New Doll....

I am incredibly excited... for the first time in over a year I bought myself a new doll. Having a red headed Gene standing here in her undies staring at me is slowly motivating me to dig out my closets again and play with patterns & fabric and slowly start putting things back online. My Advanced Discourse class is inspiring me to write again and I am updating all my blogs and may even tackle updating some small portions of my website as time allows.

Hopefully soon... very soon I'll have a new outfit to show off... if not for a doll then for myself as I am really itching to sew and craft once more.

Birthday Sale...

My daughter turns 6 and my website turns 3 officially so I have posted a Buy one Get one FREE sale on my Special Sales page. The sale is November 30th and December 1st!
Check it out!
Sue Darby ~ www.suestinycostumes.com
View My Blog ~ www.suestinycostumes.blogspot.com
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Alaska State Fair 2005

This year I decided it was time to start entering the Alaska State Fair. I've entered multiple County and local fairs for handcrafted items over the years growing up but not at the state level. It was time and my hard work paid off this year in the form of a first place ribbon on one of my nicest items I've done yet... Little Bo Peep and her Sheep otherwise known as Kitty Collier and Tiny Betsy.

When I find some time I'll post the photos of them at the fair with their ribbon. The judge's comment on my form was "cute sheep girl" and I do have to admit Betsy is pretty cute!

Both patterns will appear in the Halloween Issue of International Doll Magazine as well as being available for download (purchase) on my site.

News

News

Well once again it's time I posted on this blog. I've accomplished a lot in the last few weeks. New patterns are nearing completion, my items are all automatically downloaded now through www.payloadz.com combined with www.paypal.com and I'm working on taking new photos of everything using the full size tripod and the lovely weather we're having this summer in Alaska.

Some of the new patterns are for Kitty Collier, Skipper, Harry Potter who shares a body with Kevin & a couple new miniature patterns (not shown yet).

Well that's it for now.

Sue Darby
www.suestinycostumes.com

Playing around...

I'm playing around with settings and things I can do with blogger as I plan on publishing some informative articles shortly.
I've also been writing up a list of goals for the rest of the summer in hopes that I can get everything accomplished before the fall and my college classes start. Among these goals are:

• Taking photos outdoors
• Updating all my patterns with my new address (done with patterns need to do books, lines and kits still)
  
• Setting up Payloadz to do the delivery of my patterns (once the books, lines & kits are in the database this will be nearly ready!)
  
• New patterns for Doll Magazine
• New patterns for the site
• Writing up at least an outline of the Computerized Drafting book & class series that has been playing around in my mind for a couple years now
• Figuring out how I can afford some new dolls to play with (justifing it since some of the dolls I have still need patterns!)
• Generating a new photo gallery of my work with better linking and descriptions for SEO purposes
  
• Adding valuable content to the individual pattern's pages
• Editing the last of my site for the main SEO work such as meta tags and alt tags
• Putting all these goals into my reminder programs so that it nags at me to keep on top of my projects and their due dates
• Writing up a possible list of class dates & times for the fall schedule of classes & courses so that it meshes with my college, kids and husband's college & work schedules with out conflicts
• Blogging like this far more frequently

Now that I've put these down in hardcopy I should be able to focus on them. Some new photos have been taken but need some work before they go live, product updates are happening but not quite complete yet and the schedule of classes will be posted shortly! So things are getting done it's just a matter of time.

--  Sue Darby ~ www.suestinycostumes.com Special Sale Going on NOW! View My Blog ~ www.suestinycostumes.blogspot.com Visit My Forum ~ www.suestinycostume.proboards34.com  Want to learn more about SEO for your Website free? http://www.gnc-web-creations.com/seo-optimization.htm

New Patterns and New Lessons

As I work here in my little studio I've discovered a few things.... testing in 'real fabric' vs muslin is an OK thing to do at least for larger dolls. My reasoning behind this is that if a pattern doesn't turn out just right for say Kitty the same pattern with minor modifications manages nicely to fit a smaller doll like Brenda Starr. Besides that the 'goofs' are perfect to give to my daughter to play with as she doesn't mind imperfections in my work that usually go with a first run through a pattern as I draft and redraft and sew and resew a project.
It's funny I start with a design for one doll and eventually I have the same design or a variation of it for 2 or more others as well. I just love designing and sewing for my dolls.

On dolls and scales and magazines....

One of the focuses of my business is dollhouse miniatures.... to answer the questions on scale you have several scales that are popular or gaining popularity.

1" or 1/12 scale is the most common with tons of Yahoogroups for it and other online forums including Small Stuff Digest which is where I got my start... large international list for nothing but miniatures (not just 1" scale tho)

1/2" or 1/24 scale is smaller and has gained popularity in the last couple years as the 1" scale people run out of space for minis This is a niche market that has a growing base... not saying 1" scale is on it's way out just that 1/2" is growing in popularity due to the main body of crafters being retired or *my* elders (I'm not yet 30) and on space and money budgets that are shrinking.

1/4 scale is also popular but I'm not up on it much but I can say it is extremely tiny ... if you've ever seen the original 80's Poly Pockets those come close to the correct scale or a Z scale train is right. This is considered a dollhouse scale for inside a 1" dollhouse!

On the larger end of the scale is 1/6 scale which is Barbie and the number of adult collectors wishing there were more things for her that weren't Barbie Pink has a huge base. Then there's the Tonner and larger 15-18" fashion dolls that would dearly love more items including houses and such for their dolls.

As for places to learn about miniatures or dolls.....Ashdown Inc produces Doll Magazine (I'm a correspondent....Pattern columnist- unpaid except for exposure), and American Miniaturist (used to subscribe and adored it but budget had to give somewhere)

Jones Publishing and Scott Publications produce Doll Crafter, Miniature Collector, Dolls, Doll Costuming and a whole host of other magazines that deal with various subjects within the doll or miniature world. (Don't ask me which publishing company publishes which I just know that those are the 3 big magazine producers)

I've been into dolls since 1988 when my mom started her doll business. I have been seriously into collector dolls and miniatures for about the last 2 years.

I should also add in something about reborns, repainters and art dolls... there are lots of those out there too who redo, repaint or sculpt their own dolls that need and use props... you might just have a niche in one of these catagories.

Sue

www.suestinycostumes.com

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