Hi everyone,
Fortunately for all of us, Sissy sent me some REALLY fun pictures and a fantastic story to go with them! I’m still not up to being in my sewing room just yet, but maybe 10% better. You’re going to LOVE THIS much more than another question!! :o)
Sissy sent this email to go along with her pictures!! ENJOY!!
Jeanne, these paper dolls were painted of my mother and me and our actual clothes by a mother and daughter who were artists. They were my Grandmother’s and my Mom’s friends.
The first page shows pictures of my mom as a child and her clothes. The Artist did this when mom was little as a gift for my Grandmother. Then, when I
was 7 years old, the artist’s daughter, who had made several water color pictures of me as I grew, thought it would be fun to make paper dolls of me and my clothes as her mother had done for my mom. These paper dolls were actually cut out and played with but my mom saved them in one of her books.
I made these pages of them and gave the dolls and clothes to a place to be framed. Unfortunately, the store lost them, so I am so glad I had taken these photos of them. I wish I could remember the names of those two sweet ladies.
Hope you are feeling better!
hugs,
Sissy
Thank you Sussy,
This was SO much fun for us to see!! Thank you for sharing this precious family treasure! I don’t know anyone else who has their own personalized paper dolls!
Blessings, Jeanne
I’m glad you are feeling a tiny bit better anyway, Jeanne. Don’t be afraid to call in or even go to urgent care, though, if you are running a high fever or starting to feel worse again.
Sissy, thank you for sharing the pictures of your paper dolls! They are just wonderful. I especially like yours, as the clothes aren’t so different from what I wore at that age–you’re not a whole lot older than I am, I know! How sad that the store lost your original paper dolls, though!! That was really unfortunate.
I posted on yesterday’s blog earlier this evening, answering Jeanne’s question, and replied to a some comments–two of Barbara’s and one of Ingrid’s–if you want t go back and take a look. I had gotten onto the blog last night, but I was too early, and then I forgot to check back as the evening wore on.
Reading your comment about threading your serger reminds me of why I went whole hog and bought my Baby Lock Triumph serger with the air threading when I was able. I used to get so frustrated at my old serger, which was as basic as you could get, and wasted many sewing hours trying to get the thing to work. When I had the chance to get a new sewing machine or a new serger, I decided my sewing machine did what I needed it to do but my serger not so much. So I opted for the Baby Lock Triumph which not only has the air threading but a wider throat space as well as also being a coverlock. I love that I can easily change thread colors to match my fabric and am able to actually use my serger for finishing touches on the outside of my garment without a lot of trouble (much still to learn on that). At the time Baby Lock was the only serger with air threading but recently I learned that Husqvarna Viking (which is what my sewing machine is) has come out with one similar and less expensive.
OH, thank you for that tip, about Viking having an air-threading serger now, too, Barbara! I will definitely look into that. I am definitely a Viking girl–I have a #1+ (the extension of my right arm!!) and a 6530 (from 1974), as well as a Viking 610 serger. I don’t have a Huge problem with threading the one I have, but the difficulty is that I am no longer as flexible as I once was, and of course vision changes with the years, also! Even after having had cataract surgeries a few years ago, my eyes are really not quite as sharp as they were previously, I don’t think.
Oh gee, paper dolls were my #1 thing to play when a little girl! I even made my own! I loved cutting out the dresses, and playing with my best friend all the time! Sissy, those are adorable and you certainly were a cute little girl! Your mother was so pretty and I love the contrast between the clothing. I guess my daughter and I would have the same thing! My clothes resembled yours too! And I even had braids, especially when we played Indians! Ha, ha, sounds like I was part tom-boy but I assure you I wasn’t! My idea of playing Indians was we sat in a circle in a play teepee and ate cookies! But we wore braids!🤣
Oh, that was too bad that the store lost your original copies, but at least you have photographs. Did you frame those?
Jeanne, I hope you and George get better, but you are not alone. I also had some kind of cold or bug, but no fever, and my daughter is now going through it. I think partly it is the changing of the weather, one day hot, the next cold, and wet. Allergies could also play a part, although I don’t have any that I know of. Sometimes they come later in life. At any rate, just take it easy and slow down. We are here for you!❤️
How fun to have the play teepee experience with the addition of cookies. 🙂 Here, I had my playhouse which was a ton of fun. It had a ladder inside and a trap door that opened to the roof. I also had one of those little electric stoves with a power line that my father ran out along the clothes line for my stove. I had a lot of fun making the cake mixes and experimenting with things like instant mashed potatoes. I also remember having pretty old bottles with stoppers that I made colored water in to display. I used crepe paper which made nice water dye. Lots of memories there. 🙂 I forgot. I used to sift dirt to make fine flour which I mixed with water to make dirt cakes and cookies. 🙂
Sounds. Like you had oodles of fun, Joy! Especially loved to hear about your sifted dirt cakes and cookies! What fun for little girls! My father made us girls a big sandbox, with seats at the corners, and we made all kinds of cakes and cookies decorated with berries from our honeysuckle bush. We used water to mix with sand to make various things! The messier, the better!
