Christmas & Raggedy Pics
:) Hope everyone had a chance to visit De's Raggedy Ann blog :)
I just wanted to share some pics from last month that really bring to my mind the meaning of Christmas and Winter :) and of course the pics of Tink & I's first Raggedy Ann doll :)
I love this pic b/c this is something I see at least a few times a week. Yes they are both sound asleep...Yes that is a paci in Tink's mouth....No, i make no apologies for that fact.....Yes, this melts my heart every time I witness it :)
She loves her daddy so much, and vice versa :D
She has him wrapped around her finger even more than he has her wrapped up in his arms :)
We had a pretty good little snow storm just a few days before Christmas break, but as is so often the case in ohio it snowed great (perfect snowman snow!), then the day heated up and it rained and washed the snow away and turned it to mud, then it froze again that night making the roads a pain in the butt!......and Tink had a cold so she couldn't go out and play in the snow, so I went out and made a little snowman to put on the front porch right outside the window so she could see him from the couch :)....this also protected him from the rain that day, so he was around for the whole day or two :)
While she wasn't feeling the greatest we decided to straighten her hair :)....if you look at other pics of her, she appears to have barely shoulder length hair b/c of the curl in it....lol it is halfway down her back!!!!...I am so happy she has curly hair though; I love it much more on her than straight hair :) (as you can tell I can't part her hair when it is straight so it looks like she has a bald spot....trust me, she doesn't lol)
Here is another one of her and daddy :) he is making a goofy face but in his defense he was a bit under the weather too (we were all fighting a nasty cold)...I just like this pic b/c it shows how different (and grown up) she looks with straight hair....
This year, as I said in my last blog post, Tink finally got the nerve to sit on Santa's lap :)...she almost chickened out, but mustered her courage at the last minute and was SO proud of herself :)....we tried to get the boys to be in this pic but they weren't havin' it....all she asked Santa for was a doll and some candy LOL sigh, if only it stayed that easy :)
My 3 gorgeous young'uns Christmas Eve at my Mom & Dad's house :) Every year we get new pajamas on Christmas Eve (the ONE and ONLY gift we are allowed to open on Christmas Eve). By "we" I mean EVERYONE who is at my mom's that night. We have done this for as long as I have been alive (i think it started with my mamaw and papaw when my mom was little). When I was little it was a case of we didn't get new clothes a lot or new pajamas. There just wasn't the money to splurge on stuff. At Christmas we also didn't get a bunch of store bought stuff, Papaw would carve us something, Mamaw would make us stuff, but EVERY year EVERYONE got a new pair of pajamas so that we looked fresh and bright opening gifts :D.....the tradition has just carried on and I wouldn't change it for the world. When we get to my mom's on Christmas Eve, everyone gets their pajama's on and then one or two of the adults usually (this year we did this part on the WAY to mom's b/c we were running so very late) takes all of the kids out for a drive to go "Santa watching"......as soon as someone spots him and it is confirmed by all the others in the car that yes indeed it is Santa's sleigh with Rudolph in the lead and not some common airplane, the driver rushes home, the kids fast foot it into the house, give hugs and kisses and jump in bed and get to sleep as soon as possible so that they will not ruin Santa's arrival by being awake when he gets there :D...great way to get the lil ones in bed on Christmas Eve night.....yet another tradition carried over from what we did when we lived with my mamaw and papaw when i was little :) (there is actually a hillside near knoxville tennessee that it looks like ruldolph is landing b/c the way each part of the hill hides and reveals the plane tower things...the things that show the planes where the top of the hills are)....
My 3 and my gorgeous nephews :) this is a crew and a half I tell ya....this also gives you a great idea as to why Tink is like she is....the baby of the bunch AND the only girl....yeah, 'nuf said
Not sure what they were doing here but Daniel started it and Chloe chimed in...this is their "cheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeese" pose
Tink says daniel is her "bes' freend"....they sure are cute.......
yes this is my family....this is how we act when we get together....no, no alcohol was involved....lol
this is my baby sister doing God only knows what to my Uncle.....and what is even funnier is this is not an uncommon sight at my mom's house....
here is the tree and our stockings at my mom & dad's...our stockings are our main gift every year.....for instance, the ALWAYS have socks, panties/underwear, toothbrush, bras (for us gals), lottery tickets, and fruit in the toe of the stocking....then each persons stocking has gifts just for them....the year I moved away from home mine was full of house stuff (nice spatulas, nice utensils like veggie peelers) or another year, when I went back to school, it was all school supplies for college....the past couple years it has been full of ink cartidges for my photo printer, photo paper, and nice stuff like pricier soaps and stuff i normally wouldn't splurge on.....
