than the center panel wrong but didn’t want to start over when I noticed it and just kept going. The ropes should have been snakes and the outermost cables should have been Xs and Os but I still like it. Maybe I will knit another with the cables done right… well at least with the Xs and Os, I prefer the ropes actually.

Seaming was a mixed bag of simple and nightmarish. Setting in sleeves is never going to be something I enjoy, but doing it with a cable at the edge of one piece and no selvedge stitch? ARGH!

The same grey sweater on a Bobobie March doll with wild hair in shaded of orange and gold.

The same grey sweater on a Bobobie March doll with wild hair in shaded of orange and gold.

It fits my Bobobie March like she stole it from her boyfriend. The armhole depth is very long for her and the sleeves could be one rope cable crossing shorter.

The same grey sweater on a Wild Hearts Crew Rallee Radmore doll.

The same grey sweater on a Wild Hearts Crew Rallee Radmore doll.

The fit on Wild Hearts Crew is great! I was impressed that the neck stretched enough to get over her head.

The same grey sweater on a curvy Barbie Fashionista "spring into fashion" doll.

The same grey sweater on a curvy Barbie Fashionista "spring into fashion" doll.

It even went on a curvy Barbie Fashionista easily.

I would love a Made to Move body for this girl. I bought her specifically to model that crochet flamenco dress she has on under the sweater, so articulation didn’t matter, but then I fell in love with her face. (Not in love with the glue head I deal with and the “look at it funny and it floats” static prone hair.)

Current Mood: accomplished

Wayfaring Yarns/Sweater Sisters is doing their annual mini sweater KAL again this year so I knit up the first pattern using Lion brand Summer Nights yarn and US #1 (2.25mm) needles. My only changes to the pattern were to do some decreases in the first round of ribbing for the cuffs and hem so that I could use 2x2 ribbing to match the neck (and also get the cable to flow into the ribbing).

A doll with wild orange hair wearing a turtleneck sweater in shades of blue in green with a wide horseshoe cable running down the center front.

The fit is surprisingly good on my Bobobie March. There are some things I would change for a better fit/cleaner lines if I knit another, but I’m happy enough with it.

That excess fabric is from the extreme increases in the yoke and I would omit about eight of them in the back section and add them back in as waist/hip shaping. March has booty, so while I could shave a few stitches off here and there in the sleeves and upper torso I would need all of the torso stitches to cover her butt.

Current Mood: accomplished
Crossposts: http://tephra.insanejournal.com/64438.html

Finishing more old stuff

Sometime last year someone on one of the knitting discords posted a link to the Shusui Shrug pattern. The designer was thoughtful enough to post a video on how to get the thing started and I just had to try it….

Now, before I show the back, let it be known that my Knit Picks needles decided to betray me and the cord came out of the needle right in the middle of the two color brioche portion and dropped a couple dozen stitches.

Let it also be known that acrylic crochet thread doesn’t actually like to be knit with all that much and wants to be straight. Yeah. But! I did get everything back on the needles, and after several attempts even sort of got everything fixed!

Just please ignore the horridly uneven tension that remains even after attempts to fix it and blocking. And that one strand that ran on the RS instead of the WS that I didn’t notice until I was pinning it out to block, okay?

Current Mood: accomplished
Crossposts: http://tephra.insanejournal.com/63908.html

While I was procrastinating about blocking the sweater I posted I knit something else.

Inspired by a pattern called Tanrenga, which I liked because it made me realize I could turn a top down triangular shawl into a vest if I wanted to. So I looked for shawl patterns and then said screw it and improvised with the old classic feather and fan, like the original used.

Fingering weight yarn (Lion brand Summer Nights) on US size 1 (2.25mm) needles. Lightly steam blocked. I tried out the Channel Island bind off (Icelandic variation), but I think if I have to match the CI caston I will do a type of sewn bind off with doubled yarn.

Her tank top is what happens to uncomfortable footie socks. It’s pretty bad hand sewing (I hate hand sewing) but it does the job when I need a layer to put under an open lace vest, yes?

The doll is a Dollzone Feilan on body b45-002. Yes, her wig needs a little TLC but I’m kinda terrified of screwing it up.

Current Mood: accomplished
Crossposts: http://tephra.insanejournal.com/63715.html

In my defense, the project bag got eaten by stash and I only found it again when I had to deep dive because of the Stay At Home order. I know that’s not much of a defense.

