I have something to share, but I also have something I don’t WANT to share…
Today we lost one of our angels here on this blog… Kathie Welsh, from Omaha, Nebraska, passed away today… She was the most generous and kind woman you could ever meet. My sewing room is filled with all kinds of things from her… Ultra Suede she just “knew” I could use… (I was just looking at it this evening), vintage laces she shared with me because she said she HAD enough herself, fabric, cards, encouraging notes to me, and most recently a bisque baby doll she was sure I needed! :o)
I am so sad and at a loss for what to say… She just left comments on the blog yesterday… it feels like this must be a mistake.
She was so proud of her children and grandchildren… in fact, I don’t think I know of anyone else who beats her in that department. I’m praying the Lord will wrap His loving arms around the whole family as I’m sure they are reeling from this.
Somehow I will try to write this post… but it seems so irrelevant right now… while I was on the verge of tears over dolly shoes, someone in Kathie’s family really had reason to cry…
Okay, here goes…
I was just going to fix the buttons on Bailey’s dress and try to take a few pictures to add to the ones I had. A few more “impish” pictures are always fun for Ebay…
Well, I read the comments so far for the day and saw where Joy said, a pair of little sandals would be nice for Bailey to wear. How hard could it be to make a pair of tiny little sandals… after all, I’ve made a “few” shoes for her before… but nothing was working out…
I did take some pictures of my “journey” along the way…
The first thing I did was try to use this form I had made from Sculpy clay a few years ago… but it was too thick in the toe area…
So I threw that shoe away…
I had picked up this little dolly who had feet the same size as Mini Bailey and thought “maybe” they would work for her… I forgot to take a picture of her before my hubby pulled and cut her apart, but this is what she DID look like…
Her feet were cute and would have been easy to follow since there are already definite lines I could follow for the toe area… but they were a little too high up for what I was wanting to do…
I had this little doll, but her feet are exactly the same size as Bailey’s and I need something with a little “bump” in the toe area…
So I switched gears and decided to try with a piece of the yellow bias trim…
Didn’t get very far on them…
So I tried a piece of leather, where I punched some holes in it… but when I wrapped the leather around to the underside, it was too thick and made the bottoms too rippled…
So I tried to make a pair of sandals from elastic cording on a leather sole… I thought it was working…
But they wouldn’t stay on her feet… you can see where her toes are lifted up off the sole of the shoe… they shot off like a loaded rubber band gun if you touched them the wrong way…
So I gave up on the sandals and decided to make a template of her foot and see where that might take me… the first try was too high on the top side of her foot…by the time I wet it and stretched it a bit, they would just fall off..
The next try I made them too narrow… and couldn’t get her foot in them…
I widened my pattern piece just a bit and “think” this might work…
Both of her feet went in them so I pulled them out and have stuffed them with wet paper towel pieces letting them dry overnight… I’ll see what happens tomorrow when I unpack them…
How to waste an afternoon and evening… UGH! But I won’t give up…
In the meantime, how about a few new pictures of Bailey… that are sure to make you smile…
Well, I hope I can get to sleep without thinking of shoe ideas…
See you tomorrow,
Blessings to you all!
Love you too, Jeanne
Oh…..My……..I am in shock, Jeanne! I kept hoping one of these days I’d get to Nebraska again (my husband is from there) and we’d get to meet in person. Kathie’s comments on my FB posts were always so sweet.
For those of you who do Facebook, there is a nice write-up on her page: https://www.facebook.com/kathie.welsh It’s a public post, so you don’t need to be “friends” to see it. There are some lovely pictures, too.
Now as to shoes….well, I’m afraid I’d be no help there; the best I can do is knit baby booties!! But I have no doubt you will figure something out!
I am down in Puyallup now, at the air bnb house I’m sharing with two girlfriends. I am the last one up (no surprise), but even for me, this is “early”–only 11:30 p.m.! I will probably turn in shortly myself.
We attended our annual pre-expo dinner at Golden Corral restaurant tonight, and it was a lot of fun. Three other gals from Tonya and ReNae’s sewing group are also up from Utah–they came yesterday and took pre-Expo classes today. I wasn’t that ambitious! I have two classes tomorrow and three on Friday (leaving some time for shopping, of course!), and then will drive home Saturday morning.
I am her son Kevin. We will miss her and we are grateful for your nice comments!!
Oh Jeanne, what a heartbreaking piece of news about Kathie’s passing! I had to read that several times to make sure it was the Kathie that we all know and love! She was so kind to me, when she wrote and asked if I wanted a coat pattern she had, or wanted to know if I wanted her to make it, and then she actually mentioned me in the last post she wrote. She never mentioned being sick, do you know what happened? What a loss for all of us sofa sisters! May she rest in peace.
OK, the sandals, Jeanne, you really don’t have to make those sandals if they don’t work out. I think you push yourself too hard and while all of those options didn’t work out to your expectations, I think the ones she is currently wearing are going to work out just fine for that outfit. In fact, she even would look cute going barefoot! (although maybe not with the hat on!)
Thank you so much!!
How very sad. Kathie was so kind and I always looked forward to her comments as she was so knowledgeable. I sent the only doll I have from childhood to Kathie when she let us know that she had a doll hospital. My Mary Hoyer doll arrived back home with all four limbs reattached. I hadn’t named my doll but will call her Kathie now. 😥
I am so sorry to hear this about Kathie. She was so sweet to us at Christmas and earlier. She always seemed so cheerful in her comments. We will pray for her and her family. May she rest in glorious peace forever. Amen.
