I'm working on the alligator and can't really show him off yet because he's for a friend who I intend to surprise. She asked me to make it for her, but said she'd like to wait for his arrival before meeting him for the first time.
I wasn't pleased with his eyes, so I added some clay here and there and now I like them better. Today I'll do some finishing work to his body, and after that dries I'll sand him and then apply the paint. After that, I'll send him off to the swamps where he'll live out his life....if mold doesn't cause his early demise.
I've also been working on a witch that I sort of remember blogging about in the early stages.
Here's the stuffed cloth body with gesso applied to the head. The gesso gives the fabric a nice base coat so the clay will adhere well.
Here she is after some of her facial features have been applied.
And here she is today with her face painted and her hat. She's still a work-in-progress. She and the alligator have been keeping each other company here in the Treehouse. They've grown quite fond of each other. I just don't have the heart to tell her he'll be leaving soon.
Sorry I've been away. Sometimes a gal just needs a little break.
So while I was playing blog-hooky, Mr. Gadget and I took a 7-day cruise to Bermuda. We drove to Port Liberty in New Jersey and parked our car there for the duration.
It was a little scary getting out of the harbor because of that pesky Verrazano Bridge.
I wasn't sure we were going to make it, but we just squeaked through.
The main reason I wanted to visit Bermuda....aside from having a vacation from my stressful life of retirement....was to see if there really were houses in every color of the rainbow.
There were! In fact, there were houses in all of the colors in a 64-pack of crayons. It was a great opportunity to practice my sketching.
In Bermuda, it's perfectly ok to paint your house any color you like. Not at all like in the U.S. where your neighbor is likely to flatten your tires if you paint your house purple.
Being a big fan of whimsy, I loved seeing this house that was surrounded by a rock wall with bottles of colored water evenly spaced all around. Apparently the residents have been doing this for years.
We took a bus tour around the island with a very informative and amusing driver who drives a regular city bus when she's not doing tours. At one point, just for fun she said, she did several 360's in a roundabout just to "mess with the traffic."
In the very picturesque town of St. George's I spotted this tree sweater next to a yarn shop. (See the big ball of yarn at the top of the picture?)
Here's our ship, the Celebrity Summit, docked at King's Wharf just behind the Norwegian Breakaway--the one that hit a whale in the Hudson River on embarkation day.
It was a relaxing week, and a very colorful one as I've already mentioned.
Now it's back to business as usual...and all of the unfinished projects in the Treehouse. I'll be trying to work up my courage to revisit the alligator. Good thing he still has no teeth.
