Small Progress Steps on the Japanese Vignette and More Poppies

The first transom window for the Japanese Vignette was made using instructions (measurements in centimeters) from the Japanese book, but it looked terrible; far too small and silly.

The proportions are wrong, but time was involved in putting it together so I decided to do a slight alteration in order to make it look better. However, before doing that, I found my missing poppy kit on Tuesday, and decided to put that together. It was finished this afternoon, and turned out to be a Little Goodies kit from years back, that someone had given me. The technique is different, using beads to shape the centre of the plant, and the petals and leaves both had these cunning little circles at their bases, which you had to pierce and thread up the flower stems.

The paper is very thin, and reminds me of old-fashioned cigarette papers; no, I didn't smoke the bad stuff, but in post-war The Netherlands, my uncles and older male cousins all rolled their own ciggies! The kit was supposed to make 9 flowers, but there were enough petals for ll - I dug into my bead stash to find suitable beads for the centres. These will be quite a bit shorter when they are actually planted, of course. Although I am not sure this type of poppy would have been grown in medicinal gardens, my story is that the gardener is attempting to hybridize oriental poppies with wild poppies....

This is the new transom window; oh my, the Sailor Scouts have landed! Are they checking out if my Japanese house is a proper Japanese house? (The figures were on the kitchen counter, where I took the vignette for better light to photograph it, and I thought they looked quite nice in it - they actually belong to my daughter.) With the addition of two beams, the transom window looks much more in proportion.

Maybe I shouldn't have used the Sailor Scouts; once the vignette is finished, who is to say the Sailor Moon action figures might not decide to move in? The scale is pretty good, isn't it? In case you are not familiar with these figures, they come with removable faces (ugh!) with various expressions, and I believe there are also extra hands and things, along with their weapons, of course. The stands are articulated, and allow them to "float" in the air.

Next project to finish off is my medieval merchant; he just needs his shoulder seams and sleeves set into his robe, and his wig and beard, but that is better done by daylight and after a good night's rest.