Babies at Play on a Fine Spring Day

We can't believe it's been 5 months since the last post. We apologize to all who have been watching for the next. Life has just been incredibly busy with one thing and another, and besides it has been the coolest, rainiest spring we can ever remember.

At last we had a fine spring day, and babies Sandra Varlene and Cara Linnea got out to play in our new playclothes sewn by Ebay seller, Shadowdancer9423.

First, they tried a game of row, row, row your boat by a stump piled with squirrel middens

They were delighted to discover that with all of the rain we've had, we have carpets of moss growing everywhere, and so many different kinds too.

Do you know this moss is called "scared cat's tail moss" (Rhytidiadelphus) because it looks like a bristly cat's tail? Don't forget you can click on the photo for a close-up view. It is also nice and cushioney for doing somersaults on.

Check out this moss with the cute little red stems!

Sandra says, "My moss looks like miniature Christmas trees (Polytrichum)," and Cara says "Mine is like soft turfy grass."

Even the roots of this old tree that fell over are covered in moss.
This looks pretty fun to climb and explore.

So let's go climbing!

My, how babies love to climb...

and climb...

and climb...

and climb!

Here, let me help you up this last bit. We'll be queens of this giant stump!!!

Whoa, it's a little scary standing up on this giant fallen log.
Hold on to me, so you don't fall!
Wave bye to everyone.

Hope you all enjoyed exploring with us today!

Little Miss Cara
&
Little Miss Sandra

On Sasha Morgenthaler Course Dolls

Happy New Year!
I am the newest doll in MamaT's Sasha family. MamaT has tried out a few different names on me, but the only one that seems to be sticking is Talia Jaelle, just because. I am not technically a Sasha doll. I am a homemade doll from Switzerland. Doll making was a very popular hobby in Switzerland for some years. Most likely I was made from a Glorex doll kit or something similar. These kits are still available (click Glorex for more info). I am 14 inches (35cm) tall (positive proof I am not a "course doll" which we'll discuss below). I have a firm (probably plastic) head covered with tricot cloth, real human hair, and a soft, stuffed body. While I am not a "real" Sasha doll, there is no doubt in our minds that I was made by a collector of Sasha dolls and I was Sasha inspired. My unmatched eyebrows and eyes are very similar in style to those painted by Sasha Morgenthaler, and while we don't know who the artist was who painted my face, we agree she was very talented.


Besides my face, the second reason we believe I originally belonged to a Sasha collector is based on my dress. It is a handmade dress, but it emulates the gingham yoke dress that was a classic Sasha dress made during all the years of the English production, and also found on some Gotz and studio dolls.

Further evidence is that while the dress actually doesn't fit me all that well (wide in the collar and a little too short), it fits a Sasha baby doll perfectly, and we believe that's what it was first made for.


Now enough about me, you probably didn't pull up this entry to learn about Glorex dolls. Because I resemble a Sasha course doll in some ways, I have been tasked with telling you all we know about Sasha course dolls. And in truth, almost all we know about course dolls, we learned from Dorisanne Osborne. Dorisanne was kind enough to give MamaT permission to let us quote most of a post she made on the Sasha-L list on 2/7/08, adding in a few bits from other posts of hers.



“I don't know when Sasha Morgenthaler began her doll making classes, but I think they were held for 25 years or more with Sasha teaching them before her death in 1975, and then her assistant Trudi Loeffler, continued teaching them until 1993.




The classes were held in Sasha's workshop in the basement of her home. There was room for 5 or 6 women to take a course which was usually held one day a week, for about 5 weeks. This limited the classes to women who lived in Zurich and the towns around Zurich. They would work on their dolls at home during the week in between classes.


I was a member of the last class that Frau Loeffler taught in December of 1993, which was put on for a group of 6 American women. We were in Zurich the end of November of 1993 to celebrate the 100th anniversary of Sasha's birth so our doll making class was a very special time. Our classes were held all day long for a week, since we were only in Switzerland for two weeks. It was intensive to complete the two dolls in that time period.

The course dolls had Type A (non-jointed cloth) bodies and were about 20” (50cm) tall, varying both in girth and height because they were stuffed with excelsior (wood chips) by many different people with variable experience levels. The hardest work day was when we stuffed the excelsior into the cloth body parts as it had to be packed very tightly. We were exhausted after our day of stuffing our two course dolls because they have to be packed very tight, but I've seen some that are not so firm.

Hemp was supplied for the hair, but you could pay extra to have a hand-knotted human hair wig made by Sasha's own wigmaker. I used the hemp hair for my boy and the wig for my girl, as both were applied differently and I wanted to experience both processes. For the hemp hair we dug out a hole in the middle of the head and pushed the "hair" into it, then arranged it, glued it down, and styled it. We started with dyed raw hemp and spent an afternoon brushing (and brushing and brushing) the hemp with a dog brush, to make it silky. With the human hair wig, we sewed it to the head.

