Current Mood : Contemplative 

Well, I think I've come up with a new way to keep myself from buying more fabric. Remember all that satin I bought at a yard sale on Oct. 5th ? Well, it had a sort of musty scent, and the red bled on just about everything it touched...and if the newspaper it was wrapped around was any indication, it'd been sitting since 1967. Definitely needed at least a good rinse. Consulted my copy of More Fabric Savvy, found that it didn't need to be pre-washed if it wasn't going to get washed later. Well, still...I wanted to clean it, but the idea of cheap-serging that huge pile was less than appealing.

The book recommended a hand-wash in warm water with a mild soap. That I could do in the bathroom sink. So I did that today. What a back-breaker ! If I had to do that for all the fabric I bought, I'd have a lot less ! All the satin, except the red, left a light yellow color in the wash water. The red left a bright pink, so I tried various home color setting techniques. Lighter, but still pink. I'll just have to remember to line it.

 It took about an hour, just for the satin, but I got it all done. It was so pretty, hanging on the line. Even wrinkled as a shar-pei, it reflected glossy light around. Tossed it in the dryer for five minutes - it smells fresh and clean. Ready to use - once I iron it. It's still very crinkled ! None of the stains from contact with the red came out, but that's OK. Many of the "stains" are quite pretty.

Turns out ‘satin' isn't a fabric. It's a characteristic. You can have silk satin, rayon satin, or polyester satin. ‘Satin' refers to the way light reflects off it, the sheen it has, no matter what it's made from.

Got the rest of it - the thin yellow cotton at the core of one of the satin bundles, the variegated ‘star field' fabric, and the flannel pieces I bought Thursday - cheap serged and ready for the wash. It's all been hung out and brought in, so there's another basket-load of fabric I need to put away. I gotta quit buyin' this stuff !

Decided to try a coat of paint on the castle. Worked sort of well, sort of bad. Check it out on the ‘This Old Castle' page. Man, I have sooo much work to do on that thing, and it's maybe three feet from my new dollhouse...

I confess, I've lost quite a bit of my ‘drive' to finish the castle, now that the dollhouse is here.

Posted by dorriebelle at 10:55 PM CDT

Updated: Monday, 2 May 2011 10:16 AM CDT

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Current Mood : So Happy 

Man, you would not *believe* the effort it took for me to get the same green as what's used here on the ‘fridge' part of the Blog here. Tripod evidently has it trademarked or something. Couldn't cut/paste it. PaintShopPro's ‘Capture' feature worked on everything except the blog, and trying to match the color by eye simply didn't work. It was always just a shade or three off, and I started to brew up a headache from the effort.

Why did I want this exact color so bad ? Well, look again at Thursday's image for "mood". Last time you saw it, it didn't match so well. It was too light, and when I tried again, it was too dark. Now it looks less like a coloring page and more like a magnetic paper doll on the ‘fridge'. Which is what I wanted. It isn't so glaring as the ones before it. Sure, I could make the images a transparent .gif, but that takes a lot of time and detail. Frankly, I don't want to spend more than five or ten minutes on the coloring pages. It's fun, and I like doing it, but I don't wanna spend time on it I could use to sew or somesuch.

 I finally semi-cheated and went into the ‘change settings' feature and cut/pasted a preview image of the Fridge theme. After trying sooooo hard to make sure I couldn't do that on the actual blog, being able to on the image editor was enough to make me laugh out loud. Finally, I had my - well, actually Tripod's - well-guarded shade of green.

And today's image looks much better ! Well, yesterday I promised some belated big news. And here it is !

That's right. Yesterday afternoon, about 4pm, Beloved Hubby started my dollhouse ! He redrafted the pattern from Things to Make for Children (hmpft ! This dollhouse is for ME ! ), making it larger and more advanced. I'll have more photos up on the site Sunday or so. But isn't it fantastic ?!

I'll tell you a secret, too. The pattern in the book is not only wrong, it leaves off many key measurements. That's mostly why Beloved had to redraft it. They show the elevator (still to come) on the right side in the photo, but on the left in the design pattern. That throws a lot of stuff off. The roof patio's piece got cut incorrectly - the stairway's supposed to go the other way, back against the far side of the patio - but we put it on this way anyway. Then Beloved crafted this gorgeous spiral staircase to fit it. And I admit, it's my favorite part of the house so far. My dolls can 'climb' it perfectly.  

