Studio Update: January 11

This week has been all over the place.

I've entered this weird, transitional phase of studio life, thanks to my decision to attend two back-to-back performance shows in March. So in addition to the current orders I'm working on, I have a lot of work to do for myself to try and get a head start on improving my performance entries, rather than waiting until the week before the shows and throwing everything together (which I've definitely never done before...). 

Naturally, now that I have so much legitimate work to get done, I decided it was time to try micro scale tack. 

That adventure lasted about an hour, before I decided that micro is way, way too small for me. However, it sure made Stablemate tack seem large and manageable!

I also...

...realized it's high time to order new stirrups, and apparently make a side saddle!

At Sweet Onion Live last summer, I drooled over Leah Koerper's incredible mini scale dolls, and resolved to one day have little riders of my own. This has been quite the adventure. 

First, I decided to give a whack at just sculpting a doll entirely from scratch...

...but sculpting is hard, and I was really frustrated with her leg-to-saddle ratio. I'm keeping her around, but I think if I'm going to go that route, I either need to make her larger or make a smaller saddle to fit her. Ugh.

Frustrated with that, I took a hacksaw to one of my plastic dolls and tried to alter her into the kind of position I'm going for. She's really, really rough right now, but I think this is headed in the right direction?

Her arms need a lot of help!

With all this work on dolls, though, I'm feeling torn: On one hand, I think a doll could really help my performance entries look more complete and put-together, and give them an extra edge they need. On the other hand, I'm terrified of unknowingly having a doll with slightly incorrect positioning or not perfectly fitting the tack, and having it hurt my otherwise good entry. Non-articulated dolls are definitely hit-or-miss in that if there's something fundamentally wrong with her, I can't just adjust it later!

I'm totally open to constructive criticism at this point- what do you think? Keep going and adjusting her, or just leave her off altogether and play it safe?