Small town visit

Jars of seed at the hardware. Envelopes on another shelf held hand-collected seed for sale.
As I mentioned yesterday we took a drive and poked around a little Amish town. We drove around the county a bit but the weather was not great and we didn't see many people out and about. Speaking of hardware stores and Amish at the same time reminds me of a trip to Ohio Amish country and Lehman's Hardware in Kidron, Ohio. It is the mecca of old-time hardware stores serving the Amish with a whole aisle dedicated to oil lamps for example--replacement globes of various sizes, wicks, metal parts. It's hand tool area is superb. They have a catalog and are online, here.

I really like the colors in this quilt. A small museum in this little town had an exhibit of quilts. There was a fabric store in town with lots of quilting material--not Amish but nice to wander thru anyway. ;-)

A little embroidered purse that Em purchased for herself.

A couple of well worn dollies resting. The purply cape of the one doll is such a pretty color don't you think, especially with the lilac of her dress?

Precious Buds Unfurling

My heart's been wrenching and swelling in turns around here lately watching my two girls mature and blossom. Meg signing up for a college class and not needing a wit of help, finishing finals and projects with finesse, when did she get so accomplished? And Emmy singing solo for her music class, swinging back and forth in nervousness but not running for cover as surely I would do even now when facing a group from stage. Yikes! Mommy pride! :-)

The doll of the day is a picture of stickers that I nabbed over at little apple craft on Etsy. This is half of the sticker sheet that I enlarged because the stickers themselves are itty-bitty--I needed my reading glasses just to see them clearly--Meg said that was reason enough to give them over to her--since I couldn't even see them--no chance kiddo! ;-) (italicizing the smiley--cool idea found over at Allsorts--of course)

Pencil-neck Kokeshi?

I have never seen this kind of kokeshi with these thin necks, but I'm enchanted just the same-- with necks striped just like pirate socks .
I found these in a little antique shop in an Amish town we drove to yesterday. I had recovered fast from the night-time sickos--thank goodness and we all wanted to go for a drive.
The man who ran the shop had a few wooden and cloth dolls in his shop but most with prices much too precious for me--I should have taken pictures--didn't think. He had two Joli dolls from Poland marked at $12 each--condition poor--and for pete's sake these dolls were sold in the 1970's! I dreamt about a cloth doll with a Hungarian/gypsy? outfit he had for $35 tho--again pretty poor condition--but a sweet face.
Anyway, I got both of these Kokeshi for $10. :-) Does anyone know about the thin necks on these kokeshi? Any websites to suggest with info. on older kokeshi?

Favorite Picture of the Day

This is a project from a Marie Claire Idees--I forget what issue right now, but I love the simplicity and the colors of this little sewing kit. Have to do one up soon. :-) Not right now tho and I'll be back later today or tomorrow and add a doll. I had a minor case of food poisoning in the night and I still feel queasy....... :-(

Yeah, its Friday!!

I love long weekends-duh! I hope I can do lots of fun things down in my art room. :-)

And the dollies for the day are these three matryoshka beauts that hang out together at the end of a shelf in my art room. They hail from Russia, of course, except for the left-most one that is from Poland. The little polka dotted hamster in front is from the Hamtaro craze in Japan a few years ago. The girls and I went on ebay out of HongKong and ordered a huge set of these hamsters in all different outfits as well as the more familiar Hamtaro characters from the animated series, like Oxnard, Boss and Bijou. Does anyone want to see photos of these? :-)

Thanks for stopping by!

Garden Color

Oh my, the colors that are going to grow in my garden! :-)

And here's my brand-new garden hat! Thank you Amy! :-)

Lastly, some matryoshka love. :-) A painted ornament--I love her sweet face.

Little Lady Doll

Hi ! Thought I'd put up a quick post about this little doll head with bust. I found her in a thrift/junk shop that I loved in Clarksville, TN. It was in this old house that was filled to the gills with stuff--some really cool and some just regular stuff. Carefully stepping thru the tight aisles and the stacked shelves it was fun to stumble across little finds like the one above. I don't know what the doll's head and bust are made of, but I love how she is painted right down to her upturned nose with its chip.

Closed/Open

Gotta love this circus tent and acrobat that Emmy drew for me on Mother's Day. It is still up on our erasa-board in the kitchen. The other side features a chalkboard which I didn't take a picture of--it has a clever Emmy message on it. The other night, right before bed, Em wanted something to eat. I was cleaning up all the yucko dishes--why can't they clean themselves I ask--anyway I nixxed the whole bedtime snack idea, saying that the "kitchen was closed". Emmy's little sign then went up on the board "Kichen is Open even for girls that beg". She didn't get the snack, just a laugh. :-)

Have a great day!

Almost forgot the doll for the day.....here is an earlier sign from Em with a Brownie. Emmy loves to pretend she is running a shop and takes orders for meals that she then puts together for us. She just told me that she wants to learn to make a real supper. I asked which one--she said meatloaf! It is a yummy meatloaf recipe. I'll share it when she makes it--it has bbq sauce all over the top. :-)

Scrolly Ironwork

Lots of beautiful iron here. We toured this old home on Saturday and the iron reminded me of other pictures that I've taken.

These two are from a smallish town in Belgium. We visited when it was early, early spring so it is not as colorful in these pictures as it gets with all the flower boxes in bloom.

Below is a picture from Chicago's Art Institute.

