Secret Holiday

After a brief internet hiatus...

I'm back! Sorry it's been a little while since my last update here. The past couple of weeks have been pretty crazy, between a craft fair in Boston, visiting family in New Hampshire, then scrambling to make more animals in a tiny amount of time for a craft fair in New York! Wow! Now, I'm almost done... almost. This week will be chock full of still more sewing, finishing up orders that were placed last week, along with custom holiday orders that need to get in the mail.... I am very much looking forward to all the animals being completed and sent out to their new homes, and for a chance to rest by the christmas tree with Justin and take a little break. We haven't even had a chance to get a tree yet!

But for now, I'm still chugging along. And, I wanted to let everyone know that I still have a few animals left. I will be posting them in my Etsy Shop tomorrow morning around 11:30am EST. This will be my last post before the New Year. Get yours while you still can! There will be some new favorites in the shop tomorrow - like a couple of these snowflake Fern Animals (shown above) and a little red and white reindeer, both made from beautiful vintage fabrics I found a few weeks ago in an enormous warehouse in Springfield (see some photos from my trip with Carrie here). 

Okay, well, it is very late and I need to get some sleep if I plan on pulling off this shop update in the morning, but I promise that at some point in the next couple of days I will post an official craft fair re-cap complete with photos and such. See you tomorrow! Good night!

PS. Thank you to everyone who left kind words about my Grandmother. It means a lot to me.

Helen Gertrude Brown

My childhood memories are full of images of visiting Grandma and Grandpa Brown. Their teeny tiny house, the one my father grew up in, was just a quick run through the woods from the house my mom and dad moved into when they married, right next door. I don't have any memories of the house as a place where there would actually be room for children to live and grow up in. To this day, I can't put together in my head how there would possibly be enough space, enough beds for all the children they raised. Between the sons and daughters, adopted and not, plus various foster children over the years. 

Every room, every inch, of the house I knew as a child was covered with dolls. The living room, the bedrooms, the shelves lining the hallway, tall shelves dividing the kitchen, all displaying dolls of every shape and size. My dad would take me and my sister over to visit, always bringing leftover chicken from KFC (where he has worked since he was sixteen). He would sit at the table between my grandparents and talk for hours with Grandma Brown (this family is so good at talking) while Grandpa would sit quietly, pulling apart the chicken and putting it out on plates for the stray cats. My sister and I would gaze at all the dolls, like we were in a candy store, waiting for Grandma to notice and let us play with one. She had a whole section of life-sized dolls in the kitchen by the refrigerator, next to the table we'd all be sitting at - those were our favorite. Those were the ones we wanted to hold and play with the most. 

I remember standing in the dark hallway, peering into what was once the living room. I couldn't go in, there was a gate blocking the doorway, keeping the tiny dogs out. Oh, those poor tiny dogs. Old, and falling apart. Bent, crippled limbs that would scrape against the floor when they walked, blue-white foggy blind eyes. My Grandma loved those dogs. 

Maybe my memory is wrong, but I remember the living room looking a bit gray. Like in a movie, before the room would suddenly brighten and turn to color for a memory sequence, when a ghostly child would run into the room, laughing, being chased by a dog. Okay, back to how I knew it. There was a fireplace and a couch and chairs, but everything was covered with a layer of dust and dolls. Dolls sitting on the chairs, shelves, mantle, and tall life-sized dolls standing around the edges of the room, and huddled in the middle, forming a small circular path for someone to come in and walk around. Except for the path, every possible inch was filled with a doll, collected over years and years of flea markets and yard sales. 

Grandma Brown passed away Sunday night, after years of never quite being herself anymore. My father told me that shortly after she stopped breathing, her mouth started moving, as if she were talking to someone. He believes she finally found Grandpa again. I like that. 

Goodbye Helen Gertrude Brown. We will love you forever.