Hi all! I hope everyone had a wonderful, magical Christmas! Hard to believe it is over, the time, it just never stops!
In general I like to keep things simple, old fashioned and classic. In my own life and also in my daughter Amelia's life. I want her to learn to appreciate things from the past. To love toys that don't scream with loud sounds or blinking screens. My mother was always on a strict budget and my brother, sister and I were raised to know the value of something and to appreciate things/gifts, no matter how small. I guess that is what I'd like to instill in Amelia. I have tried to tell my mother-in-law to keep Christmas simple (present wise), she doesn't need the whole world of toys under the tree! But just being a Babcia (grandma), is to spoil the grandchild. :) So, it's a work in progress....
This year I stumbled across the world of Madame Alexander dolls. I loved the look of the hefty weight baby dolls and thought Amelia would love one for Christmas. They range in prices, so I was happy to see that they offer a doll through Toys R Us called the Middleton. She is just precious and I knew Amelia would just love her!!
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| Middleton doll by Madame Alexander |
I tried to wrack my brain and find another tie in to the baby doll gift and soon came to the conclusion that this baby needs a pram!! So the hunt was on. It had to be made of cloth, wood or wicker. Two days of searching later and I found this on Etsy for $42!
She was positively what I was looking for! Wicker, wood and fabric! Woot! Also very, very dirty. Like yucky dirty, but I had to have her. Per the usual which is me procrastinating, I started this fun project the Sunday before Christmas. I worked on it during Amelia's nap times and at night after she went to bed. There were some very late nights there, but I just loved how it turned out.
First, I took off all the grungy gross fabric and took pictures as I was peeling it off, so I would remember how to put it back together! It was once a very pretty red and white gingham, but was now a sad, dirty, faded color of pink and brown. Yuck. My fingers had a coating of grim after I was done, I couldn't wait to wash them. Here is a pic of the fabric being disassembled.
After taking it apart, I washed the wicker basket inside and out with dish soap and water and let it dry overnight. I then used a matte polyurethane and sprayed the whole thing. The fun part was taking the old fabric and ironing it to use as a pattern. My iron had water in it and as the steam came through the yucky fabric I had this lovely steam plume of dirt, age and who knows what fill my lungs. Fun times!! I cut out the new fabric. I chose a pretty blue with delicate flowers on it. I'm thinking I'm partial to the color blue, I am now seeing it everywhere in my house. Creeping in like a ninja.
Then the scary part. Trying to figure out how to put this beast back together again. Love it when I have a time crunch and I am just winging it!! Amazingly it all came together, thank goodness for the many pictures I took of the tearing apart process. I took apart the red and black wheels and painted them ivory and shiny black. Added a soft flannel bedding using blanket stitch and finished it the night before Christmas Eve!
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| The back of the hood. |
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| I had to take apart some of the blanket stitching after finishing because I had forgotten to attach the legs and wheels. Ugh. Whoops. |
Here she is all finished!! The night before Christmas Eve! Phew, that was close.
Here is the happy girl on Christmas morning!
She also received many pop-up books from Santa. She calls them her "special books" and that is something that Jeff loves sharing with her. All in all, a great Christmas had by all!
