As promised, here’s the pattern from my latest doll.

Last modified February 2013.

For some strange reason the .png file wouldn’t show up right, even though the doll saved in the same format showed up just fine. Saving the pattern as a .gif seems to have fixed the problem.

Have fun!

AZ Dawn

Wow, it’s been a while! But here I am, still kicking and as productive as ever.

Initially this doll’s bathing suit was supposed to be based on a diglett (I was playing around with Seventh Sanctum’s Pop Fashion generator), but trust me to mess up something as simple as brown with a pink oval. Still, the brown looked pretty good, so I ditched the diglett idea and just made a suit with a fairly simple pattern.

Base from Kawaii Hannah. Last modified March 7, 2013.

As you can see, I changed the color scheme from brown and pink to brown and blue. The hair has one of my few successful attempts at a decent side part.

For some reason, I didn’t have a pattern on my hard drive that went well with this particular bathing suit, so I made my own. I’d like to post it here, but unfortunately, it’s only showing up as a mostly black square. I’ll fix the problem as soon as I can and either add the pattern here or put it in a separate post.

See you later, everybody!

AZ Dawn

Long time, no post, but now I come bearing content! First, here’s one of my attempts at a variation of the Album Game (not my first attempt, but very timely). Yes, it’s adoptable.

Group Name

Album Title

Original Picture

The title makes sense if you imagine washing up for Christmas dinner and seeing Santa guest towels and cute little soaps by the sink.

That’s not the only goodie I have for you. There’s also a new section in the links: Graphics Links. Right now it’s mostly tutorial sites, but more links will be added later.

Merry Christmas to my Christian readers, and to my non-Christian readers, may this be a great time of year for you, too.

AZ Dawn

My fellow dollers, Xandorra’s Place and the Gathering are both gone.   I guess Xandorra’s contract finally expired; all that’s left are This Site Has Been Suspended pages. You can still get most of her bases at her PixiStar account, but except for the adoptions others have made, her dolls are no longer online.

I’m sad.

Good luck, Xandorra. We’ll miss you

AZ Dawn

The dolls in this post are for adoption only! Do not use in avatars, signatures, or layouts. The only exception is the second doll. Please read the rules on my content for more details. Thank you.

In memory of the Gathering, I’ve search my old CD-RWs, flash drives, etc. for old forum challenge entries. Most of these are very old and not very good, but I’ve put them here for historical and nostalgic purposes.

First up is from the first Dress Up Ball I entered. The theme: you in the future.

Base from Josie’s Dollz. Last modified October 17, 2004?

I was inspired by a sci-fi cliché that roughly states “Everyone on postapocalyptic Earth dresses like heavy metal musicians.”  Mind you, I’m a lot more optimistic about the world’s future than that.   It just sounded like a fun thing to try. In retrospect, I should’ve used a reference that looked more stereotypically metal than an 80s Motley Crue pic.

This next doll was for a Before and After challenge. I believe the Before doll was made long before I was a member of TG.

Base from Precious Pixels KH. Last modified December 26, 2004.

I’ve sure come a long way since both those dolls!  And yet, the After doll was an improvement. I’ve lost the original file for the Before doll; I’ll let you judge whether or not that’s a good thing.

This doll almost didn’t happen. The theme of this Dress Up Ball was absinthe, which at the time was reputed to be dangerous and definitely was illegal in the US. I was reluctant to enter an absinthe-themed contest, but someone pointed out it didn’t have to enter a pro-absinthe doll. And so the Green Reaper was born.

Base by Xandorra. Last modified February 27, 2005.

I originally planned to show me pouring a bottle of absinthe on the ground, but I couldn’t get the bottle, the stream, or the puddle right. Okay, so I couldn’t get the scythe right, either, but you can’t have a reaper costume without one.

This doll was an entry for a cowboy-themed Dress Up Ball. I felt semi-obliged to enter this one because, hey, I’m AZ Dawn, and hadn’t yet made a Western doll.

Base from Eleni Aranelwa. Last modified March 28, 2005.

Disclaimer: I don’t know how to play guitar, and while my singing voice isn’t bad, it’s not all that great, either.

This doll is especially noteworthy in that it’s one of my rare non-prep dolls that I made the face myself. The less said about the rest of the doll, the better.  A couple of months later, I went back and redid the folds on the jeans. It was an improvement, but not by much.

Base from Eleni Aranelwa. Last modified May 13, 2005.

This next doll was for a pirate-themed Dress Up Ball. Me as Red Dawn was my first pirate doll.

Base from Wayuki’s Place. Last modified July 31, 2006.

