Looking Good!

I've had a hard time getting dacron braided fishing line bulk. I've had an order in at Courtland Line Co. for over 3 wks. and they are not responsive to my calls. Don't they see that it is a matter of life and death for these marionettes!

Sorry to hear you are having issues getting the black braided nylon.  I've always purchased through Mason Tackle. http://www.masontackle.com/  Might be an alternative if you don't get any reply from Courtland.

Thanks Shawn! I picked up the line from Mason Tackle this morning at the post office! After the other, it's a miracle.
Dose anyone know of a cheap clean recipe for a gesso type coat?

Hmmm... Homemade Gesso. Never really thought about this one. Did a quick Google search and came up with this. http://www.ajsartsanddesigns.com/2011/01/my-homemade-gesso-recipe.html  I might see if I can find some others.

Found a video on YT and in it she did not use any water. She just used equal parts of talcum, glue and house paint.

Ok and for the sake of knowing the whole scoop I followed the link mentioned in the video above. http://www.greenislescrafts.com/2011/06/tees-gesso-recipe.html

This person refers to the talcum as "tooth".  It looks like the tooth can be a few different things.
Tooth = Drywall powder, plaster, talcum powder or baby powder.

Perhaps experimenting with different tooths would give you a finner or coarser Gesso.

Great info! thanks!

I finished stringing the flamenco musicians. Along the line I saw that I could simplify my control design because they both have fixed rigid backs and shoulders. So all I really  needed was a head bar and hand wire extensions. I'm hoping the simplicity will help my friend (puppeteer) learn to sync with the music. 

I really like the guitarist, and your ladies dress is spot on. I hope your performances go well for you.
   Shawn- interesting recipe. I have not used baby powder before. Must try it when I become a grandfather. I have used plaster of paris as a powder which is gypsum or basically chalk. A google of baby powder  indicates that baby powder is finely powdered native hydrous magnesium silicate... so it is different. According to the wikipedia definition traditional gesso was chalk/gypsum. The trick is getting it fine enough. The stuff I used to make up was a bit rough when painted on cloth backings, but sanded down quite well, because of the white glue. Comercial gesso may vary in its binder. Most vinyl paint is PVA glue with  another ingredient added to change it to a binder that will not reconstitute when it is dry. I used to know what it was, but have forgotten off hand. So basically gesso is paint with more powder to beef it out and act as a filler type base coat. The finer the powder the better. An artist I know here just takes ordinary house paint and adds 250ml of  PVA to 1 litre of  paint. She  studied under one of Colombia's most famous last generation artists, and passed that tip onto my daughter. The extra PVA is to act as a fungicide, as much as a binder. You can take all this  further by taking different colored rock dust and  adding it to your glue to get some cheap scenery paint. You can get some nice grey using cement, but you need to put it in water first to  let it go off first. and varying kinds of clay  can give you some browns greys and yellow ochres. I have crushed rock to get  some greens, and  agates give dark ocre red, some  burnt paper will do for black at a pinch. Here you can get  some powdered minerals for  coloring concrete. They are limited in color range but are  dirt cheap (scuse the pun) by the kilo.