Up until he installed that, the patio was my favorite. Believe it or not, we had that Lucite used for the patio railing already. Aside from a half-inch sheet of plywood, we already had everything else. Still to come are windows (we'll have to buy another piece of Lucite), a boxlike waist-high elevator, a hardwood wall or two, trim to cover the raw edges, and cabinets. Yes, cabinets ! He free-handed several flat-out gorgeous cabinet doors from scraps of maple last night, and he wants to make more !

Am I the luckiest woman in the universe ? I think so ! I have full access to about 63 partially used cans of professional-quality paint, at least a dozen more of stains and finishes, so once it's done, I can decorate any way I want. I think it's the most beautiful dollhouse in the world - just imagine what it'll be like by the time Beloved's done !

I've mentioned that he should refine the plans and sell ‘em. He's definitely changed it from the original by more than 35% ! Tomorrow, I'll have to post an image of the original plans - he's really altered them for the better. I have to ask if anyone would *not* love to have that staircase in their doll play ?

(sigh) So happy...but I've about run out of things to want !

Posted by dorriebelle at 6:37 PM CDT

Updated: Monday, 2 May 2011 10:15 AM CDT

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Current Mood : Daydreaming and happy 

Oh, boy, was today a busy one ! Arranged to pick up flowers for Dearest Son's teacher - her birthday is Monday, and I think I'm the only one doing anything. Not that I mind, she's fantastic, and Beloved Hubby agrees with me. I'm just really surprised at how expensive flowers are. And I hope she likes them.

Went to the Shop after Dearest went to school and helped Beloved clean up. We swept up enough sawdust to make approximately four composition dolls. When I told him about how sawdust used to be an important component in doll manufacturing, before celluloid and plastic came around, he was intrigued, so I told him all I knew. Which took about two minutes, I'm not much into compo. Porcelain, either. I've read books and studied articles on all manner of materials that make up dolls, and even read Life Like Dolls - twice ! I own a copy. -  to try to understand why I don't like porcelain dolls, even the ones I made. I think it boils down to the fact that I don't enjoy fragile. If I have to worry about breaking it by breathing, I'm just not interested. If it's worth more than my car, even damaged, I'm not comfortable anywhere near it. In my life, dolls are durable. If they aren't, I don't care how beautiful they are, or even how well-made and original their clothes are, they put me right off. Plus, ‘collectable' porcelain dolls and their gushing advertising tends to skeeeve me right out. 

Plus, if you look under the ruffly, beribboned and belaced dresses, you usually see a cheap-fabric body with porcelain limbs and head. I've never been able to ‘get into' mixed body materials. Plastic and vinyl, sure. But even plastic limbs and soft stuffed-body styles don't intrigue me much. It's probably why I don't own an American Girl or clone doll. They interest me, and there's certainly enough fun props, prices are right, and clothes patterns are legion and cheap...but I just can't do it. If the doll was all-vinyl, I'd probably have at least two. I have no idea why I react this way - one of my favorite baby dolls as a kid was stuffed-and-soft-vinyl. But I just can't stand those now. It's weird.

Anyway. No offense to those who do enjoy, this is just sort of a semi-annual rambling. Look at it as a view from the other side. There's plenty of everything for pretty much everyone to like or dislike, for whatever bizarre  Freudian reasoning of their own. I just wish I understood why some things weird me out. Moving on...

There's a reason there's a bunch of mismatched shoes for today's ‘mood' image. When I bought that big bag o' Barbie furniture, there was the usual tiny things at the bottom. A few baby doll toys, the odd door or drawer, and the ubiquitous three or four solo Barbie shoes. I put them aside, figuring I'd go through the Pencil Box of Misfit Shoes sooner or later, see if I had any matches. Turns out I did - see the turquoise boots on the far right ? One was in the bag, one's been rolling around in the PBoMS for who knows how long. And goss knows how much I needed a new pair of turquoise boots...