And a picture of our back door in Germany with a metal door "mat" that I mounted on the wall. Do you see how skinny the screen is for our back door? All sorts of weird sizing to get used to in Germany--doors, windows, wardrobe closets that were sort of convenient with one side of built in dresser drawers but almost too shallow for a hanger. :-)

In keeping with the doll a day in May here is my final picture. Not exactly a doll, but a gnome hiding behind the rosemary, in our German garden. At the time I worried he would disappear and go visiting somewhere else. Some garden gnomes would magically disappear, maybe they would go on vacation--I don't know. (see the French Garden Gnome Liberation Group here) History of garden gnomes can be found here. :-) I don't have him out in my garden now--the backyard isn't fenced and we always have kids "visiting" thru the yard. Nice for Em but hard on the flowers and gnomes. /:-)

Happy Sunday!

Surely you would like some tea, yes? Or possibly some hot cocoa--much more to my liking. :-)

Old Tattered Notepad

An unassuming little notepad, a gift some 35 years ago from my grandma, is a repository of names. All the same name in this case, mine. For some long forgotten reason, probably just a whim, I started signing this little notepad once a year, also noting how old I was at the time. Amazingly enough I have only missed one year and that was just recently when our things were in storage for a long time as we got resettled.

This is the first page starting with the childish hand of a 10 year old on up thru a few years. It is fun to look back and see how my signature evolved, from child to adult--that 14th year, trying something completely different, to married adult, with a whole new last name. The last several pages of the notepad aren't that interesting, as my signature rarely looks very different now, but I just signed it again this year marking another year passed.

And strolling down memory lane brings me to the Doll of the Day. A Raggedy Andy doll that my grandparents let me buy long ago. My sister and I had gone to visit them without our parents--we were finally old enough and we all went shopping at a big department store after they had taken us out to eat--a huge treat at the time. Well, after much looking--they must have been driven nearly crazy with our indecisions, we decided on a doll we wanted--my sister got the mini Raggedy Ann and I wanted the mini Raggedy Andy. Still such a cutie! :-)

Have a good, good weekend, thanks for stopping by. :-)

Mrs. Jarley

My mom and I were inspired by the book Art Doll Chronicles (Somerset Studios) when it first came out and we exchanged dolls with each other. Mrs. Jarley is the doll I created before sending her off naked--not a stitch of clothing or hair--she was so embarrassed to travel thru the mail that way. But mom dressed and fixed her all up before shipping her back to me. I don't have a picture of her doll that I dressed, unfortunately. I recently gave Mrs. Jarley the mega-diamond bracelet on her wrist. She would like to think that it is a family heirloom. :-)

Mrs. Jarley's name is borrowed from Dickens' book The Old Curiosity Shop where she was the proprietor of the traveling waxwork. My Mrs. Jarley is a gypsy that Mom wrote a story for--she made her a descended member of the Vlad family--as in Vlad the Impaler. You have to look closely and you'll see a small band-aid on her wrist. Yikes! It is too funny! :-)

Naughty Mrs. Jarley's purse has a secret......

Check out the cute little socks that mom knit.

This is Mrs. Jarley's box. I stamped my own carved designs of different Indian designs onto tissue paper before tearing and gluing to the box.

Inside the box is Mrs. Jarley's journal with her story. :-)

Here is the first page of the journal. This is the only picture I have of poor Mrs. Jarley before mom fixed her all up.

Toadstool Love from Flickr

Toadstool Love from Flickr
Originally uploaded by gingerbread cottage

Check out all the toadstool inspiration at the flickr group Mushroom Mania, here. Flickr lists all the original flickr photos/artists for each picture once you click on the mosaic . OOO-la-la! :-)

Not Just For Toads Anymore

My first ever toadstool, thanks to the blog inspiration from LucyKate Crafts and the wee felted babushka I made last fall was a first attempt as well. I have tried to make other felted matryoshkas since but I was not at all happy with the results. So I will be happy with this little miss. :-)

Happy Day!

It's got to be a short one today. The above knitted dollies were a gift from Meg who found them at the Art Institute of Chicago's gift shop.

See you tomorrow! :-)

One of the Prettiest Corners of the World

I am sharing today a few pictures I took in Colmar, France. We visited there several times and I just love the beautiful flowers and the canal that runs through part of the town. Down below a picture of some houses along the canal in the fishmonger's district. Such wonderful colors don't you think?! :-) I had to wack off the right side of this picture because a dude, who was really near me, looked right into the camera just as I took the photo. :-)

And here is the doll for the day--not truly a doll but a French santon (little saint). Santons are for creating elaborate creches which include all sorts of villagers at Christmas time. This is a 7cm painted clay santon of a village woman with her basket and lantern. Here is a website that has lots of santons for sale--some of them large, 25 cm, figures.

Check out this santon fair in Marseilles--how I wish I could go there! Here is a link for their fair--make sure to click on the British flag for English translation.

Paydirt--I LOVE Google!

OK, anybody who isn't crazy for the Brownies by Palmer Cox had better turn a deaf ear to this posting. :-) I posted in January about these guys and now I'm at it again!

Yesterday with lots of time on my hands, thanks to my girls and husband, :-) I got to poke around on the web. I found all kinds of things about Brownies. Hee-hee-hee! Above are three cloth Brownie dolls printed by Arnold Printworks in 1892. Two articles online about the Brownie dolls here & here, a bio of Cox is found here and info. on Brownie cameras with pictures and old manuals can be found here. I never knew Schoenhut, well known for its Humpty Dumpty Circus and wooden dolls, made Brownies, some it seems for commercial displays as they are 3 feet tall. It is the coolest thing!

If you have made it this far and are still with me make sure and check out Wisconsin's History online site, here. It has 1200 online doll photos from their collection with info. That is where I found the cloth Brownie photos above. You can search by manufacturer, country, material used, and other variables.

Still wanting more?? I posted a pattern for a redwork brownie here along with a bit more about Brownies. :-)