Go Dog Go!!

A friend is involved with a greyhound rescue group in town and she put out a call to anyone who would like to donate something for their upcoming fundraiser.  Because this immediately pop into my head I knew that it had to be made.  There were a couple of challenging aspects that I had to work through, the first being that I wanted to create the dog by felting roving.  Sounded easy enough seeing that I have dabbled with needle felting on and off in the past.  Checked out Pinterest and a couple of YouTube videos and off I went.  While their greyhounds looked like greyhound, mine, or at least as much as I attempted,  did not.  Not to mention just how long I worked on this 3 inch by 2 inch dog.

That is not to say that at some point it may have resembled a dog of sorts but this was time sensitive and the actual want to continue down this path was quickly waining. So, per usual, I broke out the wire and had something that looked close enough to a greyhound in a short amount of time.

The next challenge was to have the dog being walked only by his leash, so this meant he would be floating instead of being attached to the swing bar.  Also, I was not sure if the weight of the suspended dog would upset the balance and not allow for spin.  It took a bit of finagling to get the dog leashed and stable, and I was thrilled to see that his weight did not topple the couple.  In other words, I did not have to reinforce the legs attached to the bar.

Due to the extra weight on the sculpture side, next time I will make the counter weight a bit larger.  I used my existing pattern for the moveable parts and was all set with added color, holes drilled and parts fitted.  Because I did not have the time nor the want to remake the parts, I had to slide the swing bar much more centered on the fulcrum to get the piece to freely spin.  It still looked in proportion, but next time I now know to think about counter weight when making these.  Also, as you can see in the picture, I had yet ( forgotten) to stabilize the swing rod so the dog was starting to walk down hill.  Another thing to remember, especially since it is a bit tricky drilling a hole and hammering in the tiny wooden dowel with the wire attached.

All in all the project went well.  My friend was happy and I learned a thing or two, so it was not time wasted, unlike with a few unfinished projects that haunt me on occasion.

The calendar says that fall is here and our temperatures are starting to drop (slightly), as well as the leaves. Trader Joe's have their shelves full of pumpkin everything...bread, pancakes, butter... (now, so do I). Tomorrow we are going to watch the movie Goonies (1985) in a cave with friends and end the afternoon rooting for our college team.  What a glorious Saturday!!

Saving all the laundry til Sunday!!

Peace,

Hilari

Scuppernongs, Muscadines, and Fuzzy Socks

A Little Taste of Heaven

These little explosions of taste always make my heart sing.  I never set out to purchase them so they are a grand surprise when I come across them. On this particular day I stopped roadside to pick up the last of the season's peaches but needless to say my cash on hand was quickly swapped for these beauties.  For those of you who have not had the pleasure of a scuppernong (green) or muscadine (purple) they are somewhat akin to a grape, but with a very thick peel.  The bigger they are the sweeter they become.  There is scuppernong jelly and muscadine wine but for me I like them cold straight from the fridge, just watch out for the seeds. 

 As I have been working on automata my pieces seem to be growing in size.  My latest piece, which I will share soon, is around 16 x 16 inches.  When I saw an incarnation of this I was intrigued by the size.  Not only was it small but the mechanism was predetermined as well so I had to see what I could do with these parameters.  After playing with the clothespin for a good while, open/close/open/close/ open/close, I came up with this man tipping his hat at the lady passing by.  It seemed easy enough, but as I have learned, not all is as it seems.  It took some finagling to get the hat to go up and down, which you would think would be easy since it should only go up and down. Due to the weight of the felted hat on top of the wire, the hat would wobble around in all directions. Guiding the wire up the back of the man to control the movement worked perfectly.  I added a free swinging purse to the lady's arm to give her a bit of personality, so when the clothespin is worked his hat goes up and down and her purse rocks about.  

This is the next addition to the clothespin series and he is by far one of my favorite pieces.  Unfortunately, the pictures do not do him justice.  Photography is not one of my strong suits, but I digress...When activated be becomes a great sword swallower.  To keep his sword in track I used a kid's juice box straw and felted his body around it.  Surprise, it worked!  I truly believe that if you don't know that something won't work, you will be surprised by what will.  I have others playing around in my head but other pieces are time sensitive so they will just have to play amongst themselves for awhile.

Our weather is giving us a taste of fall this weekend so I have gladly broken out the warm fuzzy socks.  I love my warm fuzzy socks.  Truly.

I live in a college town and we have our first game Monday night, Go VOLS!!!, NFL starts Thursday, fuzzy socks...I just don't know if I can handle much more.  Maybe some warm pumpkin bread dripping with butter...

Peace,

Hilari