But with my recent adventures in paint, I started to look at the PBoMS a bit closer. I always knew many inside would match, if their colors did. So I started to sort. 29 pairs. I actually found 32, but some were a perfect mold match, but were made of different materials - squishy vinyl versus hard plastic. Nope, if I was gonna spend the time and cash for paint, I was gonna make sure all the shoes fit, looked good, and were gonna look decently OK when I was done.

You probably noticed that some are tied together with spare thread. After squinting at a few thousand tiny pumps, and matching ‘em up one by one, I was not willing to do that again when it came time to paint. They're all going into a bag inside the PBoMS until I'm finished with the castle, and who knows how long that'll be. Besides, I'll put a hole in ‘em when I pin 'em down to a piece of cardboard to spray them, this way, I have a pre-drilled hole in a lot of ‘em.  

I tried to spray Fusion on doll shoes once before. It didn't work well, and three months later, still transferred paint to the doll's feet. And felt tacky and wet. Because I didn't read directions. Now I know to use light coats - I was really layin' it on heavy back then - and wipe ‘em down with paint thinner first. Didn't do that last time. I figure, if I use a base coat of Fusion first, I can paint ‘em with anything from Testors to nail polish once that base is dry. Which opens up a whole world of custom shoe colors !

Rest assured, when it comes time to do it, I'll make a page out of it ! One funny thing I found out. See the boots, second from the left on the back row ? Well, they're kind of hard to see, due to one boot having huge fabric pom-poms. It was part of ‘Baton Twirling Skipper' s issue outfit from 1992. The brown boot beside it came from a Tommy shoe and cowboy hat set, released in 2002. You can see the actual carded set here - http://www.manbehindthedoll.com/tomkc47625.htm . The pompom for Skippers boot is held on by a loop of plastic, part of the boot's mold. If I look closely at Tommy's, I can see where the loop was altered on the mold. Two odd indentations. Other than that, the boot's size and shape are identical.

What's kind of odd is not only are the uses ten years apart, but the Skipper boot is waaaay too big for Tommy. It goes up past his knees, and there's barely enough toe to his foot to keep the boot on ! They look clownishly large on him, too. While I can kind of applaud Mattel's recycling molds, Tommy already had shoes and boots that fit him better, so I'm not sure why they did it this way. Oh, well. The boots fit Aylene (R&D Susie), Honey (Bandai Cutey Honey), Fuu (Sega, Magic Knights Rayearth), Anya (Galoob, Anastasia), and the first-release Ariel from Tyco - kind of a younger sister to the Mattel Ariel sisters - so I'll probably paint them something neutral. So they can all wear 'em !

Believe it or not, there was more going on today, but this is long enough ! I'll catch you up tomorrow, ‘cause it's so exciting !

Posted by dorriebelle at 12:01 AM CDT

Updated: Monday, 2 May 2011 10:15 AM CDT

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Current Mood : Busy and Happy 

Lots of errands to run today. Nothin' good at the thrift store but a pair of Beloved Hubby-size jeans. Levis he can get paint all over and not feel bad about wrecking. I found some gorgeous variegated pink flannel - it has stars and moons on it. Also a lovely variegated green with planets, stars, and moons on it. So I bought a half yard of each. Yes, I don't need fabric. Yes, flannel's usually a PITA to work with. But I loved the fabric, and a half yard of each was pretty cheap. At least I didn't go for the dollar table's scratchy, stiff polyester, although the print was pretty.

Went to the Shop to test out the paint over the Fusion-coated can lid. Seems OK, but it was slightly tacky and soft to the touch. So I decided to let the Fusion sink in until Saturday, and I'll test again then. Kinda felt good to have a break for a day or two.

PayPal came through just before noon today - you may have noticed something. NO ADS !! Wheee ! I even did a quick test, and I can remote-link site images now. I had to use The Doll Page for that before, and a lot of cut/pasting. Tripod now takes my 12.2mg out of my 1GB, instead of letting that stay free, but heck. I got more space now than even I can use for quite some time, so I shouldn't whine.

