Remember Me? She is finally working on me! [WOYWW158]

Remember this little fella? Well I just had to get back to him...he's been calling and calling from there on the shelf where he was resting...and I was blocking him out. But now I am paying him the attention he needs. Here is where I am working today. On the floor in front of the window. Who knows why.

So the mold is very very dry and as light as a feather which is great. I found the old vaseline jar and chose an old brush as a dedicated vaseline applicator. I mixed up a batch of paste (flour and water) in a jar, greased the mold with vaseline (generous amount) and ripped up paper towelling into little flakes. Then I start applying the flakes of paper to the mold. I pick up a flake with the brush (this is NOT the dedicated vaseline brush) bristles and lay it in to the mold. Then I dip into the paste with the brush and then go in and press down very firmly so that the paper which is now quite wet will be firmly pasted to the mold and when it dries it will shrink and also have taken the shape of the mold quite well. I just keep applying the flakes overlapping them and then when the whole mold is covered I repeat what I just did and sometimes will use paper towelling of a different shade so I can see where I am going. Then I'll go in a do a third layer of stronger paper (newsprint) and basically just build up a deep layer of paper. That is the first step really, of using the mold.

I'm using a flour and water paste with this head but sometimes I add a drop of bleach because my thinking is, is that the bleach will deter bugs from eating the dried paper mache. Bugs LOVE dried paper mixed with a flour/water batter. Mice also LOVE it. Here is what has happened in the past, to one of my lovelies. Oh the horror of it all!

Here is Gay, all dressed in her finery and ready for the butterfly ball!

You can see her fine butterfly wings ready to dazzle the party goers when she makes her entrance to the ball.

But once the mice got finished with her, her nose was partly missing and there were all kinds of nibbles on her head.

And her butterfly wings were in ruin! A tragedy.

Thanks for dropping in, and we'll be seeing you soon, I hope! To see more work desks from artists all over the place hop on over to the fabulous Julia's blog Stamping Ground, to get linked up. Have fun everyone!! *smiles* Norma

POSTSCRIPT [later in the day] I finished filling in the mold with wet paper flakes and they dried and when I pulled them loose from the mold here is what I have now:

Dried paper shell ready to be pulled from the mold:

The pieces have been pulled from the mold and set aside. I've laid them out on top of what is left of the paper towel (from McDonalds) so you can see how little paper there is: Here's a close up of his face. Isn't he handsome? The two paper pieces coaxed together. See how the registration bumps come in to play? Be still my beating heart you are a handsome one!

I'll be continuing to work on this fella and will show you as I do!! Stay tuned...