This is more of us just being us....this is my nephew Chase, my sis Crystal (his mom), and my Elijah (in the corner making the bunny ears)....i really love my family
this is the first year in 5 that my li'l brother has been really HOME (not just visiting on leave from the marine corp)...it was so nice to have him home...he adores all his nephews and his niece.... he kept asking tink "do you know how beautiful you are?"....he has missed so much of her life, i love that he is finally becoming part of it :)
all in all we had a wonderful Christmas and New Year! as i think the pics show :)
if any of you visited De's blog and really looked around, she has a section describing the tools she uses and she has a pic of a lil wooden tool that she calls her "favorite stuffing tool".....she uses it to stuff the dolls....well here is MY favorite stuffing tool :)
Here is the email I sent to De, it explains the story behind our doll....AND there are pics that follow of the different stages our doll baby went through...
Last night I sat down to just "see if i could" make the annie from the "i got you babe" set. As I drug up my sewing machine from the basement, covered in dust from only being used once or twice in the 5 yrs that I have had it, my little girl followed me into my bedroom where I was "setting up shop" for the evening. She watched me get the stuff all laid out, wandering in and out as I did so. after cutting out the pattern and very um...not-neatly? sewing it together (i am about as domestically challenged as they come and can't sew unless it is a straight line), I looked at her and smiled. She cocked her head to the side and said "what you do momma? you makin a balloon?" (lol the head/body kinda does resemble a balloon shape) I told her I was making a doll baby. She said "Tink wants to make a doll baby too." I figured with this being my first, it wasn't going to go exceptionally well anyway so what damage could she do if she helped ;). I tore off several bits of stuffing and showed her how to insert it a piece at a time with her fingers. I figured she would get bored and leave it, but she stuffed about 85% of the head/body!!! I didn't take the time to tea stain it, but "three" stained it (as in my 3 yr olds lil fingers always have some dirt dust candy or unknown residue on them even though she is obsessed with handwashing and since she did so much of the stuffing there are dirty little fingerprints all over it lol). I got tickled as I started taking pictures. In your series of photos that explain your tools and such you talk about your favorite tool for stuffing, so I took a pic of MY favorite stuffing tool....her name is Chloe but she likes to be called Tink ;)!
after she had done all she was able to do she kept right by my side watching intently as I worked, asking over and over, "my baby done yet momma?" Before I could finish, it was her bedtime, so she agreed to go to bed with the promise her baby would be done before we left for church in the morning....should have bit my tongue! the face/hair took me a long time and I think I am going to use smaller thread for the facial features next time (I used the first crochet thread i could find b/c walmart was out of the colors I needed in embroidery floss, so i used a size three crochet thread...toooo big for this little face I was making)...anyway, I was up til 4 a.m. finishing her doll baby for her. It has no shoes (i hate shoes anyway, so i am sure annie would prefer to go barefoot too if she is playing with a 3 yr old), and her dress/body/face doesn't match your dolls hardly at all even though i tried to do it right ;), but she is cute none-the-less! I can see how this could become an addiction and I LOVED the bonding time it gave my daughter and I....I cried more than once last night as I watched her face while she worked on stuffing the doll, it made me miss my Mamaw so badly, but also made me feel so happy that I am creating those memories for her great granddaughter who she never got to meet.....
hopefully now y'all can see why De's simple pattern is such a huge blessing to me :)
if you made it this far, God bless ya!....i will have a freebie up this week, along with another big announcement....if you email me, I will send you a link to another freebie when i post the one I am working on now (just for reading this far....)...all you have to do is email me and tell me what kind of tool i call Chloe :)
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