I had a big sandbox like yours with seats in the corners. The boys next door who were younger, and I made a river down the middle with sand hills on each side. I don’t think my dad was too happy because a lot of sand ended up outside the box. Ha ha
I didn’t have a playhouse, Joy, but my grandparents had a greenhouse attached to their house and I played in there. They started garden seeds and rooted plants in there. I made all kinds of dirt recipes decorated with flowers and items from the yard. Also “soup” which was water with garden items.
So neat that you had your own little stove that actually worked. What fun other memories you have.
Well the greenhouse sounds like a blast. I would have liked that too because I was always planting things and growing seeds. I’ll bet your soup was delicious. Ha ha
Joy, Linda, and Laura, y’all bring back such fun memories. I loved playing on the beach across from our house. My dear great-uncle taught me how to make a “toad house” by covering my foot with damp sand and removing my foot. We made drip castles, and I loved digging up black mud and making “dishes” from it, digging clams, catching crabs, picking up shells. Nice to go back in time.
No clams or crabs in my neighborhood as a child. They were out at the coast 20 miles away, but we had a seasonal creek next door that was a dream. We caught so many pollywogs and always had a few green tree frogs in our yard. Another muddy experience. Must have been wonderful to be near the beach. 🙂
Jeanne, I am happy that you are feeling a teeensy bit better. Keep drinking and resting.
🧑🏽‍⚕️ nurses do not wear hats anymore like in the days of olden. Anyway, keep your chest and lungs clear, use saline spray if you can to keep those sinuses moist.
Sissy, thank you for sharing your dolls. I loved cut out dolls so so much.
I would have had a melt down if a store told me they lost them. Absolutely tragic!
Today and tomorrow I am gonna straighten up the house here. We have Brian the real estate agent coming on Thursday afternoon, and I do want this place to look some what like “sane people live here” because right now, it is a tornado.
Jeanne, I will email you my EPP project. Last night I pulled out all of the papers.
Charlotte, I will go bk and look at your comments.
Love to all
What wonderful childhood memories to have! I’m with Rosemary; sounds more like theft than lost. The picture of you and your mother didn’t arrive in the message. Hopefully it’ll get added. The clothes are as beautiful as you were as a child! What a treasure! Thanks for sharing with us.
Jeanne, do you get annual flu shots? We couldn’t get on the military ship to go to England in 1956 without having gotten it. I have gotten it every year since and have never had the flu. Also there is a new vaccine that protects especially older people from RSV (respiratory syncytial virus). Google Search for info on it? It also protects those around you.
Dear Jeanne, prayers continue for you.
Thanks to Sissy for sharing her lovely paper dolls. What a treasure they are!
I too played with paper dolls. I think I had Rock Hudson and Doris Day.
Whispering 2 days
Oh yes, Dorothy! Also Betty Grable, Elizabeth Taylor, Esther Williams, and Gene Tierney, paper dolls too among other glamorous movie stars! So fun to dress them up!
And Cyd Charisee, Eve Arden, Sandra Dee, tons of bridal parties, a lot of child stars such as Evelyn Rudie, Shirley Temple (including one very tall doll), and every one of the Lennon Sisters paper doll books including one of Janet alone. And tons more paper dolls that weren’t celebrities.
I had the Lennon Sisters paper dolls! And I think someone else, although we didn’t go to a lot of movies, but we did see the Lennon Sisters on TV! Years later I found an incomplete set at a thrift store, I think, and bought them. I did remember the clothes ands such from my old set that I gave away when we moved.
What fabulous paper dolls. The clothing is amazing and Sissy such a cutie. So glad that Sissy has the photos, but sorry for the loss of the originals. Thanks for sharing Sissy and Jeanne.
I didn’t get back to see the blog yesterday to respond, and I’m sorry that Charlotte and Barbara had one of those days, sewing. But, glad that Charlotte was able to get the machine threaded. I was thinking about trying to sew something for my Dazzle, but not a clue of what size pattern to use other than the one that comes with her. I won’t know about that though as my last minute and last flight girl left HK and headed north to another city in China before finally landing in Anchorage yesterday. Today she is headed to Louisville, KY. Hopefully, she will fly back to Oakland some time soon. Still no delivery date.