Anyway, back when the Hunger Games was The Thing and Catching Fire was about to open, knitters kinda lost their minds over Katniss’ sweater (and that one arm cowl/vest thing). I poured over every high res promo shot I could find and knit my version of the sweater for one of my dolls. Then, probably in 2016 or 17, I started another from my notes on the first.

So when I was stash diving I found what I had finished, the side panels, tail, and bottom hem. About half the sweater was already done so I knit the sleeves and then in the fiddly bit to fill in the torso and finish the yoke.

This doll (Dollzone Mo on body b45-012) is a bit taller and slimmer through the shoulder and bust than the one I made the original for (Featherfall Elf Iruhi on Resinsoul Rong body) but I think the fit is okay, as long as you don’t mind flashing a bit of belly (the low rise pants don’t help; yes I knit those too).

My version was knit before we had a shot of the back of the movie sweater, and from what we could see of it I had assumed the side panels were square and met in the back. The real sweater is more boring so I didn’t even consider restarting when I saw the back was different.

Knit with Aunt Lydia’s Bamboo Crochet Thread (discontinued, dammit) on US size 0 (2mm) needles.

That’s one more thing out of the WIP pile. I might even finish the rest if the SaHO keeps being extended.

Current Mood: accomplished
Crossposts: http://tephra.insanejournal.com/63332.html

I did indeed lose at yarn chicken. Knowing it would be possible, however, I stopped the first sock with just the graft at the toe left and used the other end of the ball to make the second sock.

I ran out of yarn so I ripped back the first sock a few rows so I could get the second knit to the same point. Then I split some dark grey worsted yarn down to single plies and used those to do the last three rounds (holding the tail of the original yarn and the new yarn together for the first half round to blend the two on the top of the toe) and graft the toes closed. Since she's using her high heel feet the mismatched yarn is all under her toes when she wears the socks so it's good enough for me.

Current Mood: accomplished
Crossposts: http://tephra.insanejournal.com/63080.html

So I had a wild hair last month and started swatching an idea…

And after a few variations, I stated knitting… and ripping and re-knitting. Until I ended up with this (unblocked):

The wine/maroon neckline is sort of fail, but by the time I knew how it would look I had finally managed to get the grey neckline/yoke area sorted out and I was not ripping it again.

I had knit the sweater to go with the skirt I had knit previously, so then of course I had to knit a hat to match.

Now I just need to knit her some socks. Unfortunately I am thinking I might not have enough grey yarn, which is a horrible thing to think when you are nearly finished the first sock.

I’m hitting the end of my enthusiasm for this project, so she might go sockless if I lose yarn chicken. Maybe I will get back to one of the ideas I have had for making her some boots instead.

Current Mood: accomplished
Crossposts: http://tephra.insanejournal.com/62732.html

I did finish up some human scale knitting, and blocked some human scale crochet, but I don't have photos yet. So instead you get to see more of Fiona.

A grey Hujoo Phoebe Mouse doll standing on snow and leaves in front of a tree trunk wearing a black handknit sweater, black and white houndstooth pants, and black combat boots.

Hujoo doesn't use s-hooks in these dolls, so until I get around to restringing her I can't just take off her head to dress her like I do with my other dolls. Because of that, and the fact that I am not a fan of bulky fasteners like snaps and velcro (which is not great with knitting anyway), I had to come up with a neckline that would allow me to dress her feet first. However, I didn't want the neckline to be super large and open either. I think I succeeded with this design, which has "tabs" on the front and back that overlap in the shoulder in the sleeve cap area. At this scale the overlap is kind of like having a shoulder pad in there, but I think it looks okay.

I'm going to knit another to streamline the process; picking up for a tiny sleeve in the round while overlapping bits was fiddly to say the least. After that, maybe I will write this one up as a pattern for sale. We shall see.

Current Mood: accomplished
Crossposts: http://tephra.insanejournal.com/62077.html

While I have been knitting and crocheting right along all year, I haven't really been doing much, or finishing much, for my dolls. I fixed that this past weekend.

First, the craft project that kicked things off.

A grey Hujoo Phoebe Mouse doll sitting on the edge of a silver laptop with a doll sized pale yellow laptop open on her lap. The doll laptop has a cheese wedge for a company logo.

( More photos and other projects under the cut. )

And that's it until I either update with the finished human scale things from this year or I finish more doll things.

Current Mood: accomplished
Crossposts: http://tephra.insanejournal.com/61915.html

Because it's not knitting, and an update at this stage would be huge. It's too close to bedtime for that much effort anyway.

