Treva and the Christmas Trolls

The last falling leaves of November continue to drift to the earth, and the barren trees are opening up to the vistas of winter.  While many of you can now walk out to snow on your front porches and lawns, we are still dry as a bone.  So, as with always, and since I can remember, my holiday season, the snows of Christmas, are all in my imagination and deep in my heart.  In fact, this year is very abnormal, as we would often go cross-country skiing on Thanksgiving Day in the Sierras.  No rain.  No snow.

Perhaps this is one of the reasons I treasure Jan Brett's winter and Christmas stories.  They take you to far away Nordic countries, where the snow is deep and the architecture, a pure work of art.  Her gorgeous illustrations and story telling have enchanted me since I first discovered her work through The Mitten.  The Mitten is a story of a lost mitten that animal after wintering animal climbs into to get warm.  

Finally, with no room left in the mitten, one last animal attempts to climb in, someone sneezes, and they all blow out of that poor stretched glove.

I must have thirty of her books, and Christmas Trolls is one of my favorites.  A predecessor to Christmas Trolls, was The Trouble with Trolls, which introduced Treva and the mischievous small ones.  Christmas Trolls brings us a new pair of trouble makers with pointy ears, furry tails, fluffy-stand-up hair-dos, and wonderfully colorful and patched clothing.

The story takes place eight days from Christmas, when Treva begins to notice that their Christmas gifts and treats are disappearing.  She and her small bother, Sami, begin to look for the missing items, and then one day Treva spots their plum pudding scudding across the field of snow on the back of a porcupine.  The porcupine leads her to a tree house where two unhappy trolls live.  The trolls only want to have a Christmas,

but have no idea that its more than just "things".  The good natured Treva teaches them how to be good and how to experience Christmas.  Buy the book.  I can't give the whole story away!

As many times as I've opened one of her books that contained a child, I have often thought how darling one of them would be come to life in a doll.  Last year, maybe around this very time of year, I purchased a 10" Maggie Iacono just for this purpose.  Christmas came and went with Peggy Sue (and Grace Marie Fitzpatrick),at the forefront, so the little doll sat in a bag with some trims until about three weeks ago.  It was now or never.  

What enchanted and inspired me to create Treva was this beautiful parka she wore.  So much detail, so bright and cheery.  And, her little Swedish horse toys.  Long ago, I'd purchased Lilla Britta, a 9" Wendy Lawton doll that came with one, in a trunk with a Santa Lucia outfit and candle crown, and tray of rolls.  The dara Trojan horse is a symbol of Sweden, and Treva's favorite toy.

So, I ventured off to create the image of Treva with the 10" Maggie Iacono doll.  The first thing to get made was the stockings.  I thought they might be pants, but images of her, indoors, and wearing a light blue dress with navy tights put that to rest.  These dolls have such funny little bodies, and very long feet, and the 10" dolls have no butt.  Just a torso, then legs.  So creating a pair of tights to fit her took a little longer than I'd hoped.  I used an old, but still in good shape, Land's End mock turtle neck t-shirt.  The last thing I was going to do was start trying to buy cotton jersey and risking receiving the wrong color.  The shirt worked, and I cut it up.

The next task was making the snow boots.  Sometimes I have far too much confidence in what I might be able to do, and these boots proved a solid challenge.  Not having any suede, I used the thin leather I make shoes from, but used the other side!  It works.  And, it's nice because the smooth slide of the leather on the inside allows a stocking'd foot to go in easily.  These are pretty much the same design as UGG boots.

The difference being the red trim and fur.  Humble moments existed throughout.  I worked very hard on making my first pair of these, then discovered that the red trim, which is small pieces of hand-made pipping, were positioned in the wrong spots.  

Okay. first of all, I was sick for two weeks with a bad cold.  It came on fast with a wretched sore throat, went immediately into my head and chest, and I suffered.  Coughing all night, blowing my nose continually...I'm still getting over it while I write this blog.  SO, that's my big excuse for screwing them up.  Not all was lost though since the real sheered fur, and red piping trim was glued on.  Off it came, and I did a bit more studying of the boots in each illustration, and finally got them right.  The dark spots are compliments of those fabulous alcohol markers.

Treva's parka was a nightmare to design and put together as

well. In short, I spent a lot of time thinking it all through, trying this and that, redoing that and this, and there was no room for short cuts. 

The curved pockets in the front of the parka took a couple of days to figure out, and there's a big front pocket above them.  The problem lay in the jacquard trim.  I have seven jacquard trims that I selected this one from.  Would it have been easier to hand embroider the folk design?  Not really.  I thought a good long time about it, and using the trim was the answer.  (The parka is made from wool felt.) 

