Moving to Taiwan

Yep, Chris, Frankie and I are moving to Taiwan. I was offered a great opportunity there in my existing firm, and we jumped at the idea of a new city. Because, truthfully, Beijing is a hard place to be. The pollution is unbearable, the crimes and rules against dogs are inhumane, and the commute to downtown is soul sucking.

So we are pulling up roots again (twice in two years) and starting over in Taipei. I am quite excited about living in Taiwan. First, it is not Beijing (did I mention that already?!). Second, it is very tropical with blue skies and beautiful natural scenery - mountains, lakes, and cliffs. Third, the people are incredibly friendly and maintain all of the traditional Chinese traditions which are sadly lost in modern China. Fourth, the food is outstanding.

The only major downside that I can see is that everything is twice as expensive as in China. You don't believe me? The same IKEA couch costs roughly US$400 to 500 in China (depending on the cover) and US$1,000 in Taiwan (see pgs 36-37, upper right corner). Purchasing power parity, my ass. Looks like Chris and I need to do some serious furniture shopping in China in the next month before the movers come.

OK, another downside is that dogs cannot be imported directly from China to Taiwan. That means that Frankie has to go back to the United States for six months before he can come to Taipei. Then he has three weeks of quarantine before he can and join us. What am I going to do without my sweet puppy for six months? The thought alone makes me tear up.


And what about the adoption, you ask? Well, we can move to Taiwan without jeopardizing our expedited status, but we do have to update our homestudy. Which means a new social worker visit, more paperwork, new police clearances in Taiwan, etc. Our LID is November 24, so that means we will probably get our referral in mid-Dec or early January. We move in mid-October, so we have just enough time to update everything and pick her up. Just.

So pray for us - or think of us, if that works better for you - as we go through all of this change in the next few months. Frankie, Gioia, Chris and I will need all of the support we can get.

798

Beijing's 798 art district is a renovated factory area just outside of the fourth ring road. This place used to be remote, relatively speaking, but the creep of urban expansion has now encased it within the city proper. Originally, this area was a place where artists found cheap studio space within the crumbling walls of abandoned factory floors. Now it is closer to a community of gallery and restaurant owners, who are better positioned to pay the high rents and allow the commercialization that comes with popularity.

Art, especially political art, is hard to show and sell here. Some of China's best known artists work and exhibit only outside of China. But, times are changing, and either the government is getting more tolerant (mmm... not likely) or the global art community is looking for future potential. Either way, the buzz is that China's art is hot, full of burgeoning artists who are talented, if not controversial.


Chris and I toured the 798 space today. It was my birthday outing, and we had a really nice time popping in and out of gallery after gallery with concrete floors and whitewashed walls.

I think this is a definite "to-do" area in Beijing, once you have dispensed with the ubiquitous wall. The art was enjoyable. I particularly like big art - big sculptures, big canvases, big bronzes - and 798 did not disappoint. I was surprised by all of the military themed work exhibited. However, nothing really struck me as being cutting edge or bohemian. I guess you still need to go to New York to see controversial Chinese art, which is unfortunate.

Clearly, this is a nice community space, which will hopefully encourage Chinese artists to grow and test their boundaries as the scene here matures. I just hope the graffiti gets more sophisticated soon.


More 798 pictures here and here.

Child's Placket Sweater

Chocolate is modeling a new baby sweater knit from a pattern in Last Minute Knitted Gifts. The original pattern was published with so many errors that they released a full corrected version online.

I used Knitpicks' Shine Worsted yarn in a luscious pumpkin orange (really 23809 "sunflower"). Alas, the pictures here do not quite do the color justice. This is a size 1-2 years, knit on size seven circulars and DPNs. I wound up using 3.5 balls, instead of 3, so it may be a little big. Looks proportional, though, so it should fit Miss G at some point in her life.


Overall, very cute. Raglan sleeves are easy-peasy. Who knew?

It is a good thing that Chocolate is an excellent sport about all of this modeling. Some boys get quite touchy about having their picture taken.

The DMZ

Guess what we did last weekend? Yup. We visited the Korean demilitarized zone, aka the DMZ. Did you know that this still active, cold war memorial doubles as a tourist attraction? Yes, in between the land mine signs, the barbed wire, and the barely prepubescent soldiers rumble busloads of tourists.


