Art Paperdolls...'Lydia, Oh Lydia'

Ooooooooh...

Lydia, oh Lydia,

Have you met Lydia,

Lydia The Tattooed Lady.

She has eyes that folks adore so,

And a torso, even more so.

Oh Lydia oh Lydia,

Say have you met Lydia,

Oh Lydia the Tattooed Lady,

When her muscles start relaxin,

Up the hill comes Andrew Jackson.

I just love the idea of 'Upstairs Downstairs' & the secrets of servants

of the Victorian era. 'Albert Nobbs' was a wonderful movie from last

years Academy Award season, that tragically told this tale. Lydia's

story isn't quite so sad...she simply ran away from home as a young

girl & joined the circus. After a tiring day of duty & service to her

wealthy employers, she goes to her tiny room, locking the door

behind her. She takes her uniform off & sitting on the edge of her

bed, she takes out her few treasured mementos. She looks into

the mirror at her tattoos & is transported to faraway places

& a life of adventure. I wonder why Lydia had to quit

the circus & become a maid?? I have my ideas... ;)

Lydia can be found HERE on my ETSY for $5.00!!!

XOXO

vintagesusie

Art Paperdolls...'There Was A Little Girl'

Happy November 1st Sweeties!!!

Well, I've made a rash decision...

I'm bypassing Thanksgiving & going straight into Christmas.

Enough pumpkins for me, I'm READY for Pine Trees & Pine Cones.

Merry Christmas Friends!!

{I know, don't die hard people like me just make you sick, lol}

AnyWho...

Here's another little friend I've made to add to my

Art Paperdoll Collage Sheet Collection,

'There Was A Little Girl, Who Had A Little Curl'. Isn't she a doll?

She's my 'NOT so well behaved' lady's daughter & she loves

dolls too! You can find her at my ETSY Shop for $5.00.

You will receive a digital download to your computer,

ready for you to print as many as you'd like.

More FUN to Come, I'm just SURE of it!!!

XOXO

vintagesusie

I LOVE Art Paperdolls...'Well Behaved Women'

Greetings Friends...

I don't know about you, but I LOVE paperdolls!!!

I have ever since I was a child. I couldn't wait for my Mommy's

McCalls magazine to come in the mail every month, so I could get

the one page I ADORED...Betsy McCall.

Over the years, I have made my own Art Paperdolls & sold them at

my shop or given them as gifts. I LOVE giving my dolls as a card

rather then a traditional card. I think a card is looked at, appreciated,

saved for a couple of weeks & then tossed, where a paperdoll is

enjoyed, displayed & considered as a work of art.

{my finished doll}

This Christmas I decided I'm going to make paperdolls for my family &

loved ones & use them as the gift tag. Believe it or not, a lot of digital

work goes into making these little Sweeties! Searching the internet for

just the right images, sizing & coloring all the images, days spent on

Photoshop getting everything as perfect as possible, for ONE doll. 

{havin a little bubbly, while undressing...naughty}

This Naughty & Nice, Victorian Beauty is called...

'Well Behaved Women Rarely Make History'.

How very true, right & she turned out so darn CUTE!!!

Sooooooo, I thought maybe it would be fun to share my one of a kind

creations on ETSY for everyone to enjoy. These are fun & easy to make,

just like when you were a kid. Instead of cutting & pasting, this time

your cutting & brading!! {adding brads} LOL

I will be listing them on ETSY for $5.00 as I design them. You will

receive a digital download, that you can download right to your own

computer & print from home & then Let The Fun Begin!!!

Hope you like them...there will be many more to come.

XOXO

vintagesusie

Another Vintage Vacation & Vintage Trailer Restoration

Greetings From Southern Cali Sweeties,

I thought today I would share with you another one of our vintage trailer

adventures & let you see what goes into actually making it happen. It starts

with what you see above. When Robert brought this one home, I didn't quite

know what to to think. He had seen it on the side of the road for sale for $100

& couldn't pass it up. It is a hodge podge, the base is a 1950's pop~up tent

trailer & the top is a late 60's, early 70's Jay Bird camper shell. We both

agreed that it was so ugly, it was kinda cute...but what to do with it??

The inside of the camper was actually pretty roomy,  the length was plenty long enough

to comfortably lay down in. But it wasn't tall enough, you couldn't sit up in it. So

I started thinking, why don't we restore it & make it into an easy pull down

the road for a one or two night camping adventure. All the little

light bulbs in our heads started going off. ;)

I know to NORMAL people, this wouldn't even kind of be an acceptable trailer

to camp in. But, we have restored & camped in a vintage tear~drop trailer which

is actually a little smaller then this, so this was not an impossible idea. My main

concern was that it needed to be taller on the inside, so we could comfortably

be able to sit up & watch TV, play games, read, etc. Thus Robert began

to work his Vintage Trailer Mojo!!

First, he lifted the camper section off the base & added 18" of redwood

to gain some height.. He insulated, reinforced, sealed & waterproofed

EVERYTHING. That's just the way he ROLLS!!! lol

We love to use AQUA on our vintage trailers, it's so cheerful, so we couldn't

wait to get the outside to start looking like what we pictured it to be. And

over the course of several weeks, with Robert working all day & coming

home only to work until the wee hours on our trailer, our hodge

podge piece of coal, started to shine like a little diamond.

Drum Roll Please...

here is the end result of my man's hard labor...isn't she adorable?

His attention to detail is always awesome, like the steel corner covers

& the metal, aqua designs.

I love the original little Jay Bird decal!!!

We knew we would need a little kitchen of some kind & thinking

about the kitchen design of a teardrop trailer, Robert

added this cool, compact, back kitchen.

It literally has everything you could need, including an outside shower!

My part of this project, as with all our vintage trailer projects, is helping

with the overall design & putting together the interiors.

OK...I was SOOOOO excited when I went to Target & found this retro set

of dishes on sale!!! A BUCK a piece, plastic, travel themed...BINGO!!!

I made the curtains out of some really cute retro material I found at our

little local TG&Y type store. The inside fabric has travel signs &

city names & the backside is a rusty atomic design. Note... I go

NOWHERE without a flatscreen TV & DVD player ,

that's the way I ROLL! lol

Robert made all the wonderful detail in the trailer! The vintage inspired

magazine rack, the shelves, the light which he drilled holes in some

metal to create the shade. It casts such a cool light!

A few of my fun little additions...

I adore this little vintage thermometer. It's been in so many of our vintage

trailers, I couldn't even count. I know we have bought, restored, sold

& kept over probably 50 vintage trailers in the past 10 years.

CRAZY, I KNOW!!

So here we are, heading out on our maiden voyage with our little gypsy caravan.

We took our grandson Kai for an overnighter, to Calico Ghost Town

for their Halloween Haunt. We went last year & had so much fun,

we HAD to go back again this year!

We had a fabulous time, but were disappointed because the wind was

howling at about 30 MPH & the dust was blowin like a

sandstorm in the desert, so we couldn't set everything

up the way we wanted. But NO WORRIES...

cuz Kai never even noticed & had the time of his life just kickin

back & roastin marshmallows in his skeleton PJ's.

Life is GOOD!!! ;)

Oh...PS: Guess what's sitting outside our house as we speak??
Our new, old, 17' 1959 Jewel Travel Trailer,
the adventure CONTINUES!!

Hope you enjoyed our simple Vintage Vacation...

XOXO

vintagesusie