“Heavens, at my house everything is used to fashion some sort of plaque, or doll head or picture. I soak the old bread in a very little water then squeeze it dry, and add about ¼ cup salt to 1 cup of the bread dough and knead it. It will rise after salt has been added, but it will eventually stop rising and you will have a good clay to fashion your figurines with. Take this cowboy plaque. The plaque itself is papier-mache, the figure of the horseman of various materials; the upper body of gum, the chaps of dried banana peelings that are fashioned over rolls of clay, the seams laced with thread, and they dry resembling leather.”
“And this picture of apple blossoms?”
“Oh, that’s made of wall paper cleaner. I dye portions of it and use it for earrings and children’s dishes as well as for wall plaques or framed pictures. I dilute the mixture used as background.”
“Dilute it? With what?”
“Water, but only to the consistency of cream, then I cover the backing, usually a piece of cardboard. When that is dry I use a thicker mixture and press a bit, about the size of my thumb, on the prepared surface and add more petals until I have the desired picture. That one was made up so that you could hang it from any side and it would show flowering branches.”
Her most famous doll is the Kit Carson doll, patented and registered with the Doll Guild of America. The buckskin suits are made from old leather jackets. She carves the wooden guns and uses the spurs from chicken legs for the powder horns. A coon-skin cap and a cowboy hat complete each outfit. Although they sell for twelve dollars, these dolls are in great demand and there is a great backlog of orders.
She believes that everyone should have two hobbies, because a single hobby can become monotonous. As one alternate, she exhibits Indian belts made from pounded out soda pop bottle tops laced with colored yarn. She also works down gnarled tree roots for use as lamp stands.
Mrs. Provinzano has traveled thru-out the west exhibiting her dolls, which range from pioneer scouts to Indians and Mexicans, at various fairs. At the International Hobby Show in California, some years ago, she won a first place ribbon for “Ingenuity”.
She possesses the abiding faith in Divine guidance and protection that was her grandfather’s, believing that she is on this earth to help others. She believes sharing brings its rewards, for often a remark dropped by another will open up a door to new achievements, and she has an illustrious record of achievements to her credit.
Records reveal that she taught swimming for the Young Women’s Christian Association, hobbies and handcrafts for the Steel Works Young Men’s Christian Association and devoted many years to showing crippled children at the St. Mary’s Hospital pediatric ward how to generate their own sunshine by making things with their hands, often deformed hands that responded slowly to determined little minds. She also taught harmonica and handicraft at Sacred Heart Orphanage.