I too am wondering if Jeanne received the flu and RSV vaccine? Hope so, but not sure what exactly she and George picked up. A tiny bit better is not good enough for me. If it gets worse or lingers, please call the advice nurse and get a prescription if directed. This stuff is nothing to dismiss.
And more weeding going on here. I finally made it almost to the back fence. Yay. Of course, just a pathway, but something. I was able to uncover one side of the artichoke plant but still need to get in there and really yank out blackberry and other awful weeds. Other person actually pulled some weeds yesterday. Granted, they were in the raised beds and very few, but some anyway. Today, we are off to pick up some manure at Home Depot and then pick up the rototiller at the other house. Fortunately, other person is getting the beds ready. I’ll be back yanking and pulling weeds in other locations. No end in sight. Ugh
Wouldn’t it be fun if Sissy or Jeanne made a dress similar to one of those paper dolls? I’d like to see one for a Ruby Red, or Meadow Mae. 🙂
OK. Lots of concern here for health issues. I’d be less concerned but when I recently went for a blood draw, the waiting areas were empty — they were shifting incoming patients to different areas with lower numbers of people because of the RSV Susette was talking about. It’s probably time to check in, even by phone, with your doctor’s office to be sure that’s not what you have. Also, friends in Ohio just finished with COVID. Better to be sure that you don’t have either. You just spent time breathing hospital air — there’s no better place if you are looking for germs.
Like everyone else here, I had, made, and loved paper dolls, and these are beautiful. Could they be photocopied, enlarged, and be remade as paper dolls?
Jeanne, sorry you are still feeling a bit peaked yet today. But any improvement is good. I just had a bout with “I haven’t a clue”. If I were to describe it I’d say it was like I had been lifting heavy boxes and pulled muscles or pinched nerves. I’ve been trying to think what I’d been doing that would have cause it. I had no symptoms of anything other than what I mentioned and just on the right side of my body. I was wondering if it was a virus that affected my muscles. Whatever it was it’s gone now but it was pretty uncomfortable for a couple days. I give things a few days before I panic, and usually I don’t need to.
How wonderful that Sissy has a paper doll of her and some of her clothes when she was little. And her mother when she was small. What an amazing gift. So sad that the shop lost the original paper dolls. I always loved paper dolls and have collected as many as I can of the ones I had when I was little from a website called Paper Goodies. I haven’t cut them out and decided that if Jaiden wanted to play with them I would just copy them for her, but she had no interest. I also belong to Diana Vining’s Paper Doll Club. I loved designing clothes for my paper dolls. I really would have loved having a paper doll of me and some of my clothes. What a wonderful idea and one I’d never heard of other than in the case of celebrities.
Well Brianna is smiling today and over the moon wearing her new spring dress. I’m so glad it fits her to perfection. She loves it. Hopefully her new pink shoes will arrive shortly and then she will be ready for dancing around the Maypole. Now I’m going to start dresses for my RRFF Mini Hanna twins Jamie and Jodie. I know they will look adorable. When I’m finished with those I will take some pictures of my latest creations.
Can’t wait to see pics of your Brianna and the mini Hanna twins. I received an update on my Dazzle and somehow, she has gotten to Oakland, but delivery isn’t until Thursday. I’m sure she’ll be waving at your littles although she is only 5.5 🙂
Can’t wait to see what you make for this tiny little one. I tried the one dress that didn’t fit anyone on my AG Mini and it barely fit her. So I looked at the sheet I cut the pieces out of thinking maybe I had not printed them at the right size but they were printed right. So I’m really baffled. The pattern is supposed to fit Kish Riley and other 7 to 8″ dolls. I used the same type pattern for my Meadow Lolla and it worked perfectly. I have never seen a Kish Riley in person but they must be really slender.
I haven’t looked at the Riley here in awhile, but she does have a tummy. Jeanne used to sew for her, but may have sent hers to a new home.
My Dazzle is in Seattle already! IT says delivery 5/1, but MAYBE it will be 4/30 instead!!! Yay!
What beautiful paper dolls, Sissy. I can’t believe the store “lost” them. I, like so many others drew and played with paper dolls.
I enlarged yours and see a name under Raggedy Andy. Could that be one of the artists?
I hope that you and George continue to improve.
LOL, Laura, that name is mine! Sissy is a nick name because both my mom and I have the same first name.
So glad you like the paper dolls. My great -Aunt made most of my clothes, and probably my mom’s as well. She made the Raggedy Andy, too.
So glad you all had fun with my paper dolls. I know I had hours of fun with the original ones. I used to take my $.25 allowance to the dime store every Saturday and bought a new set of paper dolls for $.10. Copying one of these for a doll would be fun, I shall think of that.
Jeanne, Prayers that you and George just have light colds and get well soon. Prayers continue.