Also started a photo album. I'm thinking of doing one for the dolls - posting a new image and bio a day for each one - and another for misc. doll photos and stuff. I haven't posted the link on the main site, since I'm still playing with it, but here it is, just for you - https://dorriebelle.tripod.com/dolls_of_my_life/  . It'll probably change considerably, and there'll probably be more than one soon, but it's best to learn while doing. So I did this chintzy one. I'd say ‘Enjoy', but I don't know if anyone can !

Posted by dorriebelle at 9:33 PM CDT

Updated: Monday, 2 May 2011 10:15 AM CDT

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Current Mood : Happily playful

Long time ago, I was a HUGE Garfield fan. Round about 1983. Long time ago. I had one each of the main characters in stuffed animal form - the $10. seated Garfield was first, of course, then a small Odie for Christmas, a markdown Pookie (bear) leftover from Valentine's Day, and Arlene as a high-school graduation gift from best bud Sandra. I got her a carnival-size stuffed unicorn. What can I say, we understood each other. In '84, I had my first Christmas tree, and it was all Garfield - paper ornaments cut from wrapping paper and glued to scrap cardboard, a few plastic figurines, and a Garfield Angel, complete with wings and a wand, again from a half-off sale the year before.

Years pass, and after dozens of orange-cat themed gifts, my attention started to wane. There was one toy I always wanted but never got. The very expensive ‘standing' Garfield, darn close to life-size. I never wanted the huge three-foot-high one, but the one you could carry around like a real cat was forever out of my reach. It was $40. ! Lot of money to a girl makin' $5.15 an hour, which was decent for 1985, but not wealth untold.

Well, as you can probably guess, the stuff I had is long gone, and the one thing I always wanted but never got came to me via a thrift store today. For the princely sum of 25c. No tags, and his tail was draggin', but otherwise, in fine shape. It seemed rather silly to buy him, even for a mere quarter, when I'd long since ditched all the other stuff.

But I did. Used a toothpick and a long pin to fix his tail - basically, I shoved his stuffing around until his tail was straight - and cleaned up his face, brushed the fur. It's funny, I have so much stuff, and frankly, didn't even really want this toy until I saw him. But now...it's like the circle is complete.

Sorry there's not a lot of doll stuff to report. I updated the ‘Castle' sight, and I'm kind of burned out a bit. I'll probably take tomorrow off from it. House is a wreck, and we're gonna have to buy new clothes if I don't do some laundry soon.

But I hope one day you'll find a relic of your misspent youth, and have some fun with it. Soon !

Posted by dorriebelle at 12:01 AM CDT

Updated: Monday, 2 May 2011 10:14 AM CDT

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Current Mood : Getting kind of tired of paint.

My neck is still hinked up, but at least I can turn my head today. I woke up yesterday in the middle of the night with it kinked, but I was so tired I went back to sleep, pain and all. Wish I'd tried to fix it instead !

I bought the Fusion paint to use inside the castle, but I really don't like the color. It isn't at all what I want. I'll probably hit Ace Hardware later, see if they have better colors. I sort of want a nice beige, but I got this dark grey/brownish stuff. Too dark and too gray.

Beloved Hubby was home today, and it was nice, working next to him in the Shop. I'll be kind of sad when this project's over. But, hey, I got a few dozen other playsets and props that'd benefit from a quick application of paint...

That reminds me, I never did post a photo of the fold-up bath and bedroom I got from GoodWill for a couple bucks. Once I get my new space, I should probably do a ‘housing and playsets' page ! I wanna show off the FriendShip soon. Should get the space Thursday or Friday - my bank's done it's job, now I'm waiting for PayPal to get off its digital hinder !

Oh, and for some reason, the Robert Enchanted doll is now a Target.com only purchase, not available at stores. Well, &^%$. I've been checking the site to see if our local store got ‘em, but today, there was no ‘check local store' button. Website only. Which means my $15. doll is now $21.50. That ranks. I'm about ready to give up on him. I have real problems buying a doll I've never seen before - and payin' $6.50 for five-to-seven-business-days delivery. Pfgh.

Well, tomorrow, we use the ugly Fusion we have to prime the inside. Hopefully Ace will have better colors to choose from. All else fails, I'll keep to my original idea of using the same paint inside as out. It's a stone castle, after all !

