Weekend "Work"

Andres in his new garden (wearing my gardening hat)

Hope you had a beautiful weekend! We spent a good part of ours working in the new garden. The weather was perfect (upper eighties) and we most everything we picked out on Mother's Day got planted (we had to wait for the cold nights to pass). I couldn't resist getting more though ~ strawberries, blueberries, gardenia, bee balm, cinnamon basil, hollyhock and other plants and vegetables for our front yard too. I wish I could just snap my fingers and have the plants/vegetables five feet taller and the fence engulfed with vines and roses. That's the fun and frustration with gardens..they take so much work, patience ..the analogy between gardens and raising a child are not lost on me:)

smelling dirt and plants

The new garden is on the side of our house and has pretty much been ignored as we have been focusing on our front yard for the past four years.. I think our next task will be to add grass and a swing for Andres to play on.

Anyhow I just wanted to share a few photos of what we've been up to ~ I probably won't show much more until the garden is blooming later this summer.

We added a new coat of candy apple red paint on the childs bench..this too will go in the garden

 

I found some time to dye a few samples of the tussah silk / doll hair along with some vegetable based material that someone recommended (thanks Natasha!). It's super soft (feels like the mohair on my Friedericy doll) but I can tell it'll be tricky to work with as fibers fly off fairly easy. The dyed hair dried into a wavy texture, which I like, but the color isn't very natural~I may have to experiment a little more with that. I have also sent away for more hair samples (brunette) as I would like to eliminate this extra step and spend my time on other parts of dollmaking. Hopefully I'll have a doll with hair to show in the next week or so:) Thanks to all who have given me tips (keep them coming)!

vegetable based material (left: natural , right:dyed (needs more brushing)