The jacquard ribbon is trimmed, itself, in red.  The countless details of this parka are what make it beautiful, but recreating it in miniature was a quite a feat.  The belt is the ribbon encased in red and hand-stitched up the back.  Tiny red embroidery thread tassels, are sewn to the pointed ends.  Another nightmare feat - those pointed ends.  But, what a joy to look at!  

Finally, she wore a lovely headband to keep her ears warm.  Two 

little needle felted pom-poms (needle felting comes in handy!), attach to a heart shaped metal brooch on the band.  The heart was made from leather, and the details were done with a Sharpie pen.  

Another interesting feature of this parka was that it was a pull-over, so many of the final details were done to the doll and jacket after the last fitting, and that included braiding her hair after the headband went on.

Yesterday I set to work on her little dara Trojan horses.  Both are tiny needle felts on wire armature.  I think these are the smallest ones I've ever made.  The red dara is 1.5" tall at the tip of his ears, and his "painted design" was needle felted on.  

The troll horse, a gift from the trolls, is slightly larger at 1.75" to the tips of his ears.  He was fun to make. Yes, he's missing his saddle, but he's so small, and I couldn't bear the thought of

trying to make microscopic wool beads.  Later I considered embroidering them on with French knots, but then I began to feel very Type A, which I am, and settled for no saddle.  His tail is a wonder!

Why does the troll horse have a tail when the red dara doesn't?  Because the trolls have tails!

Honestly, too much fun.  And, both fit into her curved pockets.  When Treva discovers the missing cakes and toys, she tucks her favorite red horse into her pocket so it doesn't "disappear".

I'm so pleased that I finally made Treva and she's my first Christmas doll of the season.  I have plans for five or six other costumes, and you know I won't get to more than one or two of them.  This is

okay.  The fact that I feel good enough to do another, and maybe two, its fabulous.  All my Christmas boxes were mailed in November, and so were my Christmas cards.  Tomorrow I'll finish decorating the house - the tree went up a week ago and was decorated on Thanksgiving Day - and I'll begin my next Christmas doll project on Wednesday.  No work this holiday season.  Just play!

Jan Brett is giving a live video on Facebook, December 2nd, at 5pm EST.  She's introducing her new book, The Nutcracker, which she's set in Russia.  I received my copy a couple of days ago, and it's quite a different story from the original, but all Jan Brett.  The artwork on each page (of any of her books), takes hours to enjoy with so many details and elaborately illustrated side panels.

Below are a few scans from the book Christmas Trolls.  And, a few more photos of Treva and her dara horses.  

By the way, if you've never gotten a Jacquie Lawson Advent Calendar, they're a must!  I just downloaded mine yesterday, and can't wait to begin it on December the first.  They're a joy to come to any time of the day with so much to do and see.  Her animated advent calendars have been a staple of my Christmas season since the first one I tried.  And, now they're easier than ever to install!  Tis the season to be jolly!  

Love, Melissa

Treva, brother Sami, Tuffi the dog

Where did all the toys go to?

Keeping her horse safe with her.

Aha!  There they are!

Treva teaches the trolls how to be happy.

She shows them Christmas, with the gift of her horse.

Then receives a troll horse in exchange.

Camera oops!  Fun photo though!

Awesome, Jan Brett

 

Skipper's Dream Room

What's really been an obsession of mine lately, are the vintage diorama, cardboard fold-up dream houses and rooms that Mattel made for Barbie and Skipper back in the early 1960s.  I would have flipped for one of these as a child, but alas, my mother hid all the advertisements for such "expensive" toys.  

As you know, I bought the reproduction Barbie Dream House a couple of years ago, and I've loved it ever since I assembled it and set it up.  Barbie and Ken have enjoyed every holiday in that Dream

House, and they've even traveled to Hawaii, dressing up for friends when they returned home.

Last month, or earlier?, I discovered that Skipper had a Dream Room.  A seller on Ebay had listed the Dream Room and Barbie's Kitchen Dinette.  Guiltily, I could only afford one of them, and have since been kicking myself in the fanny for not buying BOTH.  For some reason she'd added reasonable shipping to Skipper's Dream Room, but a walloping $75 for the Kitchen Dinette.  Still...I should have bought both.  Found a way.

I've always been of mind that vintage and antique are not in my purchasing category as I detest dirty old things.  Things that have yellowed or cracked with age. Items with yellowed tape, stains, holes, ratty hair, etc., but this is what you get unless you get really lucky with these cardboard homes.

