Van Craig Presents: The Vantastiks "Roaring 20's Black Mama Santa"

Yesterday I found a brand new ornament/figurine that I immediately fell in love with. How could you not love something this absolutely JOYFUL?

I'd never heard of Van Craig before, or his ornaments, but after googling this ornament, I see the others he has done and they are just as awesome.

She was brand new, package never opened. I, of course, removed her right away. I absolutely adore her. She is painted resin.

But my perfectionist streak has issues with her. Although she is brand new, she isn't very well-decorated. The sculpt is perfect, but the decoration is bad. She is clearly the victim of rushed mass-production. To be blunt, she's a mess. But that is fine with me, because that means she's my new project! Her mask is a cardboard cutout that was glued over her eyes, as designed. The glue has not aged well, which is a good thing because that means it was easy to take off. I was very glad to find sculpted eyes behind the mask, not just a flat area. The eyes aren't painted, but that's easily remedied.

If I can get her eyes the way I want them, I will reattach the mask differently. I'll put it on a stick and have it as a hand-held mask, and not on the face. My idea is above, with the blue stick acting as what I would do with the mask as far as placement. To illustrate the kind of mask I am talking about, here is one:

It wouldn't be that color, though, it would be the original mask, just on a hand-held stick.

She has a tiny bump on her left cheek, which is great. I don't know if it is a production flaw or if it was meant to be there, but I am glad it is there because I am going to make that a beauty mark.

She's got a lot of lovely danglies all over, beads and parts of the wrap. Unfortunately, the rushed assembly shows, and these all need re-doing. The fur danglies have the aged/yellowed glue problem, and one of them doesn't sway due to the glue covering the metal posts it is hanging from. The beaded waist danglies look great, but the ribbon they're attached to isn't in great shape.

All in all, I am glad that she isn't 'perfect', because I really look forward to giving her a make-over.

It turns out that I own an ornament from this series that is from the Van Craig series. I bought it at another thrift store a few years ago, and am glad to know more about it now. Interestingly enough, I bought her March 20, 2013, one day shy of 3 weeks to the year that I found the one above.

Abalone Shell Pair

Tonight BFF and I went to a thrift store we hadn't been to before. I was very happy to find these two abalone shells. The larger one is almost a foot wide, making it probably the largest one I now own. I hadn't brought enough with me to buy them together, but the owner wanted them to stay together, so he was awesome enough to include the smaller one with the ten dollars price. They'll remain together as long as I'm alive.

As they were purchased:

After washing:

Though they came together, they are not a pair. Abalone shells do not have 2 matching parts, they are a one-shelled organism. They are like land snails - the shells are their backs, and they have their 'foot' that covers their open area. I found this out recently, having thought that the abalone shell might be like a clam shell, with two pieces.

(photo courtesy www.aquariumofpacific.org)

I found a fantastic article about the abalone that I highly recommend. Find it HERE.