We practiced the eye and face painting under Frau Loeffler's direction before we actually painted our dolls' faces. Frau Loffler taught us Sasha's method of painting eyes. We painted a round eye in the color of our choice and then were instructed to put the pupil right in themiddle of the iris. If you stop to think of the human eye, it is a ball, with the pupil "dead center". The secret seems to be what you do after you have the pupil in the center of the eye. The lid is what changes the character of the eye, as it can come down and cover much of the eye, or be high for a wide-eyed look. And the addition of eyelashes can change the look too. The pupils on Sasha's studio dolls range from very large, to rather small. She tried to make individualized eyes. The "star pupils" on some of the early English dolls were made made by painting the pupil with a fine brush--I've heard that it was a brush with five "hairs,” but can't confirm so.

We dressed our dolls at home, though some people were able to find clothing and shoes to fit at the toy stores in Zurich. It was an amazing experience to make Sasha's dolls in her own studio. We expected her to walk in at any minute. Many women in the area took the class over and over, making two dolls each time. Some of them sold their dolls, and others still have them. Probably, hundreds of these dolls were made over the years.”
--Dorisanne Osborne

Thanks again to Dorisanne for her all of her wonderful information and first hand experience in a doll course. We have very little information other than what Dorisanne had to offer. We found no information on when Sasha Morgenthaler began giving workshops, how often or how many classes or how many dolls were made. She continued teaching them until she passed away in 1975.

Frau Trudi (Roos) Loffler, who began working with Sasha in the late 1940s, was considered her closest collaborator for the next 25+ years, continued teaching the workshops until 1993. Frau Loffler was also involved in preparing exhibits at the museum in Zurich and did a lot of hand sanding on the studio dolls, among other work, no doubt. According to Dorisanne's book, the course dolls had Type I faces (square shaped with medium full cheeks). We've seen a course dolls described with fleece hair, which was likely hemp fleece.

Here are some current links to photos of course dolls (for sale or already sold):
http://sasha-dolls.com/page7.htm
Previously sold doll on Ebay.
http://www.sashadolluk.co.uk/26247.html (Scroll to bottom of the page). This page also has information on how to contact Dorisanne to get a copy of the book, “Sasha Dolls Through the Years” which we HIGHLY recommend.
--And as Tigger would say, Ta-ta for now! Talia Jaelle

Merry Christmas from the S-kids!

MamaT almost got Angela out to be the Christmas girl AGAIN, and we all started to whine, why does Angela get to stand by the tree EVERY year? So MamaT stopped and thought about it and picked ME, because my name is Tasha (which is a variant of Natasha, which means "child of Christmas," a traditional name for girls born near Christmas in Russia, like MamaT's sister (my namesake) who was born ON Christmas (even though she isn't Russian). So her family always got to have birthday cake on Christmas, which somehow seems appropriate. It is also Sasha's birthday, who is going to be forty-one-derful this year. None of the rest of us have specific birthdays... Many of us don't even know exactly what year we were "born." Here you see me holding the stocking with all the symbols of Christmas. If you want to read the poem about what they all mean, you can find it here.

But I'm not the only one out by the tree this year.
I'm joined by Patrick and Sandra, which is good, because they make good company while MamaT and her DH are busily preparing for the holidays.
Here we all are, ready to spread some holiday cheer!

Patrick sings, "Glad Tidings we bring to you and your kin, glad tidings for CHRISTmas and a happy new year!" He has a nice soprano voice.
If he would ever age past 7, he might make a good tenor.
Oh yes, and a note on Patrick's scarf. MamaT's mama taught all her grandchildren how to knit, both girls and boys. This little scarf was knitted by one of MamaT's nephews when he was about 10, and he gave it to MamaT who recently discovered it was in perfect Sasha scale by pure coincidence and gave it Patrick so he wouldn't catch cold while he was out caroling. Now MamaT wishes she had learned to knit from her mama.

Here is Sandy, playing with the train set again,
and licking on her everlasting candy cane!

Yours truly, Tasha, a child of Christmas,
thinking about Jesus, the real Child of Christmas.

We're feeling mighty cozy in our corner by the tree
as we eagerly await the big day!

We hope you had a peaceful solstice, and wish a joyful Christmas
and a fabulous new year to all of you and your dolls!

Ted's Pinafore Challenge #72

Hey There! Now that all the voting is over for Ted's pinafore challenge, we can post our entry here. This was not the original planned entry. The first one planned was to be out of a nice corduroy fabric with a delicate print perfect for Sasha scale. There were a lot of complicated ideas in the plan, and MamaT was just figuring out where to begin when the idea for this dress flashed into her head. The fabric for this dress was a fat square for quilting MamaT found while looking for fabric for the baby cradle quilt (shown previously). She found this piece of fabric to be literally irresistible, because she purchased it without having a clue of what she might do with it later.

