In which guest blogger Persephone gets a semi-extreme makeover...

You guys remember me, right? John's sister? That's me on the right with him and Caroline, right after I came here to help him investigate the whole Dr. West mess.

I know I haven't been around that much. I've been settling in - it is really great to have a home home, not live in an office that serves as home. John and I are still working with Miskatonic, of course, but on a freelance basis now. Paranormal work is too interesting to give up, but, like John, I'm liking not having to travel all the time. As well as liking having my future sisters-in-law Caroline and Val to hang out with. (No, John hasn't asked her yet, but Shel, his sweetiepie John-John and I think it's just a matter of a very short time....)

But there was the issue of how that Bishop woman had made me.

You see, John and I were her prototypes - we were supposed to be the Kuddle Family Twins, "Katie" and "Kaleb" Kuddles. Eeek. However, we didn't quite turn out as planned. I think "monsters" was more or less how she described us. (That's a compliment coming from either Lady Gaga or Caroline's Monster High friends, but not from her.) And well - let's just say that ripping off other people's patterns as her own was more her forte than actually making her own patterns. I was cobbled together from a resized Patti Culea pattern, an elinor peace bailey pattern nicked from a magazine and a Barbara Schoenhoff pattern. Sort of like Frankenstein's creature. The end result was that my arms weren't properly put on, so they were too long and looked like a gorilla's (or maybe Arthur Jermyn's,) my legs were too short and I didn't fit into much of anything in the way of doll clothes. (I also didn't need to hear her saying "Oh Lordy, I sewed its face on upside down! It looks like a dog!" For one thing, don't call me "it"...) I'm really no fonder of that Bishop woman than the Creature was of Frankenstein....okay, yeah, as Shel put it. I have issues, I guess. I will admit she did a better job on my brother. At least he's of somewhat normal proportions.

Anyway, enough of my complaining. Meet the new, improved me...

Slimmer, so I can easily wear the same size clothes as the other small dolls. My arms are now sewn on correctly, so they're no longer down to my knees. And my legs are now in correct proportion to my body. Makes it a lot easier getting around. And my hair is even redone, courtesy of Maddy and the always-awesome John-John Kilburne. I don't need to tie it down to make it stay in place anymore.

I like this....


Maddy's note - Percy was in fact intended to be a toddler, but her name was to be Pearl. She was going to be the little girl John-John and Shel adopt from China in a story I'm writing. However, she really didn't turn out like a small child. And those were indeed the three patterns I studied trying to make my first more-or-less original doll pattern, although I ended up sketching out the various parts myself because I needed to change arm and leg poses and resize her head to suit myself. However, I did indeed make all of the above mistakes - her arms were out of position, which made them too long, her legs were too short and she needed to be slimmer to wear clothes sized for the Hitty and Little Mo dolls. And the yarn I used for her hair was coming apart. I also really did sew her face onto the back of her head upside down, although a few quick stitches and snips (to sew up the old neck hole and cut a new one) fixed that. And I love the widow's peak she has now.

She's also the prototype for Caroline, Val, John Ashton Smith and the other small dolls. Only after I was waiting for the arrival of Hitty Jade (my GW girl) did it occur to me to measure Percy and see how tall she was. She was exactly six and a half inches tall. Kismet?