Down the rabbit hole....

Story of my life.... start one thing, remember another thing.  While looking for the other thing, discover a different, more interesting thing, which requires more things.  Repeat ad infinitum.

So.  With a renewed enthusiasm for my languishing miniature projects I set up my desk this morning to continue dressing some little dolls for La Mignonette.  Making umpteen sets of silk underwear and socks is very boring, compared to the delights of the actual costumes, so I tend to do them in batches. 

During a lull in knicker construction I thought I'd just have a look in my drawer of undressed dolls to see if I had a pair which would work as a Cinderella and Prince Charming and at the back of said drawer I came across these....

Back in the mists of time I made some of these dolls with holes in their hands and feet with the notion of making string puppets and marionettes.  I didn't make many because they were a bally nightmare... so many of the limbs cracked while putting tiny holes through the leather hard porcelain, or pinged off during soft cleaning, but these made it through the tortuous process.

Of course, after they'd been fired, china painted and strung, I put them in this tray in a drawer and promptly forgot all about them.  

Rediscovering them this morning I thought I'd make up a few to hang in La Mignonette then promptly remembered why they'd been languishing in a drawer for decades.  The control bar mechanism is fiendishly difficult to make in miniature.  

Now, I know what you're thinking.  Sandra, don't talk rubbish.  It's literally two bits of wood in a cross shape, with strings hanging off.  But hear me out.  It may LOOK simple, but it most definitely is not.  

First off.... the wood must be in scale with the doll.  Too thick and it would look ridiculous.  And making tiny holes for the 'strings' in thin, narrow wood is fraught with difficulty, similar to that of making tiny holes in the hands and feet of the porcelain dolls.

Then there's the string.  I have very fine thread which I use for sewing delicate silk costumes but it's too fine for the holes in the puppet's limbs.  Nylon jewellery thread might work but it doesn't 'flow' in very short lengths. I'll have to experiment and see what works.

If I can think through a solution for all of that, I also need to fashion a hook to hang the puppet up.

I can vaguely remember grappling with all the challenges when I first made the puppet dolls, and consigning them to the back of the drawer as I couldn't come up with something perfectly to scale which worked effectively.

See, this is what happens to me. All. The. Time.

So, once again, I've put the puppets aside.  Not back in the drawer where they'll likely languish for another 10 years... but ON MY DESK in my line of vision where they will taunt me with my ineffectual faffing over working out the control bar until I finally crack a workable solution.

Watch this space....