Not the fanciest outfit, but not everyone can be a captain. That and my poor frill-drawing skills kept it simple. It’s pretty good for an older doll, though that knife kind of stinks.

Of course, these aren’t the only challenges I entered at the Gathering. Here’s a list of posts with my other TG challenge dolls:

Warrior, Masquerade, and Red Carpet Dress Ups.

The Fragrance Challenge (3rd Place!)

Superhero Dress Up Ball.

Your Pet as a Human.

The One-Color Challenge.

The Black and Orange Challenge.

The Metallics Challenge.

Bad Hair Challenge.

The last one, sadly.

The Gathering still lingers sadly on until Xandorra’s contract with the hosting company ends, but the memories of its heyday are happy.

AZ Dawn

Who says I died?  Can’t say I’ve been super-prolific this year, but I’ve made three dolls already. Sadly, one really stinks and another needs serious work before it can be put here, so I only have one doll to show.

Base from Kawaii Hannah. Last Modified: February 10, 2012.

Nice and simple, isn’t she? I think the best part of her is the shirt.

Hopefully I’ll post again soon with more stuff. Until then, stay cool and hydrated.

AZ Dawn

P.S. Happy Memorial Day!

It looks like I’m going to have another one of those years, but things aren’t all bad. For instance, the GIMP developers have finally released GIMP 2.8 for Windows! Seriously, I’ve been patiently waiting for this version ever since when I heard it had a single window mode. No more having part of your work covered up by the Layers or the Tools menus.  It has some other changes that sound pretty good as well.

Now the question is, should I download it now or should I wait for a couple of bug fixes first?

AZ Dawn

Sad news in the dolling world: The Gathering is closing. No definite time has been announced, but the forum’s pretty much dead.

I’ve been a member of the Gathering since 2004; it was the first forum I joined. My reason for joining was to get critique for my dolls, but being there helped me in other ways that I never expected. TG gave me practice interacting online, and while I’m still not exactly a social butterfly, I gained the courage to join other forums on other subjects. If it hadn’t been for TG, I might’ve been too shy to create the Brainchildren!

I’ll never find another doll forum like the Gathering, no matter how long I doll. Farewell TG, and good luck Xandorra and my fellow members.

AZ Dawn

Last doll post of the year, folks! This doll’s from October, when dollers like to make Halloween themed dolls. I originally based this on a cat ballerina costume. When I changed the colors to my tastes, though, she started to look more like a Black-Eyed Susan.

Base from Apitchou. Last modified October 31, 2011.

Goodbye, kitty; hello, flower girl!

Now that she’s a Black-Eyed Susan, she seem more like a springtime doll than a Halloween doll, which, of course, is just fine.

Happy New Year, everyone! (And a very good one, I hope.)

AZ Dawn

I’ve got some non-doll graphics for you: avatars. There’s not many, but perhaps you might find what’s here useful.

I’m a member of a few forums that only allow 80 x 80 or smaller avatars, and being at a loss as to what to doll for an av, I looked around the web for something premade to use in the meantime. Not only are 80×80 avs hard to find, many of them were on sites I’d fear to link back to for credit.   I saw a need for avatars of that size from sites you would let your kids visit, so I looked for some tuts and gave it a try.

All photos are from morgueFile. The grunge brush is from Digital Goodies. I’ll link to the tuts I used near the avatars I used them on.

Iguanas. Last modified October 6, 2010.

This av was made using this Vintage Effect tut minus the last step because the picture was red enough without it.

Last modified October 6, 2010.

Same photo, but I used this Orton Effect tut instead. A bit more cheery than the reddish one, don’t you think?

Chameleon. Last modified October 8, 2010.

For this one I used this tut for Making a Photo Grungy. Unfortunately, what works at large sizes doesn’t always work at smaller sizes, so I had to supplement it with a grunge brush and layer modes.

Coyote. Last modified December 28, 2010.

This is another one I did with Orton effect tut; definitely works better with brighter colors.

A silly setter. Last modified December 28, 2010.

Made using this Black and White Vintage tut. This is the best of the five, I think; simple and crisp.

The rules for these avatars are slightly different from most of my graphics. Credit is still required, of course, but in cases where linking is not possible, credit can be giving by saying something like, “I got this from The Brainchildren,” if someone asks where you got that spiffy avatar.

Also, you may change the size of these avatars if necessary. Indeed, depending on where you use them, you might not have a choice! No other changes are allowed. If you want to do anything more, go to the morgueFile and get the original photos. Who knows, with skill and the right tuts, you might be able to make a better avatar than me! Or at least one more to your own tastes.

AZ Dawn