Tag Archives: messenger doll

NEW! A Messenger Mouse

Dolls, Gift Pouches, , ,

Here it is. The fruit of playful imaginings, inspired by the fabric at hand, no doubt. In any case, I was looking forward to putting this little guy together. It was playing against the screen of my imagination, begging for a place in the order of things.

It was time for something different. Of course, the focus tends to shift back to replenishing good sellers that dwindle to nothing, consistently. No complaints. This is what I want, after all. But it can be challenging to live with new ideas that take on life and even a conscience of their own, it seems. It gets to a point where you have to sooth it, as though it were a child, begging to play. “Not yet,” you plead. “I need to finish this or that first. Then I can give you my full attention. Isn’t that what you want?”

Then, we meet. At last. The living object of my imagination rests in my hand and it feels right. I think the wait is an important part of the process. It helps define the shape, so that when it is born it has an undeniable presence of its own. Or it’s all in my head. It does not matter. It is real anyway.

It does not have a tail? No. I doesn’t. The shape, the outline, is all that is required to make a connection. The soul is in the eyes, after all. This little guy could be the first in a line of animal-inspired buddies for children and the young at heart. Or how about this: it could be a tooth fairy mouse!

Eleven more await assembly. They will be distributed among my four sales point locations. 7 1/2 inches tall. Color schemes will vary.

Stop Motion

Dolls, One-Act Art Play, , ,

21st century kids missed out. They will not have experienced the infancy of television and motion pictures. I suppose every generation “misses out” at some level. I did not experience first flight, my children, if I had any, would know nothing of being one of the first households to have a color television.

It is not really important, in a way, yet it is immeasurably important. These experiences shape our sense of wonder. More than this, they prompt us to recognize human ingenuity and to recognize it in ourselves as well. An idea, we realize,  is always worth exploring. And most of us understand that we must keep in mind not to harm others in the process.

Yes, too much television is not good. We have to go outside and play, and also choose healthier snacks while we stare at the screen. Life is a balancing act, and this includes allowing room for creative expression.

The creative children’s television shows I was privileged to know has a child had a profound impact on me. I loved stop motion animation. Think about this for a moment: We knew we could convey human movement and interaction through fast, subsequent images captured as we moved, but it took wonderful and free-flowing insight to realize that the same method could animate still objects. And to make stories out of these… wow! Story telling was forever transformed.

The creative mind works that way. One idea sparks the next as though it had lifted a rock and discovered an entire world, previously unseen and unknown. Today’s complex computer animation was a huge stretch of the imagination. There must be a sixth or seventh sense in us, like a pilot light, just waiting for a switch to be turned on.

For some reason, this is what crosses my mind every time I make a new batch of Messenger Dolls. And also that life itself is a stop motion animation. We move forward and take steps back; we become absorbed in projects and stop short in moments of doubt; we move, we rest, we hesitate, but the story gets told one moment at a time.

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