As I set up this charming little room, I'd begun to do a lot of research on it, and realized that many pieces were missing.  That's another reality of vintage toys.  But, I did a little fixing up of what was there and kept an eye out for missing bits and pieces to include later.

What's usually missing from sets like this are things like pillows and cardboard toys and paper items that got lost or destroyed with time.  Even pieces of furniture.  If you don't know what to look for, how are you to know the set is complete?

Well, lo and behold, another auction came up for Skipper's Dream Room a couple of weeks later, and it had items like the curtains, the paper rug, the cardboard rag dolly, and an unused set of fabric for the pillows. It even had the foam pieces for between the pillows and lots of the sticky tape that little girls would use to assemble all of this. 

So I did my best to win it, and did.  There went my allowance for the month!  Of course, a little girl would play with these toys.  And, she'd put things together as she pleased.  So one of the chairs in my first set had a pillow glued to the back of a chair.  I did my earnest best to remove the pillow and clean off the stickiness.  Then I colored in the damaged paper.  That chair now sits next to the desk.  The second set also had the books for the shelves in the desk!  You can see them next to the repaired chair.  

I began adding little accessories from my Skipper collection, like the mini Queen of Prom game that came in a Barbie repro gift set.  And, for the tiny Barbie New Dream House, I added one of her tiny Barbies.  Later I found a tiny Ken that must have come with one of the reproduction gift sets.  I might just make a few pieces of tiny cardboard furniture for this petite play house.  It is the one thing that made the decision for me when considering either Skipper's Dream Room or the Kitchen Dinette.

Skipper's Dream Room came with two heart backed chairs, and one curved back, comfort chair.  Seeing as how this room was large enough for all six chairs, in the other three went.  The first set only came with one of the settees.  And, it was missing the brace or leg.  So I made a cardboard support to hold it up.  

I used one of the half tables that holds the bird cage as an end table to hold the second lamp.  If you're wondering about the other pieces and the folding structure of the second set I bought, it was a mess.  

Rotten, torn, bending...you name it.  A lot of the legs for the tables in these sets are hopelessly damaged.  They're not worth saving.  

One of the great things about the second set, was that the pink flooring that sits in the game room with the curtains was in perfect condition.  The flooring in the first set I bought was badly damaged and had patches of yellowed tape.  It was more than worth the cost to buy the second set for all it added to the first.  If you want something nice, you have to invest.

Sadly, there is no perfect and pristine when it comes to these vintage finds.  I'm just delighted to have one in the condition I've made it into.

Another item I used from the second set was the bed spread.  There are these little double-sided blue buttons that go through stitch holes to pinch the ends together.  One of them was missing from the first set.  This bed spread is much nicer.  A little of this, a little of that.  

I know there are a lot of people who feel you   

shouldn't clean or fix antiques, as they'll lose their value.  Well, when it comes to printed cardboard, I think there has to be an allowance.  Its no good to anyone damaged.  And, I want the best for my dolls.

I loved Barbie as a child, but Skipper was my doll.  She was the pretty little girl I wanted to be.  She had it all.  Vintage Skipper collecting is not new to me.  Just the Dream Room.  Several years ago I went on a Skipper bender and bought every single outfit she had in the early 60s and each had to be

complete and in mint condition.  Later I would do the same for a Twist n Turn Mod Skipper.  One doll each for these collections.  Maybe Mod Skipper had a vinyl house, or room, carry case.  One thing at a time.

I am not reliving my childhood.  Mine did not include these marvelous toys.  This is an adult's appreciation of something truly marvelous from long ago.

I hope you'll enjoy these photographs.  I also just made a fabulous book purchase.  Marl B. Davidson wrote a compendium called Barbie Structures and Furniture, that describes all of these extraordinary toys.  Color photos, complete descriptions.  Its now out of print, and such a lucky find.  I need it!!!

Love, Melissa

photo courtesy of Ebay

photo courtesy of Ebay

 

Cissy in HOliday Cocktails

Here we are entering the third week of November already!  I must admit that time has evened itself out nicely since not only the beginning of the month, but since the time change.  I like the time change.  I know a lot of people don't, but I like getting up early and going to bed equally early.  I read at night before I fall asleep.  When there's very little sunlight in the late autumn and winter days, I use it wisely.  

Some seamstresses and artisans enjoy working at night, but I don't.  It feels like I'm working "overtime".  I think it goes back to my days as a working girl.  When night would come, its time to rest the mind, and body.  Silly.  I know.  But, that's me.

October was fabulous, and enjoying Halloween all month long by sewing doll costumes, made it super fun.  I never know where my inspiration is going to take me.  Even though I'll plan - and its good to have a plan - I often get an idea that must be followed

through on the spot.  

