Advent Calendar Day 19

The pocket for Day 19 of my elder daughter's Advent Calendar contained another reference to her musical occupation, well at least in my view it did! The picture is a robin, which sings, and the gift inside was another cross stitch picture made by her sister. I saw them as mice carol singing, she saw them as mice carrying gifts.

Day 19 pocket

The mice cross stitch and 'oh bring us a figgy pudding'

Front view of the mice asking / singing for figgy pudding!

Back of the mice Christmas decoration - starry fabric and figgy puddings

She had always wondered about figgy pudding and whether it was another name for Christmas pudding (which she likes). I had made a Christmas cake and a Christmas pudding which we posted to her along with her gifts and some lights for her Christmas tree.

Day 19 was also the day we decorated our Christmas trees so the pockets of the Advent calendar, which had been holding the unwrapped items until the tree was ready, started to be emptied. Two days earlier she and her landlady went out to a Christmas tree farm and bought a beautiful Nordman fir tree. 

The Advent Calendar just before her tree decoration activities began

Day 19 cross stitch hanging on the tree, with a Day 6 snowflake and Day 2 star in the background

She has sent me photos of the tree as she gradually added the decorations from her Advent Calendar and her landlady added the collection of decorations her family have used over the years. 

At home, for the first time our younger daughter had the job of putting the lights on our tree, a role her elder sister has usually done in recent years when at home, otherwise I have done the lights.

Advent Calendar Day 17

The pocket for Day 17 of my elder daughter's Advent Calendar contained another cross stitch item stitched by her younger sister and assembled by me. The picture on the pocket was connected to the contents by its shape and a joke as it is a round figgy pudding and the cross stitch picture was a very round Father Christmas who had been indulging in too much figgy pudding after all that sleigh riding! 

Day 17 pocket

Father Christmas cross stitch decoration
with ribbon trim depicting his Christmas eve travels

Front of the Father Christmas cross stitch decoration

Back of the Father Christmas cross stitch decoration

My elder daughter laughed a lot when she saw the decoration - I think Father Christmas's sticking out hands made her giggle the most.

Advent Calendar Day 11

The pocket for Day 11 of my elder daughter's Advent Calendar contained Christmas trees. The pocket was Christmas trees in a snow globe so was a hint at the contents. This was another cross stitch picture, this time a Christmas tree stitched by my younger daughter and assembled by me.

Day 11 pocket

Cross stitch Christmas tree decoration

Christmas tree print fabric on the back

Cross stitch Christmas tree on the front

We watched on video call as she unwrapped the package and exclaimed at the trees on the decoration, a definite hint to get her Christmas tree up soon.

Chat n Snap 2016 - part 2

The Scouting and Guiding Jamboree wasn't the only display of Sasha and Gregor dolls at the Chat 'n Snap.  Plenty of dolls had come along to enjoy the fun and were put on tables around the sides of the hall.  I went round a couple of times to take photos as the displays grew, they were fluid through the day as people showed off their dolls to their friends and rearranged them a bit in the process.

Two blond toddlers and red haired girls

A pretty little Iona Gotz toddler girl wearing a ra ra skirt outfit

Toddler twins - one pair of only two Trendon prototype toddlers

Red haired girls in hand made white dresses, and friends

Jocelyn's two dolls (left in Emma Flood outfits) with a Red haired Gotz and a course doll

Two beautifully dressed Trendon girls

A Trendon boy in a wonderful Christmas sweater and a Trendon girl with her attractive beret and cardigan

Some gorgeous red haired girls

Dawn's lovely pram she restored this year

Reuben, Trendon Elliott, Melanie and Edmund brought some of the Summer Music Festival to the Chat 'n Snap

Three of our babies Nina, Daisy and Amy babble to each other while Florence (wearing the lovely Emma Flood outfit I bought at the Sasha Celebration) dreams as she listens to the music from the Summer Festival.  Beside our babies is the soft bodied baby made by Janet for Tricia

Caleb and Cora playing it cool on their motorbike!

A well behaved group of toddlers and babies with the older Sasha and Gregor dolls

A baby with a glove puppet entertains the other babies and toddlers

This collection of Muller Wichtel dolls was brought together for the day by those who collect them as well as Sasha

A doll made by Theresa using a course doll pattern and baby rerooted by Theresa with soft body by Janet joined the display

The Trendon toddler twins were joined by the only other pair of Trendon toddlers, a baby and a puppy

This was the dolls for sale table where anyone could put their doll for sale if they made a small donation to the charity pot

Three lovely Trendon dolls pose in the window, I managed to capture them on camera with the light behind them

Gayle's beautiful re-rooted Cora

Close up of Gayle's re-rooted Cora

Teddy had brought his lovely jointed wooden doll

Close up of the face of Teddy's wooden doll.  She is a bit bigger than Sasha serie dolls and wears Magic Attic and American Girl doll clothes.

