About Faces

In a recent post, I was talking about painting some of my doll faces to give them more expression. And soon afterwards I was over at Barnes and Noble where I saw this new book by Patti Medaris Culea, dollmaker extraordinaire. Well, I just had to have it! This book is full of wonderful dolls made by extremely creative dollmakers. I can hardly wait to get back to my sewing machine and try out a few new ideas that are whirling around in my brain!

Finding this book so soon after I mentioned wanting to create more expressive faces reminded me of another interesting book-related experience I had about a year ago. I had just finished grocery shopping in my local market, and I headed for the magazine and book section for a quick browse--my usual routine. I parked my cart up next to a book rack, and noticed a gardening book right there in front of the cart. The author's name looked familiar. It was the name of someone I knew as a child--the daughter of family friends who we vacationed with for several summers. Her mother was a sorority sister of my mother, and was also her maid of honor.

I looked on the back of the book to see if there was a picture of her, but no luck. I did notice a website though. So when I got home, I went right to the computer and sure enough it was her. She still had the beautiful red hair I remembered. I wrote her an email and she wrote right back, and we had a delightful little reconnection! It seems she has become quite the gardener, as well as a published author with several books to her name. We haven't gotten together yet, but hope to one of these days. Maybe I can teach her a few embroidery stitches in exchange for a small dose of green thumb...

Hubby and I had a nice trip to Disneyland. The day turned out a little differently than we expected though. There was very little traffic on the freeways, but Disneyland was packed. Since it was a weekday in the winter, we expected kids would be in school. But it seems there's this thing out here called winter break. We used to have that in Connecticut (where it really seems more appropriate anyway), but the moms revolted. What with winter break, snow days, and then spring break.....well......the moms marched on the administration building and insisted that winter break be cancelled or they'd have to fling themselves into the nearest frozen pond. Fearing the mess that would most certainly result, not to mention the lawsuits, the administration relented and moms were awarded one more week of sanity.