Jena's Class~Hair rooting pictures

Was it ever a long day yesterday! Poor Jena was exhausted!
She is a trooper though.

Before Jena and I got started on our second day of rooting yesterday, we glossed the limbs so that they would be ready for when we had a bit of time to put the body together.

Here is Jena with fine precision as she glossed her Bella's nails:

And then it was back to rooting.
Some of these pictures were taken on the first day of rooting and some yesterday, on the second.

I really struggle teaching how to root. There are so many components to rooting; so many variables that it is hard for me to tell my student exactly what it is that is needed to make that needle grab the hair. Plus, I am left handed where as most of my students are right, Jena included.

But after many words and physical examples, she was able to root her baby! (Well okay, most of it! She rooted the sides and most of the top and Grandma ended up rooting the back for her. She was just worn out and we are running out of time.

After the sides were rooted:

She has got the directional rooting method down!

Now the sides and top is finished! Of course the hair is too long for little Bella right now, she will get a trim later.

Just this much left! I rooted the back during the length of one movie. I sure wish my guy would root that quick! LOL The difference is that a larger needle and thicker hair is being used on Bella and a smaller and finer baby kid hair is being used on Gus. He remains undone. I am around to the backside on him though.

Jena wanted to take my picture with Gus in progress. YIKES! I actually turned my $800 camera over to a 9 yr old?!?!? LOL She took a good, clear picture though!

So sometime after 10:30 pm, after Bella was all rooted and trimmed (I failed to take a picture of the rooted but untrimmed hair) I taught Jena to root lashes. Wow, she was a real pro! She took her time and inserted the lashes with exceptional precision, making sure there were no gaps. She rooted about one half of an eye and I finished due to the time.

Looks like she did better with that $800 camera than I did! I should have had the flash on this late at night and the pic looked clear to my tired eyes~until I downloaded it. You can get the general idea though.

Today is the most exciting part! Bella will get her little lips glossed~and a few other gloss details on her face~and while that dries, we will finish putting the body together. We started that last night while the hair sealer was drying a bit so that we could handle the head to insert magnets for a paci and a bow and back the nostrils. She was amazed at how lifelike the nostrils became after the felt was inserted behind them.

Bella will become a "baby" today. Jena has had several squeamish reactions during the "birth" of her little girl. The first one that about put her on the floor was drilling the nostrils open on the first day!

The rooting did not bother her, I guess since she has practice rooted before, but when I showed her how to root the lashes, that make her all tingly inside. She would say things like: "You are poking a baby's eye!" and I would respond that this is a piece of vinyl...it is not a "baby" just yet. I guess that helped her get through!

What special memories we will have!

I will do my best to blog tomorrow with pictures of the finished Bella~and partially finished Gus, but I can't promise. I will have to be on the way taking Jena home tomorrow and we must visit my mother en route so an early start is needed.

Hugs!