"I love food. When I make my miniature versions, I'm never happy until I've got as much detail as is humanly possible into each and every part of the dish! My creations run from extravagant platters to simple vegetables, with a few "sweet" pieces thrown in, all in 1:12 scale. I find that to get the detail I want into smaller scales is just not possible," she said.

Not to say that her 1:12 scale pieces don't have some details she finds tedious and impossible to face on some days.

"The hardest part of any of my creations is to make myself sit down and make the canes I need - things like tomato or cucumber canes. I always think that I'm wasting time doing these as they take so long to get just right, but once they are done I realize that it has been well worth the effort as sometimes a day's work can result in a year's worth of supplies! The easiest part is actually putting a piece together. Even if it takes several days before I see a result."

Although as far as mold-making is concerned, Linda isn't sure there will be a good result from her hands.

"Whatever I do, I just can't manage to work with molds. I've tried over and over again to make molds from a master I've made. I've tried flexible molds to solid clay molds and it just doesn't work for me! I can waste a whole tub of silicon mold with every attempt ending up in the bin. In the time I wasted, I could have made hundreds of whatever it is I'm trying to take a mold from," she said.

Otherwise, she doesn't think there is such a thing as wasted effort when making miniatures.

"I hope that in some small way, my work can help people to recognize that miniatures are not simply "dollhouse" accessories, but are actually wonderful works of art to be treasured. If this happens, then I will have reached my goal as an artist!"

Linda has taught several on-line tutorials for CDHM but has never had any 'formal' training herself, aside from some lessons in watercolor painting.

"This probably explains why I'm totally hopeless with things like Photoshop!" she said with a laugh.

Trial and error has proven to her that Fimo Classic works best for her pieces, and allowed her to branch out into some unique tool choices.
     
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