Angora's Mohair Scalp

Last night I put on a bootleg series CD of Bob Dylan and finished re-rooting Angora Lee’s scalp. The 1/4 ounce of “brown sugar” mohair I ordered last week came in Saturday. It’s a bit lighter than the “Wild Spirit” hair she has but it really isn’t a big deal at this point. It really is just the rim of her scalp near the front. The length of wefts were also much shorter than the “Wild Spirit” but I expected that. This mohair wasn’t really meant for Blythes but I didn’t want to buy too much more hair when I wouldn’t be using all of it and Mohairhouse didn’t have small amounts on sale in the length I would have liked.

At first it wasn’t going that well. I couldn’t figure out why until I looked at the other end and realized I had picked up on the wrong side and my neat little loop hook was staring at me like an idiot. Once I took my crotchet hook out and switched to that side, the rest of the re-root went smoothly, hook, through loop through loop. I’m really interested in trying this new  “knot” method for mohair re-roots I’ve been hearing about and seen one tutorial about on flickr. It sounds easy and a lot faster perhaps that the lock and loop method.  As far as I understand, you still separate out the hair in strips and pulls them through the scalp holes, but instead of connecting them inside the scalp, you ties a knot inside so that it stays and repeat.

As for Angora, I glued her mohair scalp down on her dome last night with some craft tacky glue. I really was not careful about keeping the flanges in tact when I took her scalp off so I’m not sure the scalp will connect completely all around the dome. We’ll see. I’m a bit anxious but I’m not taking the bands off until tomorrow. I want to make sure, it’s good and secure. I did this with Reya’s scalp as well which was really shoddily done. I mean her hair looks nice on the outside but the inside is a mess. But her scalp has been on and stayed on perfectly for the last year or so. I can’t wait to see Angora whole. It’s been months!

Angora Lee Preview

I have only about a row and a half to go. The closer I get to finishing, the longer it seems to be taking, But I plan on finishing by the weekend at least.  And you know what? I would definitely do this again. I really like the way it's turning out a lot. And I think next time I will use the mohair more sparingly then  did this time. I think I could have had a lot more left over if I hadn't stared off with such thick plugs. Even thin plug, once they dry are nice and fluffy and all together they make nice thick tufts of full rows of hair.

I haven't decided what to do with Angora's lips but I want them to be simple, sweet and magical. I will be looking at the customs and reaching out with questions as to the best medium to use for lip painting. And yes, when she is done, I will be selling her. I need to support my habit people.

Licca Brown!!!!

It worked!!  I could kind of tell just from the smoothness of the original unpainted texture that it might take the paint successfully. What I have noticed so far, is that of the legs of the body are already sticky, such as the Takaras normally are, chances are the spray finish is going to be sticky as well. I guess it also helps that I sanded this one as much as I could to prep it. I also washed  it with soap and water and let it dry first as instructed by Jaszmades site.  So I'm a little hopeful now, that second Licca body may work out as well although the legs on that one are more of a velvety smooth texture. I noticed that one of them says China on the back and the other says Japan. Perhaps the manufacturing is different because of this. The other one is a whiter body. The one above was more pinkish.

 Originally, I wanted this body to go to Angora Lee, the Black Blythe with the gold lids and mohair re-root that I plan on selling but there are a few little flaws in the body you can't see from this picture; lightness in the upper right shoulder, a small nick in the lower torso, nothing really noticeable and nothing I can't touch up but I don't know, I might feel weird putting it on the market. I may give this one to Neige whose Takara body is just a wreck. I'll have to see how the second Licca body custom goes this weekend. The re-root is coming along by the way. But the closer I get to finishing, the slower I seem to be moving. I'm trying to stretch the mohair I have left by using smaller sets of plugs which seems to be working. I also feel like I'm really getting a feel for the rhythm of the way a scalp re-root is supposed  to be done. 

I have suffered some minor damage doing this, but damage nonetheless. In the beginning, I was stabbing the heck out of my left index finger with the crotchet needle whenever I would pass it through the inside of each hole to pick up a hair plug. I was literally gouging out a crater in my finger for a few weeks. And the index finger on my right hand suffered burns from dragging the needle on it while pushing the head through the holes on the inside of the scalp. Now though, I've developed a nice and easy system where I can find the holes and push through slowly without piercing my finger every time and still keep up a nice flowing pace. At this point, I've probably built up protective callouses anyway. LOL!!  I cannot wait for it to be over. I just wanna see how it will look already! It's so much hair!