skullduggery

A couple of weeks ago my friend Yvon invited me over to her place to make papier mache skulls for Halloween. Sounded good to me: I like to make a mess, uh, 'create art', and I'm more likely to finish a project like this if I'm working with someone else. Are you like that too?
Using an ornament of Yvon's as a reference, we made our skulls out of the usual papier mache materials: newspaper, wallpaper paste and a balloon - no need for a tutorial. The 'jaw' on mine was made by cutting two narrow trapezoid shapes out of a cardboard box, shaping each into a 'U' and taping them to the knotted end of the balloon. We used book tape, which is good because you can reposition it - but only if you shut your eyes, wince and pull the tape off the balloon very slowly.
Did I mention there was cake and beer at Yvon's? There was cake and beer. Anyway, after a few layers of paper and a few days spent drying out in the hot water cupboard (the skull, that is - I only had the one drink), here is the finished product.

Alas, poor Yorick! I glued him, Horatio.

When I say 'finished'... I probably won't end up sanding the little bumps out of Yorick and haven't decided how/if I'll paint him. The pastel colours of the newspaper are pretty nice. Although I do have glitter and glow-in-the-dark Mod Podge at home...

To read Yvon's post about her finished Skully and the spectacular cardboard haunted house she just made, go here. And for answers to the questions you probably have about the birds on my head, go here.

art deco

Louise from the great Twenty Cent Mixture blog is holding another handmade Christmas Ornament Swap. I participated in the first one last year and really enjoyed it. I received about half a dozen cool handmade ornaments, all different and all lovely. Plus it's always so nice to get mystery presents in the mail!
This was my contribution, fabric pompoms/pompons.  Each of them was escorted to their new home by an R.W. Scissors ninja gift tag (for security).

The last day to sign up is this Friday (the 6th), so if you're keen check out the Flickr pool and then take a look here for instructions. I've already signed up... now what to make?!

the handmade's tale II

 Photo borrowed from buyolympia.com.

I am emerging from my cave to tell you the great documentary Handmade Nation I saw back in August is now out on dvd! It's available from Amazon or buyolympia.com (WARNING: Both sites - especially Buy Olympia  - are extremely addictive and should be approached with caution).  The dvd is in NTSC format, but region-free, which makes it potentially less annoying than some international dvd purchases. I'll be ordering it as soon as my next handful of magic beans appears in the old bank account.

snooze

 Barbara Harris (rules) in Freaky Friday (1976)

There are lots of new crafty things going on around the town so I've plenty to read and write about, but instead I'm going to take a short break from blogland - a week or so maybe.  As some of you guys know, I'm very run down at the moment and therefore a bit prone to rambling. Obviously this doesn't make for great reading or conversation! I'm sure my tweets and tales of insomnia must be a big yawn (pun intended) for everyone who has been subjected to them. Anyway, R.W. Scissors will continue to run in the background and normal programming will resume shortly!

it's toasted

Just wanted to show you all the clever new purse I bought from the lovely Karen of Luxford St on Sunday.  It's toast! 

Total genius, I love it.  Now where's my coffee?

updato

Anyway, I'll tell you all what I know you really want to hear about - the potatoes!  21 days after the cages were set up, they looked like this:

Lots of lovely lush green growth!... which unfortunately had to be covered up immediately with more dirt and more straw.  The idea is that the potato plant stems are kept in the dark so they will set tubers and also so the spuds themselves won't turn green and therefore inedible (sunlight is what makes them green - that's why you store them in the kitchen pantry).  This is also the reason behind the 'nests' - the potatoes are only planted in the centre of the cages because if they were planted right to the edges any potatoes growing there would be spoiled by the sun.

I heaped another layer each of dirt and pea straw to cover the new growth, pushing it down to fill any big air pockets around the stalks.  The leaves don't have to be covered, just the stalks.  Now the nests look more like filled cakes or hamburgers.  Mmm, cakes and hamburgers...

r.w. huh?

I had marginally better sales at Kraftbomb yesterday than at the last couple of markets - still nothing near what I was making last year though. (In case you were wondering, the response to the goofy pink cards was one of - mild interest.  One sale. Thanks Heleen!)

With summer - and dare I say it, Christmas - approaching things should pick up, but by how much?  In the winter months I accept that slower market sales are par for the course - there aren't any major holidays in the middle of the year, and customers understandably don't want to leave the house in bad weather unless they have to.

Several months of extremely low sales for R.W. Scissors at Devonport Craft Market was very depressing, though.  It got to the point where I was losing money. Sitting at my table while people walked past peering and frowning at my matchboxes and confetti - or occasionally even saying things like, "A dollar for a box of matches! That's too much!", or even "What a waste of books!" (I got that one a few times) - was bad for my little ego.  Hecklers I can handle, but a bunch of them combined with no money was, well, horrible.  I made the decision not to sell at DCM anymore, except for the odd market here and there.  Please note: I'm not saying anything bad about the organisers or the market itself at all.  But the people of Devonport spoke, and what they said was 'thanks but no thanks' to R.W. Scissors.

I make a huge variety of things as R.W. Scissors: confetti, gift tags, printed cards, collaged cards, earrings, rings, necklaces, covered matchboxes, notepads, Christmas decorations, bookmarks, badges, brooches, fridge magnets... and other things I may have forgotten about.  I like making all kinds of things.  I've had several people ask me if I'm part of a collective, because they find it hard to believe one person could make so much stuff!  Maybe that works against me - my 'signature' if I have one is perhaps harder to discern than someone with a smaller variety of products.

Because nothing I make usually costs more than $20 (the average is more like $5), that also makes it difficult to make a lot of money... but I never had any trouble before.  That might sound egotistical, but it's true.  There was never the feeling before that people thought my work was total crap.

People do have less money to spend these days and I'm not the only crafty person experiencing low or patchy sales, but combined with a rejection from another market (which admittedly wasn't one I expected would like me), it has me wondering:  am I out of favour with the general public?  Are my salad days of big-small money at every market over?  It does make me wonder what the heck I'm doing wrong.