Our tour took us 73 meters underground to a tunnel dug by the North Koreans. This particular tunnel was blasted out by political prisoners of Kim Il-sung. It goes underneath the 38th parallel and down towards Seoul. The South Korean Government officially admits that there are four tunnels, but unofficially there are 10 or so.

So what do you do when your tour of the Commie tunnel is over? Why go to the DMZ souvenir shop, of course!


More Korea pictures are available here.

Hair and Faces

Elisa is working on a baby from my rag doll tutorial. (How fun is that!?) She reminded me that I was going to post later about hair, but never did. Elisa also asked a great question about embroidering faces. So, while this post will not be a true hair and face tutorial, perhaps it will be enough to help Elisa finish her baby.

Making the Face

Question: Why isn't the face embroidered first, before the doll is sewn and stuffed?

Answer: Well, you can do it that way too, if you like. But the advantage of adding the face after the stuffing is that you can tailor the face to the 3D shape of the stuffed doll. A flat face is different from a round/oval/curved face. What looks good in 2D may look weird in 3D.


You have many options in finishing your face. The easiest method is to add buttons for eyes, as my husband did with Tiddley above. Of course this is not a good idea for a doll destined for a child under three. You can also use felt shapes to make eyes, cheeks and other features. Mimi does felt faces exceptionally well. She sometimes uses scrapbooking tools to cut out the perfect shapes - like circles cut in half for eyes - and then appliques them to the face with a blanket/buttonhole stitch or something similar.

You can paint the face. You can embroider it. Or you can be minimalistic and leave the face blank, like I did here. This part really is all up to your imagination.

To embroider the face, you will first make a knot in the embroidery thread and then insert the needle from the back of the head, through the stuffing and out to the front. Embroider the eyes using your choice of stitches - satin, outline, anything. When you are finished, put the needle back through the head and create an ending knot on the other side. For Waldorf doll heads, you will need a 5" or longer doll needle for this step, because the head is really thick. But for the rag doll, you can use a regular needle because the head can be squished enough to send the needle through and out the other side without losing it inside the doll.

Making the Hair

Now, the reason that you can embroider the face from the back of the head is that the knots will be covered up by the hair. Hair can be made of many things, actually, like yarn, cloth strips and felt. Many people attach hair by hand sewing each piece to the head, while some people glue it down. I really like using yarn for hair, and I prefer to sew the pieces down. But that is just me.

Each hairstyle is different and requires special methods. For Miss Tiddley's hair, Chris threaded an upholstery needle (with a big eye) with the actual yarn used for the hair. He sewed the strands directly into the head along the crown, and then tied it back into a ponytail. This was quite quick and easy. Here is a link to a tutorial for a similar hair attachment method.

One of my recent hair favorites (one with no picture - alas!) was a Raggedy Ann-esque style with pieces that stuck out crazily all over the head. This method was really labor intensive, as each strand had to be hand tacked down with sewing thread. With one long piece of yarn, I created row after row of long loops. Each loop was sewn to the head twice: once with the thread looping around the yarn and into the head, and once with the thread through the yarn and then into the head for security. Then I snipped all of the loops open to create a wild, loose style.


This little doll's hair was sewn down at the crown (piece by piece) and then looped back to the ponytail area where it was gathered into a bunch.

One of the best resources I have found for doll hairstyles is "Making Waldorf Dolls" by Maricristin Sealey. Pricey book, but maybe you can find it at your local library for free.

Elisa, I look forward to seeing your finished baby. Good luck!

Sorry, We Cannot Change Coins

One of the downsides of traveling a lot is that you get stuck with a bunch of foreign coins. Money changers will not take them, so you often find yourself wandering around an airport going... Hmmmm, What can I buy for 40 Baht? Often, the answer is nothing. Then you take the 40 Baht home in your pocket thinking that you will just spend it when you come back. Except you forget to bring it back next time, and instead the money piles up in a forlorn jar in the kitchen.

I went through our jar last week and sorted all of the coins. We have some crazy coins in there. For example, we have coins from monetary regimes that no longer exist, such as French Francs and Austrian Groschen. We have Mexican Pesos and Israeli Scheckels. Now, we haven't been to these countries in years, which means that we must have moved to China with all of these ridiculous coins.

