Today is Friday May 16^th, and this year it is the long weekend in May. It’s time to start planting your gardens with the hope of no frost. here in Ottawa the Friday to Sunday is also CanGames (and felting) Convention I have shown you that before. Glenn will be playing board games, praubly those 18XX train games (older trains can rust, becoming useless and there is lots of math, how can that be fun?) there will be interesting games there such as the live action Kill Doctor Lucky or the chariot races! It also will be a good spot to work on felting or spinning. I may convert some gamers to fiber arts yet!! (i have tought a few to use a drop spindle in previous years.)  I am not sure I will be there the whole time, since I am still finding Mondays at the guild really tiring and am sore a few days afterwards. So now is the time I must decide on what I will work on this weekend.

You may have noticed last fall when the OVWSG had their 75^th anniversary retrospective Exhibition at the Mississippi Valley textile museum that one of my Mer’s was missing!!!

1.1-1.3) the Mer Family and Pets having fun while out at the Museum, Mr. Mer trying to get someone to play Tennis with him, Mrs. Mer is admiring her new hair, Shark boy playing with the pets Miss Manta and Sharkette.

Yes the teen Miss Mer has wondered off! I was sure she was in the project bag just behind me but no! She had cleverly replaced her project bag with another when I was not paying attention! Teenagers!!! So she had wondered off and did not get herself finished to go out and have fun with the family and their pets. I think she may be wondering the house, looking for a boyfriend,…..she is a teenager.  Since I have looked in all the obvious places I think she might try hiding, without success,  I have decided to move to plan 2, Make her a boyfriend. That should tempt her back to the office! That could be a good project to start at the convention.

If I were an arctic char based teen Mer-person, what sort of boyfriend would I like? well, personally if I was a Mer, I think I would look for a very dry fish,  maybe one of the really early land walking varieties? Luckily, I am not making this fishy-boyfriend for me. I did see a cool looking fish as I was researching the other Mer’s fishy bits. it was very big, sort of an extra-large more feisty version of a pike. What were they called? Stergons? Oh its spelt Sturgeons? I was close. Hum that has potential. The transition would be fun to consider, but Lots of fiddly details on a sturgeon, so may not be the best option for a busy convention.

2) Sturgeon, there are lots of types, and I would need to do more research to figure out which is which. The pattering is intriguing but very specific.

Since she is an arctic variety of fish-person, I should look at arctic options too. There are Inuit myths about sea people, there is the Qalupalik, who usually hunt children who stray too close to the water, catches and eat them. I am not sure that would work out well in the family dynamics of the Mers.

3.1) Qalupauk, who steel children who play too close to the water.

There is also Sedna the Sea Goddess, who has the head and torso of a woman and the tail of a fish. She created all the sea creatures the Inuit hunt.  I have only seen pictures of Qalupalik as women and a Goddess is also a woman so that would not be a boyfriend. Keep looking.

3.2) Sedna the Sea Goddess

Let’s keep thinking, Narwhals are interesting but the fish parts would not have the fabulous horn. There are Orca (Killer whales), they have very interesting colour patterning, that might work. Why is my brain yelling at me to look at the walrus? That’s not a fish! But that would make an interesting Mer.

4.1) Narwhal, it would be hard to tell from just the fishy parts that he is a narwhal without the horn.

4.2) orca, strong graphic patterning and it would be fun to integrate fish and body parts together.

4.3) walrus, ooh this might be fun, integrating shapes, but I am pretty sure that this is not a fish.

I think my best options to consider are Sturgeon and Orca. Both will need ether 12 or 14 gauge wire for most of the armature with finer for the hands, maybe an 18 or 20 steel floral wire. I have a bag of “Carded Core Wool Sliver” from World of Wool, now where did I put it. I will also need photo diagrams to work from.  I hope the printer likes my computer today. (nope, i will see if Glenn’s computer is deemed worthy of printing)

For creating the armature I will have to pack pliers & wire cutter, wire, a ruler, a finger length guide or Sara’s Digitwidget, the proportions for the armature (I have that written out somewhere….)maybe I should go back and look at Sara’s Felt-along It starts here: https://www.youtube.com/live/hljS4YRmz9w

I will modify the original armature to suet whichever fish body I go with. Glenn likes the killer whale, since its simple, elegant, and very classy.

Ok I have a plan, consulted Sara’s mermaid armature and just need to collect the tools and supplies to be ready for CanGames!  Once I have the armature made I will need to bring; a work surface, the extra tacky fabric glue (the type that dry’s clear for fingers), a selection of needles and the fake clover tools(helpful to make fins), then top colours for whichever fish shape I go with.

I am looking forward to the long weekend, but may have to enjoy it in pieces.  i hope you will join me for the parts i get to attend, maybe you will find a sheep related board game we can play? Have fun and keep felting!