blue

Blue Gown with Gold Trim

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Hello! See, I promised I would stay alive long enough to start drawing again.

To those of you who are still checking in on this page, thank you for your patience! I’m not too sure what things are going to look like, so I’m not necessarily going to go back to the old schedule just yet, but I am going to try to get back into the drawing habit. Please don’t rush to suggest things that I should draw, it will tire me out ^^;;

For those of you who aren’t already reading it, I wanted to highlight the awesome paper doll blog Paper Thin Personas. RLC has been drawing some wonderful, varied sets lately, as well as showing us what her sketches look like, and seeing an update pop up in my RSS reader never fails to make me smile. (She’s also been posting regularly, I could stand to take some lessons!)

I’ll write more another day, but for now please enjoy this blue gown. I suppose it’s a little nightgown-ish, but at least it’s better than the previous dress I posted. (You can really tell when I’m well and truly sick of drawing, I’m afraid.)

Blue and White Gown, and a Vacation Announcement

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Well, I may as well make it official… I haven’t really felt inspired to draw for some time now, and I have some other projects that I’ve been really into lately, so I’m going to take a bit of a paperdoll vacation. I’ll post if I happen to feel like drawing something, but I won’t stick to a schedule. I’ll come back, because I always do, but I couldn’t say when; I am thinking probably within a couple of months.

If you’re wondering if I’m still alive, your best bet is to check my Twitter feed. (But I don’t lead a dangerous life, so there’s no need to worry!) Thank you all for your patience with me, and check back in a while!

Queens of the Sea #10: Striped Shirt and Vest for Mary Read

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Welcome to day ten of the Queens of the Sea series, part of the Random Magic Pirates book tour! Here is the mini-bio for today’s pirate, provided again by Lyrika:

Mary Read: The Last Woman Standing

Mary Read was an English pirate and contemporary of pirate Anne Bonny. She’d spent her early days as a soldier and innkeeper, and her character was marked by bravery and resoluteness, as this snippet of a story from her short but tumultuous life illustrates:

An occurrence soon happened that put the attachment of Mary to a severe trial. Her lover having quarrelled with one of the crew, they agreed to fight a duel on shore.

Mary was all anxiety for the fate of her lover, and she manifested a greater concern for the preservation of his life than that of her own; but she could not entertain the idea that he could refuse to fight, and so be esteemed a coward.

Accordingly she quarrelled with the man who challenged her lover, and called him to the field two hours before his appointment with her lover, engaged him with sword and pistol, and laid him dead at her feet. (From: The Pirates Own Book (1837), by Charles Ellms)

She was one of only three people standing to defend the ship she sailed on when Captain Jonathan Barnet’s crew attacked in an October 1720 battle. Mary Read, Anne Bonny and an unnamed seaman fought off the pirate hunters, while the rest of the crew remained in the hold.

The battle ended in the capture of the ship, Revenge, and all her crew; Mary and Anne were both imprisoned and Anne’s lover, Jack ‘Calico Jack’ Rackham was hanged. Anne vanished from historical records and her final fate is a mystery, but Mary died of a fever.

I like the contrast here between her tattered striped shirt and that spiffy black and silver vest – the intended implication is that the vest is, shall we say, a new acquisition.

Take my poll and let’s choose the Queens of the Queens of the Sea! They’ll both expire on the 28th, but I’m not sure when, so if they’re not closed by noon PST on the 28th, that’s when I’ll pick the winners.

poll by twiigs.com

poll by twiigs.com

The contests will be open until May 27th, 11:59 PM Pacific time. So if you haven’t entered, today and tomorrow are your last chance! Click here for the chance to win an original drawing, for those of you who can give me an address if you win, and click here for the chance to design a pirate outfit, open to everyone!

Check out the tour schedule here! And for more information about Random Magic, here’s the trailer for the book.

Also, check out the Rum + Plunder treasure hunt for more pirate prizes!

Queens of the Sea #7: Pirate Costume for Unknown Pirate Captain

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Click for larger version (PNG); click for PDF version. Click here for the list of dolls.

Welcome to day seven of the Queens of the Sea series, part of the Random Magic Pirates book tour! Here is the mini-bio for today’s pirate, provided again by Lyrika:

Unknown French pirate captain: The Mystery Captain

Jamaica Rose and Michael MacLeod relate the tale of a mystery pirate captain in their book, The Book of Pirates

In 1805, an American who was held prisoner in Cuba reported on a French privateer vessel, La Baugourt. He said the ship had a crew of one hundred, ‘commanded by a woman.’ This is about all that is known of this unnamed captain.

This anecdote might’ve easily been dismissed as just a fanciful tale, if not for the fact that there is, indeed, a mention of the activity of French privateers at that time — and this very ship — included in a volume of The Mariner’s Mirror, a quarterly bulletin printed by the Society for Nautical Research.

I have been trying to stay at least true to the spirit of the historical periods, and to think “well, someone in this century would have worn this, not that” or “if someone was just a regular sailor she wouldn’t be swanning around in a fancy coat, right?” or “no, somehow, I get the feeling hot pants were never actually part of most female pirates’ wardrobe.” But if this mysterious pirate captain may have never existed, I feel a little more free to give her a costume that never existed! Well, it’s not the most unreasonable pirate costume I’ve ever seen…

By the way, I’m scheduled to have another paper doll up tomorrow, but I’ll be out of town, so I’m going to try to do two over the weekend instead.

Don’t forget to enter my contests! Click here for the chance to win an original drawing, for those of you who can give me an address if you win, and click here for the chance to design a pirate outfit, open to everyone!

Check out the tour schedule here! And for more information about Random Magic, here’s the trailer for the book.

Also, check out the Rum + Plunder treasure hunt for more pirate prizes!

There is still time to join my crew… Take the poll!

poll by twiigs.com