The story of The Magician and The Growth Spurt can be found in the Fantasy pages here.

This was another UFO where all I needed to do was to bash an existing doll and basically glue things in place. I have had the magician figure for a few years; he was a Nutcracker Suite holiday figure, Mr. Drosselmeyer, that I purchased from The Smithsonian.

I removed all the trims, including the holly and red satin ribbon on his hat, the sort of furry cape and sleeve trims, the bells on his waistcoat, the gold trim on his black velvet coat, and the red ribbons on his legs.

Then I began altering. I repainted his eye to make it larger (and automatically less sinister), painted on a darker eyebrow, and repainted his lips to give him more of a benign smile. I also gave him a new slightly larger eyepatch over the painted one, by gluing on a small oval punched from black leather. I folded a piece of baby lace in half and glued it around his neck for his cravat, and repainted his hat and added a new band, using a piece of rusty-red leather lacing.

I wanted him standing so used my pick to insert FabriTac inside the folds of his robe to drape them properly

The birds were wedding doves from my stash; I painted them with glue and coated them with white flock.

I did the same thing with his white stockings and also repainted his shoes. I chose not to add anything further to his costume, as I wanted the emphasis to be on the accessories.

The playing cards tucked in his hatband and "fluttering" around on the ground were also in my stash, leftovers from a swap I did some years ago.

The base is cardboard, with a brown paint and Tacky glue mixture painted on, then a mixture of model railroad foam, bits of dried greenery and coffee grounds dirt added. The mossy bits here and there are from some greenery that I purchased from Bill Lankford in Chicago.

The rat was an after-Halloween purchase at a decorators warehouse which is open only seasonally nowadays. I just loved his sweet goofy look and although he was BIG I had to have him. It was pure serendipity that the two came together for this setting. I was looking for the doll I used in the Go To Sleep Little Ba-Be setting when I came across the rat, and I had just placed the Drosselmeyer figure in the bin with all my UFOs a few days before, and bingo!

The little rabbits have been in my stash for a long time. I have cut apart others like them in the past, but since I didn't want to have to do any more cutting than necesssary this time, I left them joined together. I did use my craft knife to cut away some of the excess along the edges.

What fun this was to do! These fond friends make me smile whenever I walk by.

I was so glad to learn that Anachronon had a brother!

NEXT: >>