Christmas Angels

I love to make dolls for my granddaughters to celebrate their birthdays and Christmas. It's a challenge designing something different each time though. Over the years, the dolls are getting smaller in size!

These little angels can either hang on the wall or sit on a shelf. The doll is approximately 8" tall. Various neutral cotton fabrics make up the body and head. I needle sculpted the hands and faces (just the nose since the head is quite small). Acrylic paint, colored pencils, gel pens and graphite were used to paint the faces and, of course, each has painted fingernails! The "shoes" are painted on with gold paint.
The dresses are made of silk scraps. Making the blouse was a bit of a challenge since I decided to slip it over the head which meant the armholes needed to be wide enough to accommodate the hands. I interfaced the silk too which made it much easier to handle.
The dolls are a bit top heavy and need to lean against something to sit up straight - which they must do at the dinner table! I cut the core of a roll of paper towels to size and painted these with cheap gold paint. The doll will sit nicely now and the support doesn't show under her skirt.
Here are the completed angels. The buttons and trim are hand sewn. The angels needed crowns which are made from painted and punched card stock. There is a small ribbon hanger on the back of each as well a pretty wired bow which forms the wings.
I've still got lots of Christmas gifts on my to do list...better get back to work!

Travel Photos

I had a lot of fun taking pictures in Croatia. The cities were filled with charming doors, windows, winding streets and interesting people - plenty of photo ops! On one of the upper "streets" in the walled city of Dubrovnik, I saw a lovely young couple sightseeing. I took this picture of the young woman standing atop the stairs. I liked it so much, that I thought I'd play with it in Photoshop Elements. I sharpened and blurred the image, changed the opacity, reduced saturation, added filters, etc.

This is the original photo.

(1) Orton technique

(2) Warming filter

(3) Sepia photo filter

My favorite is No. 1 - what's yours?

Home Again!

We had the best time in Croatia and Slovenia and hated to leave, but now we're happy to be home. My travel journal is overflowing with memorabilia. We made a lot of new friends on this trip. There were only 23 people all together. We felt like family in no time. No longer "tour virgins," we're looking forward to doing it again. I can hardly wait to look through and sort all my photographs - but laundry comes first!

Croatia - Day 13

This is the last day of our trip. The weather today is absolutely perfect. It's still cold, but the sun is out and the skies are clear.

We visited the very old town of Kropa, which was famous for its iron work for centuries. The people were very poor and worked incredibly hard. As many as 8 families would live in one house. A family usually consisted of mother, father and 6 to 8 children. The women shared one kitchen. The men and all children over the age of 8 did iron work. Their workday was 16 hours long. Once all the iron ore was used up in this region, the town closed up. This is a war memorial honoring the young men who were killed in World War II. There is talk of destroying the memorial because some of the men fought for the Germans.

The Sava River runs through the town and ultimately into the Danube.

Artisans still do iron work today which is mostly decorative screens, chandeliers, gates and the like. The man below demonstrated making small nails - just like before the war. All of the iron work done here was by hand - not machine. The small spikes he made today would have been put on the bottom of shoes to make walking in the snow and ice easier.

After lunch, we took one more walk around Lake Bled. This picture of the church on the island looks spectacular with the snow capped Alps in the background.

Croatia - Day 12

We were so pleased to see the sun this morning! We took the bus to Ljubljana, the capital of Slovenia. Because much of the city was rebuilt after an 1895 earthquake, Slovenia's capital has a unique architectural style that has integrated surviving historic structures with more modern designs. The work of Joseph Plecnik, a 20th century architect, is particularly remarkable for the way it incorporates Roman, Medieval, Baroque and Habsburg elements. The Ljubljanica River flows through the heart of the town. Here you can see the Ljubljanski castle in the background.The Cathedral of St. Nicholas built in 1701. This is one of two bronze doors made to celebrate the visit of Pope John Paul to the city.

The cathedral was almost 200 years old when the earthquake of 1895 did some extensive damage to the inside. The architectural integrity was preserved by the 20th century architect Plecnik allowing for the baroque appearance to be maintained throughout.

One of four bronze dragons guarding the old city.

We returned to Bled in the afternoon and took a boat ride on Lake Bled to the 17th century church located on the only island in Slovenia.

Here we are getting ready to climb the 100 stairs to reach the church. Yes, we were still smiling once we reached the top!

Tomorrow is our last day here. We've had a wonderful trip. I can hardly believe it's time to go home.

Croatia Day 11

Partly cloudy skies this morning, but rain is on its way. We thought we better hike up to the castle before the rain started. We could glimpse the castle from our hotel. We hiked up a rocky goat path. Going up was difficult. All the wet leaves on the path made going down a challenge. I'm happy to say we made it and didn't fall once! This is St. Martin's Church. We attended Mass here on Sunday night.

A view of Bled from atop the castle. For 800 years the Bled Castle was the seat of the bishops of Brixen. Bled is blessed with natural hot springs regarded as having healing powers and has been a popular fresh-air retreat since the mid-19th century. We walked the 4 mile path surrounding the lake. By this time it was raining steadily - luckily we were dressed for it and had umbrellas. After the hike, we treated ourselves to cream cake which was invented by a chef in our hotel dining room and well known in the area. It was light and delicious. I could have eaten more - maybe tomorrow...

Buildings on the top of the castle. The museum and gift shop are located here. All of the views are fantastic. Many blackbirds could be seen in the colorful vines eating blueberries.

This is the part of the path we followed going up to and down from the castle.

There's a promise of sun the next two days - I hope it clears up. This is a fairytale land in the Alps and I'd like to take more picture of it.