Prized Posessions

Hey, remember about seven posts ago, when I talked about the small things I had, that meant so much to me?
It was inspired by a list of important life lessons my daughter Heidi had posted the day before on her blog.

One of them, number seventeen, really resonated with me.

In a nutshell it said to get rid of all your excess stuff, and to hold on to only those things that were useful, or if not exactly useful that really meant something to you. I realized that without intentionally doing it I had done it.
I wrote about the small, seemingly unimportant, little treasures I had accumulated over the years that to the casual observer may not look like much, but that meant an awful lot to me.

Well, I promised to put up pictures. That meant getting Lisa's help. I do have a nice little digital camera, and I actually do use it once in a while. But in this family, if you want beautifully done photos you go to either Lisa or my daughter Heidi.

They are both pretty incredible.

All right. Enough background. If you never saw the post you can read it here.
I can be succinct, clear and concise if I really put my mind to it.

At least I like to think I could.

Like, say, if someone put a gun to my head.

Alright, alright.
Without further adieu (or explanation) here are pictures of a few of my favorite things.

I love these. These are the paper dolls I made for Courtney when she was around nine years old. I mentioned these in my earlier post. I have made probably at least a hundred sets of paper dolls in my life time. Most of them before the age of 18. And one day I was thinking about them and wishing I had kept even a few of them.

That was when I decided to make some new ones. It had been a LONG time since I had drawn anything, so it took me a while to get the first doll done to my satisfaction.

I had so much fun. I made lots and lots of clothes for her. In fact I ended up making another one using the same body but drawing different hair and face. That was so Courtney's best friend Karleen would have her doll to play with too.

Oh how I wish I had one from my childhood to compare these to. I would be so interested to see which ones were better.

Well, the dolls were a huge hit.

Courtney and Karleen even took them to school to play with at recess. Of course they were the envy of all the other girls. Well the ones who weren't trying to pretend they were way to old and sophisticated to have an interest in something as juvenile as paper dolls.

They had been so much fun. Courtney then asked me if I had ever done little girls before.

The funny thing is that I don't think I ever did. When I was younger I made them to be whatever age I was at, at the time. That way I could dress them in all of the styles that I loved but didn't have. Well of course I did have clothes. I craved the clothes though that I saw the older girls wearing.

I mean think about it.

This was the era of Go Go Boots and Hip-huggers and all kinds of cool sixties fashions. Could you blame me for a little vicarious fashion wearing through my paper dolls?
I think NOT.

I decided that I would very MUCH like to make a set of little girls.
So I did.
They turned out so darn cute that they are my absolute favorites.

Aren't they just so cute? The picture only shows a small part of all of the adorable clothes I made for them. And who knew at the time that the outfit with the Mickey Mouse head would one day thrill a little grandaughter that at the time I wasn't even thinking ahead to.

And yes. It is one of Lorelai's favorite outfits for my little baby girl dolls.

While I'm on the subject of paper dolls, below is a picture of the darling little wooden doll my sister Janice bought for me several B.C. (before she had children) years ago.

I also have my little Happy Meal Dutch Barbie in this picture as well as the 2 dollar bill I won from David in one of his first contests/give-aways.


This is one I forgot to mention in my post that day. It's a little bar of soap that my oldest daughter Heidi made for me at her church girl's group activity to give me for Mother's Day when she was nine or ten.

I could never bring myself to use it. So it has been renting space in my bottom drawer ever since.

Don't worry. My rates are very affordable.

Alright. Now we come to my oldest and most favorite of all of my favorites. I already told the story of my little Piglet and how I acquired her.

It probably wasn't one of my finest moments, but hey, I was just a kid.

Here is my sweet little, 45 years young, porcelain painted piggy bank Piglet.

Isn't she just the SWEETEST?????

I know that there have been countless cheap knock offs of her seen in dollar stores and various other places over the years. Some of them weren't really even that cheap. I've seen a few that actually look pretty similar to her.

But.

As far as I'm concerned they are merely pale imitations, of my beloved little Piglet.

Like I pointed out in my earlier post, she has her share of the war wounds you would expect a little piggy of her years to carry. I have lovingly glued her back together more than twice. And as you can see in this last picture there was one time when I couldn't even find all of her to glue back on.

She takes it in stride. She knows that she is loved and she is happy with that. She never was one to put on "airs", my humble sweet little piggy.

Well, there you have it.

The things that I love.

The things that I hold on to year after year.

Some, like David's two dollar bill, are fairly new to my collection. Most are much older and at times almost forgotten. But never for long. All it takes is an occasional sighting of one or more of them and I am reminded of how simple life can be. I realize how little a person really needs to enjoy life.

It's a lesson I am happy to remember time after time.

And I will use them to remind me of that. If I ever find myself getting carried away with too much longing for things I will most likely never have, my little treasures will be there.

Ready to pull me back to earth and ground me in reality.