Some Sasha children stood behind the motorcycle

This Gotz girl wears a lovely coat and hat set

This Trendon girl likes elephants

Three gorgeous early Trendons

The three gorgeous early Trendons are joined by another lovely early Trendon and a Gotz Claudius toddler

It is impossible to stop the toddlers and babies crawling and playing around and a Mexican copy of Sasha has crept into the lineup

A wonderful Studio girl

close up of the wonderful Studio girl

When eating our lunch and during the afternoon we sat at a table near our dolls and chatted with various people.  I brought out my Heather Maciak dolls - Jenny and Lexie wearing their knitted sweaters and my new Heather Maciak UFDC 2016 Convention souvenir doll Emily and journal which I bought recently via ebay.  Heather had told me all about the making of this doll and her companion doll when we met last year in Vancouver.  Teddy and I had an animated discussion about our Jenny and Lexie dolls and Dee showed me the two she had very recently purchased, inspired partly by my blog posts on them.  My daughter and I also made friends with Joanne who was crocheting a dress for her Sasha baby.  My girl sat stitching her first Cross Stitch kit (and finished it during the afternoon) and I knitted a few rows of a sweater for Emily my newest doll so it became a bit of a working crafts table for the afternoon.  I later saw Diane D knitting at another table as well.

Sewing for Sasha Festival 2013 Raffle

I wish we could attend the 2013 Sasha Doll Festival in the USA, however funds won't allow, so the best we can do to participate is send donations for the Children's Fund Auction, or main Raffle or Helper items.  I was contemplating sewing or knitting something to honour Sasha collector Erica who was my swap partner last Christmas - sadly she died earlier this year.  However just as I was considering ideas, along came an email from another England based Sasha collector telling me about the donation for the one of the main Raffle prizes which the English collectors are putting together to celebrate the wonderful time we had at the 2012 festival, and I was glad to join in.

The message was addressed to both me and my younger daughter, and we both got to vote on the name of the doll who is crossing the Atlantic with her marvellous wardrobe of clothes and accessories.  A list of items to donate was included and we had fun choosing what we wanted to send.

My daughter decided to make the gardening apron and gym bag so I dug out some fabric from my collection for these.

From her birthday pattern book my girl found an apron sized for a Barbie or Sindy doll and I showed her how to scale this up on some paper.  She wanted a pocket in the front of the apron (to hold the seed packets or gardening tools) so she cut out a rectangle for this.  I showed her how to use the iron to double fold the edges so there would be no frayed fabric then helped her with the machine stitching (the curved bits were the trickiest).  Once the pocket was stitched on she found some embroidered transfers in my sewing box and arranged these on the pocket, then ironed them carefully in place.  The finishing touch was stitching on the ribbons - I showed her how to hand stitch these in place and she did a great job.

close up of the gardening apron pocket, with the iron on transfers

hand stitched on ribbon ties, sewn by DollMum's daughter

The gardening apron, made by DollMum and daughter

The gym bag needed to have the doll's name embroidered on it.  My girl was delighted that the most popular name chosen was the one she had picked (my favourite came lower down the list).  I showed her how to use the lost thread cross stitch method - using soluble cross stitch canvas to provide the guide for the stitching, then wetting it and removing the threads with tweasers to leave the cross stitch in place on the base fabric (apparently some soluble canvas literally dissolves on wetting, water dissolves the glue holding the canvas together on the canvas I use).  She decided that the doll had to have ballet shoes on the bag and the Olympic Rings, to celebrate 2012.  Once the embroidery was complete we stitched cord runners in the tops of the bag, stitched the sides of the bag together and had fun working out how to thread the bag correctly for drawstring operation!

my girl trimming threads on the gym bag

trimming threads carefully

the gym bag, made by DollMum and daughter

The Olympic side of the gym bag, made by DollMum and daughter

One very proud young sewer, with the gym bag and apron

Rosemarie S sent me the Liberty fabric for the dress (I wanted to do the smocked dress) and I was pleased to see that it was the same fabric as had featured in the 2012 Sasha Festival programme - Berry F dress (on page 23), however I chose to use a different pattern from the programme (Red B) as I wanted to do puffed sleeves and no collar, and my own design of smocked stitching.  I made a pair of matching knickers from the remaining fabric to go with the dress.  I am pleased with the results and Rosemarie made kind comments in email correspondence.

Miranda models the dress, gym bag and apron for Charlotte

Miranda models the gym bag and dress in our spring garden

Knickers to match the smocked dress, by DollMum

Back view of the smocked dress, by DollMum

close up of the back view of the smocked dress, by DollMum

Miranda models the smocked dress, by DollMum

Miranda looking wistful in the smocked dress

close up of the smocking, by DollMum

I checked with Rosemarie before publishing this - I didn't want to spoil the surprise for those lucky enough to attend the 2013 Sasha festival.  As our contribution is just one small part of this wonderful Raffle prize, this post will just provide a taster of what is coming their way in July and Rosemarie is happy for me to share this on my blog.