I have now sorted all of the coins into very fancy plastic red cups. I guess the thought is that we can grab the cup o' coins next time we travel to that country. But it really seems futile. And the cups are ugly.

Perhaps a better idea is to just lug them on my next Cathay Pacific flight and donate them all to the Change for Good Program. Although that requires forethought as well. Sigh.

Anybody wanna Peso?

Sundresses

A few weeks ago, I discovered that there are tons of vintage children's sewing patterns on eBay. Yes, I know. Where have I been? Well, once I figured it out, I went a little crazy and bought a bunch.

I bought some single patterns and one large lot of several unknown patterns. When I sorted through the lot, I realized that I had one pattern which was nearly identical to another one purchased singly. They were different sizes, thank goodness, but the basic pattern was pretty much unchanged in the two versions.

I made one outfit from each pattern on Sunday. Both came with a pattern for bloomers that have elastic at the legs and waistband. The pattern(s) says to measure the child's waist and leg circumference and then add 2 inches to get the appropriate length of elastic. Since I have no child to measure yet, the final bloomer steps will have to be done later. This is a difficult thing. You want to do lots and lots of stuff to prepare for the coming of the kiddo, but certain things just cannot be done ahead of time.

The picture at the top of this post is of a size 1 outfit made from the Simplicity 5052 pattern, which was published in 1972. The bloomers will be much poofier and gathered once the elastic is inserted. For now, however, we must all just use our imagination to see the cute bubble bottom that will be. Look at the fabulous cross-over straps in the back.


This size 2 outfit was made from Simplicity 8537, which was published in 1978. Basically the same pattern, but with an optional scalloped hem.


I guess those peeps at Simplicity knew how to "leverage" well.

Mimi's Doll Workshop

When I traveled to the States a few weeks ago, I had the great luck to be able to run to Boston for one of Mimi's doll workshops. It was such a lovely day. There were eight of us learning, and we all had a blast digging through Mimi's scraps of wool and ribbon and deciding which baby to make. Her studio is incredible, filled with all of these amazing cloth dolls from her earlier dollmaking periods and lots of works in progress.

Earlier that day, I had a conversation with Chris about the workshop. I told him that, for me at least, the workshop was really a chance to learn some new techniques and to see and be inspired by Mimi's work. Chris said - No way! You are there to make and come home with a new baby! Indeed, I was. Chris was very pleased to see me arrive back in Beijing with the swaddled baby pictured above.

It was a great time. If you are near to Boston, I encourage you to stop in for her next workshop, whenever that may be.

An Early Birthday Gift

A few months ago, my mom called to say that she had found some adorable Japanese dolls at an antique market. "But I cannot figure out who I could buy them for..." she said. Luckily I was there to suggest a very worthy person who was having a birthday in August. Me, that is.


I finally got to see them when I visited the rents two weeks ago. These dolls are so very tiny and delicate. Unbelievable craftmanship. They seem to be made of wood and fabric, with removable heads.

I decided not to take them home with me just yet because I was afraid they would get damaged in transit. It was probably a wise decision, as my dad kept hinting that I needed to let them stay for a while. And that I would be able to take possession of my birthday gift when they pass away. Nature or nurture, I am not sure which, but it is clear we all come from the same mold.

New(er) Babies

When I was in Atlanta last week, my mom and I pulled out a number of her old childhood dolls from the attic. Some of them need desperate repairs - one poor baby has no arms at all - while others just needed a good scrub. Almost none of them have clothes that have survived. I took the baby floating in the picture above home. Once I have some free time, I can see about covering her chubby nakedness.

I think I would like to try to fix the two big dollies in the picture below. For sure I can replace their cloth bodies, which is the most obvious issue. More difficult will be the hair replacement on the one at the bottom left, which will probably require follicle transplants. Ha!


I found some interesting sources on doll repair, which I will have to look into once I get these kids to my house. Before I rip them apart, however, we need to take them to be appraised to make sure they aren't secretly valuable. There is not much chance of that, though. Cute as they are, these babies are not that old, were very well loved and seem to be pretty standard (i.e., probably many were made). Actually, I am rooting for "not valuable" so I can dig in and see what can be done to make them whole again and ready to be loved by a new generation.