Just a quick little headband for Fiona, my Hujoo Phoebe Mouse girl. The bangs are a bit of boa/eyelash yarn that I tucked under the edge.

Crocheted with one ply of vintage Red Heart Lustersheen on a US #7 (1.65mm) steel hook.

I've been working on a wig for her but the first attempt stalled at the bare wig cap stage due to engineering problems. I'll probably finish it up eventually, but she will need a head bang to keep the bits in front of her ears down I think.

Current Mood: accomplished
Crossposts: http://tephra.insanejournal.com/61622.html

The craft output of the last year has not been up to the usual level due to life events. I know I mentioned my mother's valve replacement surgery that was scheduled for last summer and ended up being last fall. What I didn't mention is the reason for the delay; my Dad died. I spent late summer and fall with Mom and my brother and didn't get home until early November, which is also why you didn't see any hints of NaNoWriMo last year. I wanted to do NaNo but there was just nothing for me to work with, not even enough to really get a character or setting started, and absolutely no energy to write with, especially not with nearly a third of the month passed already. It hurt a bit to skip a year but not as much as trying and failing would have.

Anyway, I did actually get some crafty things done in the second half of last year. ( Many photos behind the cut. )

Current Mood: calm
Current Music: breeze in the trees

Current Mood: calm
Current Music: breeze in the trees

Is faceless no longer!

My first, and so far only, attempt to give a doll a face.

I did a layer of pastel shading (which the camera mostly ate) to contour her nose/eye sockets and the sides of her face/behind her ears. Then, in a move I almost regretted, I did her lips with a pastel that looked like a good lip color and painted it on damp rather than dry.

Hello lipstick. I wasn't sure Talar was actually a dark lipstick sort of girl though, hence the near regret. I decided to keep on with it though, and gave the pastels a coat of sealer.

Then it was onto the tubes of water color, raw umber and burnt sienna, for her brows and eye liner. The brows, those were a major pain. I tried sketching them on with powdered pastel... nope, not enough color stuck for me to see it and it was way too imprecise. I tried with an orange pastel pencil about a half dozen times each and was only managing to polish the brown bone as I erased them to redo (and tinted the area orange as well). Eventually I said "screw it" and grabbed a dark brown pastel stick and sketched them in with the corner, it only took about three tries to get her right to match her left close enough. :P Then I attempted to brush the paint on like individual hairs and the 10/0 brush immediately showed that it was not fine enough for that, but it gave a reasonable brow texture so I went with it.

After all that the eye liner was almost a let down for how easy it was.

The lower lashes made up for that.

I then tackled the lips. My paint set has a tube of "flesh tone" paint, it's basically an opaque pale peach color, so I did a wash of that over the lips to tone down the color. Getting that to the point of "not too streaky" was a whole lot of fiddling and frustration. Then the crease between her lips was too pale, so I had to go in with the 10/0 liner and some of the raw umber to darken that up again, and then fiddle with the lower lip and the streakiness again to blend that in. Finally I felt enough was enough and I patted on some powdered terracotta pastel to even out the lower lip and called it good.

I really like the color I ended up making there.

Fingers were crossed when I sealed it; I was told, after I was in the middle of all this, that applying sealer over tube watercolor can make the watercolor blur.

After all that I figured "why the hell not?" and glued in some orange lashes I bought ages ago for her and my other redheads and had never got around to sticking in their eyes.

Now I just need to get my hands on a small bottle of acrylic gloss to add a hint of shine to her lips, but I'm happy enough with the matte look that I'm not going to worry about it.

Current Mood: accomplished

I started this in December, not long after I saw the still from Catching Fire that made all the knitters on the internet want to knit That Sweater.

Every single stitch in everything but the white ribbing is twsited, both knit and purl, including decreases both left and right leaning. For the knitters that will mean something; everyone else: suffice to say that it slowed me down a bit.

I'm so happy with it that if I had other colors of this bamboo thread I'd be seriously tempted to start another one.

Current Mood: bouncy
Current Music: 2cellos - Smells like teen spirit

Well, not really, but I sure did increase my output there for a bit at the end of May. There was a doll meet/party at Mint on Card, a doll store in Traverse City, and I wanted my girls to look their best so I went a bit nuts for a week or so beforehand.

In more or less chronological order... ( Photos under the cut. )

I love this shot. Therefore I am leaving it out of the cut. ( Back to the photos and stuff. )

One last thing finished before the party and not photographed, a new case for my camera because the original one is all icky nasty with age. I knit one of out cotton in linen stitch with a velcro closure on the flap.

