Medieval Gown colored in Yellow and Red

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The last time I got my mitts on this poor dress, I really made a hash of it, so, time to try again. I like it better when someone tells me what colors to use, though — it feels like a surprise I can enjoy, too. Sadly, I can’t ask Brian, or you would be seeing a muted turquoise/salmon pink medieval ensemble.

I’m curious about you all, and I don’t believe I’ve done this poll before. Mom and I call my readers “the paperdoll girls,” and I wonder if it’s about right. (Certainly I do have a couple of male readers — a minority to be sure, but I do!)

Contest winner!

Hannah guessed I was wearing blue nail polish with sparkles on top –that’s one tick over on the color wheel from the actual color, which is purple. But it did have the all-important element of “sparkles,” so she was the first to get the closest answer and she wins!

The color is this one, It’s Bouquet With Me. My nails aren’t that long, though. I would poke two little holes in my left hand with my pinkie and ring finger when I was drawing…

Congratulations, Hannah, let me know which black and white outfit you’d like me to color, and how! Do it within the next couple of hours and I might get it done by tonight…

Blue Mermaid Gown

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As you can see, I am really still just kind of playing around with colors at this point. After a paperdoll vacation, I have to — to borrow an image Brian uses frequently — swim around in color the same way Scrooge McDuck swims around in his gold coins.

As a matter of fact, maybe it’s time for a contest or two, so I have an excuse to just color for a while and don’t have to think about pesky form and fit. (I haven’t forgotten about my music contest, trust me, but those outfits are going to require some thought. Color is just there in my fingers somehow, waiting for me.)

Here’s an easy one, so someone will get it before noon tomorrow… What color nail polish am I wearing? Hint: it’s not just plain color. That is, you will need color + nail polish additive to win this one. (Color in general: I’m not looking for the cutesy little official color name or anything.) The winner gets to pick out any of my black and white outfits and tell me how they’d like it colored!
Rules as usual:
1) If you’ve already won this year, please don’t enter. (Music contest winners are OK to enter a black-and-white coloring contest though.)
2) One guess per person per day.
3) If no one gets the exact color by noon PST, August 27th, ’ll pick the closest guess.
4) People who happen to have a view of my fingers are prohibited. (That means you, dear!)

Flame Colored Gown

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This skirt is not intended to conform to the realities of fabric. Paperdolls 1, real life 0.

In any case, it reminds me of poor damned Linnetta, possibly because of the pale vermilion and sunburst yellow. (How impossible is that dress, too? Paperdolls 2, real life 0. Still one of my favorites, improbable or no.) In my imagination, she and her sisters are still bound to the Devil, and he’s never short of jobs for them. She can wear this, then, but I doubt it would give her much pleasure anymore.

Oops! I forgot to note down the colors I used for today’s dress, and yesterday’s too, and now the pencils are all put away… Let’s see — black, pale vermilion, poppy red, sunburst yellow, yellowed orange, cream, non-photo blue, Copenhagen blue, dark umber, bronze. I think. Forgive me, I am still out of practice…

Layered Green Gown

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My friend posted this poem to her Facebook page, and for some reason — perhaps all this recent practice in letting go — it has been on my mind as I gathered my paperdoll materials over the last couple of days.

You shouldn’t attach to one thing blindly.
You shouldn’t say “I can’t live without her.”
You just shouldn’t say it.
Because you can!
There’s no need to use such clichéd words.
……Don’t love too much, for example.
If she loves you less, your heart will break.
And usually, she loves you less than you love her anyway.
If you don’t love too much, you won’t hurt a lot.
Besides, if you don’t own much, you won’t be owned either..
You shouldn’t own the building you work in,
your table, your phone, your cards..
In fact, you shouldn’t even own your hands or legs.
You should act as if they are not yours.
Then, if you don’t have anything, you won’t be afraid to lose.
You should act as if you can live without them.
For example, there shouldn’t be much furniture in your home.
You should be able to walk around clumsily.
If you insist on having something,
You should own the points where rooftops join the skies.
You should own the sky.
The sun, the moon, the stars…
For example, the northern star should be your star.
You should say “It is mine!”
If you really want something of your own,
Rainbows should be yours, for example.
If you really want to belong to something, you should belong to colors
To orange or to pink, for example.
Or you should belong to paradise.
You should live without owning much,
And not belonging to a great deal,
As if life will slip away from your hands any minute,
And as if it will be yours forever.
You should live attached to life,
Hanging onto its edge…

Can Yücel (1926-1999)

I do not think I could take the first piece of advice, whether or not it’s true; I’m too intense. But at those times when I pay for it in melancholy, it helps to belong to green. Could I be of any other color? What of you, I wonder?

Well, as you see, I’m back, or at least I will try to be! After I get out of practice, it can be difficult to draw anything, and I still feel a sort of residual stress from all that’s been going on over the past couple of months. (I tend to be a pretty upbeat person, but my temperamental moods are proportionately bad, and it gets hard to draw when I’m out of sorts. My state of mind definitely corresponds to my paperdolling proficiency.) Don’t worry about me, though: I’m very happy in my new home. I’ll write more about it soon.

A short update!

Hello everyone! Thank you for your patience during my move. Things have been going very well so far — the cats were fine on the plane, all of our stuff made it across the country and we’ve already found an apartment. So far, the worst that has happened is that I packed my shampoo in my suitcase without closing the top properly, but even the annoyance from that was very well contained; with something like that as our biggest problem, I think we’ve been extraordinarily lucky indeed!

We are still getting the new apartment set up, and I have a hard time concentrating on anything while I feel so unsettled, but as things come together, I find myself wondering which box I packed my pencil sharpener in… Be patient with me a little while longer, and I hope to be drawing again by next week!