Once she got the inspiration for this dress, she decided she better try it first, because it would be much easier to start with than plan A, and would be good sewing practice. While the result isn't perfect (and the flaws don't show in the photos much), it's not bad at all for her experience level, we think. One of the most interesting parts of adapting the original pattern was in lengthening the skirt, since the bottom hem is curved. She figured out how long she wanted it to be at the edge and at the center point and made pencil marks there. Then using her arm like a "compass" and her elbow as the pivot point, she just free-handed a line between the 2 points, which came out perfectly first try. Those moments are so rare it's very exciting when they happen.




























So as you might guess, the first pinafore planned has never been completed, and probably won't end up as a pinafore (or jumper) now, but MamaT still hopes to make a dress with it, maybe over the holidays when she has some time off work.

Cora claimed the dress immediately as hers alone when the dress was finished. She found a choker of MamaT's made from juniper berries that was the perfect accent for the dress. Juniper berries are supposed to ward off bad dreams, and Cora confirms that she hasn't had a single nightmare since she put it on. She won't say whether she ever had one before though. She also tried out a beaded hair tie as a necklace, but it was a bit much. Lona doesn't care about that and is wearing it now anyway, as you'll probably see in our next post.

One more thing to notice is to see all the photoshopping Ted did in the top photo to remove the back edging off Cora's modeling platform/dresser. He also improved the lighting. He said he even added legs to some of the models, so you can see he spent a lot of time on some of the photos. We'd really like to thank him for his huge investment of time on the project, because it was very fun, and the perfect motivation to get MamaT to start and finish a project. And THAT makes us dolls happy.

Lastly, we'll include a link to Ted's blog post that shows all the entries with comments by his fashion model daughter, Alex. She made positive, constructive comments on every single entry, another big effort. We really liked her comments on this dress. She said, "This elongated pinafore with overtones of an ethnic influence shows how any simple pattern can become the basis for completely different garments. Excellent solution."

If you haven't already seen them, I encourage you to check the link and see all the amazing creativity generated from one simple pattern and one challenge.
Alex's comments on Ted's pinafore challenge entries.

A Fall Fungal Foray

Happy Autumn Everyone! We have been having a very wet fall, making it a great year for mushrooms. Patrick has been itching to get out on an exploration trip, so we thought we'd count how many different kinds of mushrooms we could find while investigating the backyard. While we won't try to identify all of them, we think this first one might be a slippery jack or Suillus luteus. In theory, it is edible, but not considered very palatable. By the way, please don't use this blog as an id. guide. You should never eat a wild mushroom unless you are 100% sure of your identification and its edibility. Never eat wild mushrooms that are raw or decayed, and never eat them in large quantities.

This cute little mushroom is a Lepiota cristata, sometimes called a star dapperling or a stinking parasol. Hmm. I like the first name better. Not recommended for consumption as it has toxic close relatives.

Okay, I'm not even going to try to identify this one or we'll never get through this post, but it IS hard to resist trying.

Looks like another Suillus type mushroom. Don't they look like just the perfect pancakes? Makes me hungry, but I will pass on eating these.

This large stump is a regular nursery. It has moss and fireweed, and baby birch trees, along with these adorable parasol shaped mushrooms

Ooooh. Now this stump is amazing. Check out this colony of mushrooms here!

Awesome! That big white thing is a giant mushroom pushing up out of the ground. They are coming up right through the moss all over around here.

Now this one looks like the earth itself is growing up out of the ground.

I am beginning to feel surrounded in fungus. These are called larch boletes, Suillus grevillei. They grow in a symbiotic relationship with western larch trees providing them with more water and nutrients then they can get with just their roots alone.

These cute little orange fungi are growing out of the side of a log with moss and lichens.

I'm starting to get bored with the whole mushroom thing. We found at least half a dozen others, but the photos didn't turn out so great. This stick is starting to look more fun to play with.

Besides mushrooms, there's also berries out this time of year. This one is called bunchberry. It is related to dogwood and is one of the fastest plants on the planet (the pollen is released by a little trigger when a bee lands on it.) MamaT insists I include the Latin names. That's Cornus canadensis.

Here's something to pucker you up. It's Oregon grape (Mahonia or Berberis repens). We tried making lemonade out of it once. Started with 10 berries and it took about 10 teaspoons of sugar before it wasn't too tart anymore!

Now Patrick is just exploring without looking for plants--walking along a rotting nurse log here.

Do you think anyone will think I'm holding this big log up on my shoulders? I didn't think so either, but it's fun to imagine.

This hollowed out stump is kind of fun to play in. I think there's a red squirrel who hangs out here shelling pine cones all summer.

Gregor showed you all kinds of hidey holes like this earlier this summer. I'm finding some cool critter haunts too.

Just a swinging in the trees. That little branch doesn't look quite strong enough to hold me, but it did!

I like all the different colors of rocks you can find around here--red, yellow, and green for starters.

And finally a trip to the dock where I got to look a large mouth bass in the eye. How cool is that? Thanks for sharing my little autumn adventure with me. See you later.
--Patrick Terrance (a red-headed Gregor)