Posted by dorriebelle at 12:01 AM CDT

Updated: Monday, 2 May 2011 10:13 AM CDT

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Mood:  don't ask

Sorry to be so brief, but I'm fall-over wiped out. I've finished the castle exterior for now, unless I wanna get fancy with the turrets and windows. Helped Beloved Hubby with some work, too. Hinked my neck last night, and while I've been able to ignore it for most of the day, it's really singing now.

Hope your day was good !

Posted by dorriebelle at 12:01 AM CDT

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Current Mood : Fun !

Did some more work on This Old Castle - it has paint on it now ! Only one small problem. Can of Fusion says I can apply more paint within 24 hours or wait until after 7 days. Eeek. I was hoping to be done with it in a week or so. Hmpft. Not sure what I'll do now, except for buying more paint along with the groceries tomorrow. The beige can says it covers 25 square feet, but I used the whole thing priming the front.

And knowing the 27 hours/7 day issue, at least I'll make sure to have my spray cans in a row before I tackle the interior. I'm secretly dreading that. It's kind of a make or break part of the whole deal, ya know ? But I've come this far, might as well go all the way !

Took Dearest Son to Dollar Tree, conveniently next door to Ace Hardware. He picked out a toy and a Pez dispenser (racing helmet) while I decided to go for it and buy the "Just Pretending" hair they sell for Halloween and dress-up fun. It's a sort of turquoise, very pretty. I was going to get the lime green, but I don't think it'd look as good on Casey as the turquoise will. So if I end up waiting for the castle to dry for a week, at least I can start her reroot !

And, as you can see, I got a Happy Meal doll - a My Scene skater, I don't know which one. I've heard that the My Scene line's been cancelled, so it may well be that it goes out on the roller skate line. That seems somehow wrong to me...

Posted by dorriebelle at 12:01 AM CDT

Updated: Monday, 2 May 2011 10:13 AM CDT

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Current Mood : Dazed and Confused (and a bit high on paint thinner)

Visitors to the main site may have noticed that something new has been added. Yup - a new page ! Might as well use up the space I have while waiting for my order for more to go through. Perhaps spurred on by yesterday, or just plain getting sick of intentions going nowhere, I packed up the Bright Pink Castle and the can of Fusion spray paint I bought Monday and took ‘em down to Beloved Hubby's workshop. He'd cleared a workspace for me inside, so I wouldn't have to use the windy backyard and the outdoor table. Waiting for me was a mostly empty jug of mineral spirits - paint thinner - that he said I'd need.

First order of business was to get all those *&^% cutesy stickers removed. I'll have a much easier time painting if I don't have to spray around and block off doves, bunnies, chipmunks, and puppies that I don't want anyway. I also removed the prop stickers - I hated those when I was a kid, too - as I'd rather have the shelves fulla stuff my dolls can touch. Took down the portrait over the fireplace and the mirror ‘reflection' - I'd rather have non-specific doll stuff there, and a real mirror. Even went after flowers, as those decals will be replaced by more dimensional stuff later.

At first, I started with scraping ‘em off with a razor blade. I figured any nicks would add character to the walls. But after several jumping skitters, it soon got too difficult to position everything I wanted to keep behind the blade. Beloved was right - the Fusion can said unweathered surfaces would need a wipedown with paint thinner - so I wondered. Would that help get these darn decals off  ?  

Oh, yeah ! A short soak, and those suckers almost came up by themselves. If you end up tackling a project like this, Goo Gone easily peels up stickers and their residue. But it's a lot more expensive than paint thinner. Beloved pays about $8. a gallon for thinner, and that'd barely get you a quart of Goo Gone. I put the razor away and peeled up about three dozen decals, wondering idly if NASA uses the same stuff to attach heat tiles to the Shuttles.  I kept the fireplace ‘flames' sticker, the cat in front of the flames, and the face to a mantle clock, but all the other stickers were gone. Alleluia !