I was looking at my doll shelf in my bedroom (doesn't everyone have one?  hahaha), and noticed that poor Cissy was still in her aqua spring coat and dress.  Pretty as it might be, she really needed a bit of a change up.  When I started sewing for her, I made four complete outfits for her, one after another.  Then that was it.  I was watching the series The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel at the time, and went nuts thinking I would make some of Midge's outfits, too.  Bought fabric, straw for hats, you name it.  Then "bloop".  Dropped  the whole idea, and started on something else that inspired me.

It should also be noted, that just before finishing Peggy Sue's Mechanical Man costume, I was already tinkering with Christmas ideas.  So, one thing lead to another, and Cissy had to have a red silk dress to wear to the holiday cocktail parties.

I think you already know how much I've been enjoying 50s Mid Century retro images since dressing Peggy Sue.  Well, Miss Cissy was Mid Century, too.  Just a grown up version.   And boy, oh boy, does dressing her take a lot of fabric.  I just happened to have a nice length of this gorgeous red silk taffeta, and have used most of it on this cocktail dress.

The dress is a mix and match of some reproduction patterns I bought a couple of years ago, and the jacket, or bolero, was designed from one of those patterns.  It was shortened and the neckline was redrawn.

I had the red shoes, and added a rhinestone to the center.  Do I need to admit that the rhinestone was glued on?  Yes.  Because I did try to back it with the prong setting the rhinestones came with, but the prongs were not long enough for the thickness of the elastic.  I made the little evening purse and it does work - lined and closes with a snap.

Cissy's bandeau is a Richard Originals.  He does such a beautiful job on these.  I couldn't do better.  And, it matched this cocktail dress beautifully.  I don't always have to jump into a huge, prolonged project to get some satisfaction out of it.  Creating costuming needs to be fun and simplified at times.

What I like about this dress is that it can be worn without the bolero.  I may make a belt for it as an option.  I was a little skeptical that the dress wouldn't be fancy enough on its own.  I spent a couple of days trying a big, fold over bow in front, but her arms got in the way of showing it off.  It was too much.  The old "less is better" had to win this time.  But, who can argue with RED?  Cissy has a holiday cocktail dress, and I'm planning a New Year's Eve gown for her.  And, a spring cropped pants outfit, too!  Here we go again.  

I have not forgot the two Red Riding Hood outfits I want to make.  They will come.  I just had to make this for Cissy.

In the meantime, and before hand, I was experimenting with tiny honeycomb decorations.  The idea was to make a few Halloween ones in addition to the ones I have, and that didn't happen.  Halloween was over, so I tried the Christmas ones.  The snowman, Santa by the Tree and Santa with a Bell, are from a Jean Nordquist mini honeycombs kit.  The tree came first, and I felt that was a minor success, so I tried the Santa.  Now hers didn't have the little bell made on it, but being a once-upon-a-time miniaturist, I had to try it.  Cutting tiny shapes through those thick pads of honeycomb paper is not easy.  The tiny bell came out cute.

Emboldened by my experiments, and the success of the snowman, I decided to try my own.  First of all, you need images where the arms are generally free of the body.  And, a good study of how the bases of these honeycombs work.  

The candle is a mini reproduction of a decoration from the 80s.  The rest are from retro cards and images I found on Pinterest.  Would the little choir boy look better with a white tunic?  Of course.  But that would require cutting both black and white.  These honeycombs are about 2" to 2.5" tall.  The little pink angel on top of the dark green tress in the back is kind of weird.  She's obviously too big for the tree, but that is how the card was drawn.  All of this is just experimentation, and its FUN.  The caroling girl in red and white came out cute.  Her skirt was red and white plaid or check, and the honeycomb paper was red and white.  The effect was perfect!

As far as playing dolls and decorating early, I'd bought Ginger and Cinnamon, the Poppy Parker gift set way back last year.  I think it arrived in late summer and I couldn't wait to set up that cute little record player.  

The white tree was an Integrity purchase during their London year of Mod.  The backdrop is a vintage Barbie reproduction.  I like it.  Its how little girls played in the 60s.  We didn't have computers to generate super backdrops.  Mattel, by the way, has always been great at cardboard dioramas.  Just love this one.

And, at that, I'll say adieu until next time.  Here's some details of Cissy's Holiday Cocktails, and some great retro images.  Just for fun, pop into The Retro Christmas Card Company Home - Retro Christmas Card Company  They have the most amazing things and its been one of my sources of inspiration since last holiday season.

Wishing everyone who celebrates Thanksgiving, a great one.  And, to all of you, Christmas is coming!!!

Love, Melissa