Current Mood: creative
Current Music: kitty snores

The aspens/poplars have leaves the size of quarters, the delphiniums are about eight inches tall, the grass is green, and it is snowing.

So, as I sit facing a window that shows me this all too clearly, I will do a knitting update and silently think a stream of profanity to make a sailor blush.

I have been really bad about documentation for the last year at least but here's some attempt at catching up with photographic evidence. ( Lots of photos under this cut. )

For those that remember my ranting about my craft blog, Omnifariously Knotty, well it's still lacking OpenID... but there are posts! Not many, but there's actual content. To be specific I put up a post on what I did to make Namid's white top (seen in the lace stole photos) from a baby top/dress pattern as well as a post on how to modify my shorts pattern into capris.

Current Mood: indescribable
Current Music: Stevie Nicks - Rhiannon

The paper clips I have are the vinyl coated ones that are just a bit over an inch long. They straighten out to about three and a half inches long, which is just long enough to do this style of glasses for Anjeni, who has a 14cm head.

For larger dolls you will need a larger clip or a longer piece of wire that is about 20ga in thickness. For an idea of how much wire you will need, measure your doll from the bridge of their nose to behind their ear in a straight line parallel to the side of their head. Double that and add the width of their head across their face, again in a straight line. Add a smidge for shaping the top of the frame, it is better to cut the wire too long than to try to get a too short piece to work.

I straightened the paper clip using my fingers since it's really easy to crack the vinyl if you use pliers. Also be cautious using pliers on anodized clips or craft wire, you can wrap tape around the jaws of the pliers to help cushion them if your fingers aren't strong enough to straighten your clip/wire.

I bent both ends of the straightened clip one inch from the end to make the bows. For larger or smaller dolls this measurement should be the bridge of the nose to the back of ear length, or whatever half the total wire length minus the face width happens to be.

Then I bent the center of the wire at a right angle perpendicular to the bends I made for the bows to make the center of the bridge. The curves for the tops of the "lenses" I made by curving them over the barrel of a Sharpie marker and then flattening out the curve a bit.

There was a lot of fiddling and trying on to get the shape and size right. And more than a few spring loaded escapes. Thankfully the steel center of the clips meant I could retrieve it with a magnet. :D

I used three inches of the 28ga wire to make the bottoms of the "lenses" by making a lark's head knot around the center of the bridge and then wrapping the ends at the corners of the bows. I used the barrel of a pen for a spacer in the lens area so the two lenses would be at least close to the same size.

If I make another pair I will try to take in process photos. The only problem I have with them is the 28ga wire is very soft. It doesn't take much to get the lenses out of shape. Of course it's on a spool jewelry wire, maybe the core of a twist tie would be stiffer....

Current Mood: creative

As part of my Christmas doings today, I redressed my dolls. I was just going to redress Rico, into clothing she would not like much I admit, but while I had her down and headless I swapped her neck S-hook for Anjeni's (and tried Namid's on her, it's too large for her head). Then, since I had them all down and headless, they all got changed for the holiday.

( Photos under the cut. )

Current Mood: pleased

It's been a while, so NaNo status catch up time.

I didn't write at all the day before Thanksgiving. My motivation hit the dirt and buried itself six feet under. I managed not to let myself fall more than a day behind after that and managed to catch up again on Friday.

Then Kris decided to derail me with my Christmas present. I've posted about that more completely at my "archive dolly stuff" journal on LJ.

For those that don't want to read that, well there are some photos under the cut that will explain things. ( Looky what Kris gave me! )

Current Mood: bouncy
Current Music: Bonnie Raitt - Something To Talk About

This is a public archive of the post I made at the Den of Devils.

( There's a new girl in town. )

Current Mood: bouncy
Current Music: Right Said Fred - Too Sexy

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December 2022

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The Shadows on My Wall Don't Sleep

Enter the Shadowzone

Entries tagged with bjd

Buttercup Miniatures 2020 Advent KAL

Mini Sweater #1

Finishing more old stuff

Things you do to avoid other things

It only took 3 or 4 years...

Now with Socks

Close enough

A little bit of doll knitting

Feeling crafty

Not a knitting update

The Crafty Report

The Crafty Report

The elf with no face...

Impressing Myself

I am a crafting machine

In an attempt to ignore the view out the window....

Doll glasses from paper clips and wire

Merry Christmas

State of Things

NaNo Derailment, Expertly Done

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December 2022

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