Unfortunately, now the damage was visible. Plastic that was colored differently behind the stickers, just plain discoloration for no reason elsewhere, and all-over dirty. Structurally, it's still quite good, but if I ever wanted to play with it, I *had* to paint it now. Even clean, it looks bad. Beloved said there's no way he'd attempt to paint it - too many nooks and crannies, too much texturing. So watch me go where pros fear to tread ! I noted how things were put together, figured out how to remove some parts, and gave it a solid cleaning and wipedown. And that was about all I could manage. I need a primer coat before I put the textured paint on, so I have to go shopping before I lay anything on it.

And it's all documented on the ‘This Old Palace' page. Hopefully I can do a bit of paint shopping tomorrow, and keep going, but I'm already pretty nervous. It is a much bigger project than I thought. Still, I don't have much to lose - if I totally butch it, I'm sure Dearest Son would take it off my hands, or I could donate it. At least I will have done something with it besides move it from place to place and stuff it in a closet. And who knows, I may actually do a good job at it, or maybe show how *not* to do this !

Posted by dorriebelle at 12:01 AM CDT

Updated: Monday, 2 May 2011 10:13 AM CDT

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Current Mood : Happy yet somewhat morose.

Dearest Son was home today - school holiday. He pretty much stayed busy discovering new facets of his Ultimate BumbleBee, and introducing him to the rest of the Transformers we have around the house. By Dearest's count, we have seventeen of the things...including four BumbleBees in various sizes now. Beloved Hubby got BB for him, as it was the only thing Dearest wanted for Christmas. Since Beloved's work is seasonal, we tend to do our big gifts early, and just do small stuff in December. More time to enjoy, I think.

If there's one thing I learned today, twice over, it was enjoy, celebrate, and live your life RIGHT NOW. After Dearest went to his grandparents' for a visit, Beloved and I hit a few yard sales and local stores. Pawn shop next to the tool place had a 10 DVDs for $29. sale, so you'll be seeing some new titles up top of these entries soon. We also picked up wood for various Beloved projects - including my dollhouse ! Eeeeee !

Picked up all the satin you see in the photo at one sale. The seller was very sweet, and let us play with her Lhasa Apso / Shi Tsu puppy. She was moving the next day, and basically gave me all of that for just $2. Some of the lighter colors are stained by the red, but even those can be used - on the blue, it comes out to a variegated lavender that's quite lovely. She said her mother used to sew, proficient at a professional level, and the satin was hers. She'd amassed collections during her life to enjoy during her retirement, notions and luxe fabrics for sewing, classical and wonderful books for reading. Shortly after her long-awaited retirement, her eyesight dimmed. She didn't have much time with the things she loved before she could no longer enjoy them, and she passed not long after her vision did.

In case I didn't get the lesson, it was repeated at the third sale. Second one netted me the blue and glitter ‘nightime stars' fabric on the far right. They had a fabulous tree house installed for their kids...who never used it. I mean, it was better than some places I've paid rent to live in. If I was 10 again, they'd have to toss food up to me, because I'd never leave the tree house otherwise. Anyway, the third sale got me the cool case behind all the fabric - it's one of those that changes pictures when it's moved, and has some girl dancers that resemble My Scene ads and the main character in Boogie for the Wii. The yard sale was difficult for them because they'd had a grandson pass recently, and some of the stuff was his. I'd heard of him in local news stories, but aside from the idle "OMG, how horrible for the family" thought, I didn't have a connection.

I could tell his story, but I don't feel it's mine to tell. If he had a legacy, it would be that everyone learn CPR and update the skill, and again, to celebrate, enjoy, and live life while you're here. I like to think that's what I'm mostly doing. Oh, I hate doing dishes, and sorting socks ranks, but I've learned so much by letting myself be who I am, and getting the time to do what I want that my life is wonderful. I just wish I could do something for his still-grieving family. It's been years since my CPR classes, so maybe that's how I can honor this life that has left behind so many voids...

Sorry, didn't mean to go all maudlin on you. But as someone who never knows where a yard sale will take her, I have to take the lessons I get via them to heart. I'd hate to have to repeat this one. I was nearly in tears by the time we got back into the car. We sort of shook it off with movies, but my thoughts return to a young man I never met.

Requiscat in Pace, A.

Posted by dorriebelle at 12:01 AM CDT

Updated: Monday, 2 May 2011 10:12 AM CDT

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