So kind of you. Thanks
You never know when you’re going to go. I think we all need to look to Kathie, and how she lived her life. She was so caring and generous. I especially loved her beautiful garden photos. An amazing array for sure. And the dolls she shared at Christmas, this year were so fun. She was so kind to share her great knowledge of dolls with us. Such a loss. My thoughts are with her family.
So sorry to hear about Kathie. What a wonderful lady. My heartfelt thoughts go to her family and to all those who loved her!
We will miss hearing from her.
Oh boy, I certainly didn’t want to send Jeanne, into a sandal frizzy. I’m sure that Bailey will appreciate all of her work. We do too. It is nice to see what works and what, well doesn’t. I’m wondering if using pleather instead of real leather might work better? It’s much thinner and has some stretch. I actually made a pair of sandals some years back with it, and it worked on a small doll. I think I used that plastic foam, comes in many colors, for the soles and probably Aileen’s glue. Those tiny clothes pins work perfectly to hold them together while drying as well. Just another idea that Jeanne, has probably already tried. Anyway, I think using the foam soles, which would be more delicate, and maybe the bias tape for the tops with a piece of tiny elastic attached around the heel might work? And the last pair that are drying. What about using a thinner sole? Just a thought.
Here, we’re now enjoying our high speed internet and new tv. Still might want to get a wall mount for the bedroom tv, but the one in the living room is working great. Actually, too many choices of what to watch. Fun though. 🙂 And perfect timing as we expect more rain for like the next five days. Ugh.
Do you now have streaming TV? I love ours. Sometimes with all our cable channels we couldn’t find a thing to watch. We like a lot of the older – I mean “old” shows of classic TV and now we can watch them whenever we want. But we have found some newer amazing shows that we’d missed over the years like “Almost Paradise”. A series we are watching now from Canadian TV is “Murdock Mysteries”. It is a great show. It started in 2008 and is still going on. Some amazing writers. Glad you are enjoying your new technology, but you sure are right about all the choices.
I do think we can stream, but are not quite up to that yet. We’re just newby’s. Lucky if we can get the local, SF news. 🙂 I’ll bet there are some great shows out there. Thanks.
Oh, dear, you just never know when someone with leave so quickly and unexpected. I am so sorry for her family. I certainly makes me think of enjoying each day that I have.
As for the sandals, I loved making them in Ultra Suede. I just to get it from Field’s Fabrics on line. I would order it in small strips and it wasn’t so costly.
I am so sad about Kathie. She made my two 18″ MA dolls stand again even when she had never seen legs attached like theirs and the normal way to fix them wouldn’t work. But she did her best at trying to tighten them up and what she did worked. She was an amazing person all around and I looked forward to her comments each day. I’m wondering, Jeanne, if there is a way to do a “Kathie” page on the blog where some of the wonderful pictures she posted will be all in one place. When I saw the news I was thinking we just heard from her yesterday. I know it’s very true that we are never promised a tomorrow so make the best of today, but this is just too sudden for me to wrap my head around. I will be praying for her family. I know Kathie is with the Angels and what an asset to their community.
As for the sandals, Joy mentioned something that was similar to a pair of sandals I made for my 18″ doll a few years ago. Very simple and it worked. Just getting something around the back of their foot to hold the sandal on should work. I actually used clear elastic so the sandals looked like slip ons.
Yes, Barbara, I agree a “Kathie” page would be lovely!
Barbara I saw on the news last night about the fires in Texas. I am well aware how big the state is but the news didn’t give any indication of where so I hope you are safe and well.
The fires are in the panhandle which is a long way from me. I was just reading that there are so many they are hard to contain. There has already been a lot of cattle that died, not to mention a lot of grazing area lost, and very sadly an 83-year-old woman who could not get out of her house in time lost her life. But many have evacuated and are safe. Definitely prayers needed for that area. Thanks for asking.
I’m so sorry to hear of Kathie’s passing. She was such a kind and sweet person and I enjoyed her comments. Her garden was just beautiful. Prayers for her family. May Jesus surround them with His love and comfort.
I was sad to hear of Kathie’s passing, My parents both died very suddenly, Mum of a stroke at 62 and Dad of a heart attack at 96, and it’s the feeling ‘yesterday we were doing this together’ that I found difficult. My commiserations to the family may they find comfort in knowing that she is safe in God’s love.
I like Anne’s comment — yesterday we were doing this together. It does describe the empty space.
But Kathie did leave a great gift for everyone she knew or wrote to — everyone is commenting on her kindness and niceness and how much we appreciated it. When something like this is lovely and noted and appreciated, it’s something everyone who appreciated it can practice. It’s nice that the world is a better place because Kathie was here.
As for shoes, the ones Bailey has on are cute, but a picture of her sitting barefoot in the grass (or a green hand towel) would be cute.
Oh Jeanne,
How sad to know about the passing of Kathie.
I do not write messages very often here, but I read every post of yours. I always read with interest the comments because we always learn something new from them. Kathie’s comments were always cheerful and kind. We will miss her.
May the Lord comfort the family and Kathie rest in peace.