Tree Peonies Are A-Blooming.

Sorry to everyone I owe a response to--I've been busy lately, and I'll get back to you shortly! It's hot and humid today. I normally dislike hot weather that accompanies spring and summer, but it's always fun to watch the flowers pop open. ^_^

Today, our Chinese peonies bloomed!

This one's called "Blue Butterfly." The flowers are huge--eight inches across!

( One More Peony. Cut for big picture. )

This one's "Green On White Jade Tower." It hasn't bloomed true-to-form since the first year; it's supposed to be crown-shaped, but for some reason it's anemone-flowered! It's still pretty, though. I wonder if it was corrupted by "Blue Butterfly?"

There are a lot of plants that are supposed to be "easy care" that we have a hard time growing, like oriental poppies, beach roses and globe thistle. We do exceptionally well with peonies, anemones and...::gasp:: clematis. Clematis grows like a freak in our yard with little care at all, especially the huge-flowered kind. It think it has to do with the clay content in our soil.

On the gaming front, I am attempting to earn the true ending in Atelier Elie. The game doesn't have as much fun stuff as Lilie but I like the setting more. I prefer Elie over the other heroines, too, because she's so plain that you have to feel sorry for her! Her schoolmates treat her like crap, even the supposed nice guy Nordis. Even if you have max friendship points with him, if you score higher than him on the yearly contest he sulks in his room with the lights off until Elie's main rival comforts him!

I'm still annoyed by the downward turn the series has taken over the past three years. Still, there's so much to do in the four games I like that I'll probably never need to buy another Atelier game again. I wonder if I'll replay Violet any time soon?

First One In A Long Time.

Kristen does most of the doll rooting and rerooting around here nowadays. A long time ago, I used to be quite productive in that area myself! When I look back at the myriad of custom dolls I've produced, I have a problem with most of their faces, but I think a lot of them have pretty good hair. I figured there was no reason why I couldn't reroot a Jenny doll for myself, rather than depending on the Rooting Boss for everything.

Nevertheless, I did have to ask her for help in the end...rerooting is a bit more complicated than rooting a blank head from scratch!

This doll was a Takara Calendar Girl Flora. She used to have short blond hair. She's been rerooted with RestoreDoll hair in Turquoise, and her body has been swapped out for a Pure Neemo Advance E. She'll eventually be Malta from the Sanrio movie The Legend of Sirius, as soon as I figure out how to do her antenna and wings. I'm not sure what I'm going to do about her clothes, though. Malta is supposed to be naked. I don't know how that would work with a display piece. Right now she's wearing the second outfit that came with Angelic Sigh III Lien.