Medical Dolls!

Hello everyone!

I'm excited today to finally share my Medical Dolls with you. Given everything that's going on in the country and world right now, it kinda gives me goosebumps to be posting this now, but this project has actually been long in the making. There's a story behind that, which I'm about to tell you. But before we begin, if you're noticing similarities between these and my Owie Dolls, you'd be right - and there's a story behind that, too. 

One of my favorite aspects of working in pattern design and sewing in general is collaborating with other creative people, both individuals and organizations. Often, in spite of us both saying, "that was so much fun - let's do this again sometime!" these are one-off opportunities. It's usually the nature of the assignment, or the way of the ever-evolving crafting environment. Occasionally, I am fortunate to form a working relationship that allows for multiple opportunities to create together. Publications - books, magazines, blogs - have opened doors to working with some wonderful folks, many of whom are as nice as they are artistically awesome.

In the spring of 2018, the editor of an overseas-based magazine for whom I've done some prior work, asked me to design a new project for an upcoming issue. I'd always enjoyed working with them, in particular this editor, who was a thoughtful and succinct communicator, appreciative, kind and easy-going. She was specifically interested in my Owie Dolls, and while we didn't want to reissue the original pattern, she wanted to preserve many of its pretend-play features - could I essentially create a new twist that still fit within the space constraints of a magazine article?

So I got to work reimagining. If you're anything like me, you might sympathize with the particular challenge of recreating something you've already done before and whose outcome you were already pretty happy with. Creatively, it's a lot easier to dream up something completely new than to tweak a previous design, typically. But what a fun opportunity to reach a whole new market with a fresh version of a doll that's already been beloved for a decade. In a different country, no less! By late summer, the prototype was ready, photos were sent and approved (and exclaimed over) and I began photo-documenting and writing the instructions.

Then, unexpectedly, the magazine was acquired by a larger publication company. And the editorial team was let go of and replaced by new staff. Apparently, this was all went down quickly and unforeseen - it was evident in the email this editor sent out to the contributors that they were just as stunned as we were. As I read about how our contracts would be handled by the new management, I remember feeling a sense of loss beyond just What Will Happen Next; this was a working relationship that I would actually quite miss. 

And now, the madness began.

Right at the outset, communicating with the new editorial staff was very different than before. They were inaccessible, although cordial enough when we eventually did connect. Yes, they said, keep to the original deadlines and finish up. So when the pattern instructions were completed, I packed up the prototype and all the paperwork and sent everything off to the new editor along with an email to say it was on its way. This part at least was familiar; in the past, the package would arrive in a couple of weeks, the editor would notify me when it did, and it would join the queue of projects to be processed and readied for print according to sequence and priority. 

Weeks passed and I heard nothing back, but I assumed that the new editor was busy with the transition and all its demands. I figured that when it was time in the queue for my project to be worked on, communication would start up quite naturally, with clarifications and questions and other things inherent to the editing process. I moved on to Menagerie, becoming distracted with designing new animal patterns for Auntie Laura.

When weeks turned into months with still no news from the publication company, I began to be concerned. I forget who reached out first, but we collectively discovered that the package never arrived. Bewildered, I pulled up tracking info, contacted my post office and ascertained that it had successfully made it overseas, found its way to the local post office, was out for delivery to the address, yet was never received, and was then returned to that local post office, at which point the trail went cold.

I relayed this to the new editor, and asked if any inquiry might be made at their post office, but nobody responded. By now, this was beginning to feel like a low-grade, even lower-stakes crime drama, rife with red herrings and no viable leads. How might one possibly move forward, stuck in limbo as things were? 

But a few days later, the package turned up again - on my doorstep. The thing had traveled halfway across the world and miraculously, with inscrutably serendipitous timing, found its way home. 

Dumbfounded (albeit secretly relieved), I reached out to the editor again. Here it is, with a note from their P.O. explaining why they had to ship it back - would they like me to resend the package? And if so, would they look out for it so that this time it might safely received?

Actually no, thank you, the editor replied. Since the project had been returned to me, they had decided to drop it from their lineup, as it were. They cited various reasons, including the changing focus of the magazine under new artistic direction, away from projects like mine. They would still compensate me for my time, of course. There were other logistical and legal bits, but that was the gist.

Well. That was certainly disappointing.

This is a business transaction, I reminded myself; they're profit-oriented and task-centric. Besides, how fortuitous that the prototype came home, and isn't instead languishing in some cobwebby corner of a post office in a foreign land. (The children, who are always slightly heartbroken when my projects are sent to new homes and who'd been carefully following the misadventures of The Package, were very happy that the dolls were once more in their possession.) Think of this as closure, I reflected; perhaps now I could move forward, throw myself into other, new projects and chalk this up to experience. All true things, yet I still felt mentally and emotionally wearied for a couple days. As for the manner of the letdown itself, let me just say that I'd never missed that old editor, and all her humanity, more than in that moment. 

And now, how exactly would one move forward? On the one hand, I had a sort-of ready-to-release pattern, complete with prototype; on the other hand, it was in spirit similar to another popular pattern that was already in my shop. It was also formatted rather narrowly for a publication, which meant that instructions-wise, it was skeletal with limited photos and no annotations or other details, as per the uniformity guidelines set out by the magazine. Certainly it was of no use to me collecting dust on my desk, but could I possibly release it as is, qualifying it as "Magazine Format", which was not only lame but also meaningless to most people, and slap on a token price tag like 99c to appease my conscience, while simultaneously undercutting the market and invalidating the months I'd spent developing and writing it? 

Or I could rework it into a more usable format, and give it the new lease on life it deserved. I'm happy to report that I decided to go with the latter. As expected, it took several more months of work, but at the end of it, we had a pattern that's accessible in all the ways you guys are accustomed to. An unfortunate debacle that found redemption, I call it.

And that's the story. Incidentally, please don't let this discourage you from working together with other potentially lovely organizations should the opportunity present itself. I think of this as an anomaly among the many other wonderful experiences I've had in my collaborations. 

So now, let us move forward and meet the Medical Doll Set!

I'll highlight similarities and differences between this doll and the Owie Doll, too - partly to distinguish one from the other and partly to share what happens in the design process during a reinvention. 

A little bit of background: in the early stages of creating this project with the original editor, there were several practical guidelines we'd considered. One was the variety of materials available to the typical readership of the magazine. This was not the US, and some of the more specific fabrics would not be available overseas. With that in mind, we opted for common fabrics for the doll, as opposed to the fancy velcro-sticky velour that was so crucial to the Owie Doll's design. Another was the space constraint. While many of the readers had considerable sewing experience and would likely enjoy projects at least as involved as this one, more complex techniques meant more detailed instructions and numerous photos and diagrams. Which we didn't have the luxury of in a magazine layout. So we picked a happy medium - simpler construction techniques than those in the Owie Doll pattern while still offering a toy with a good level of detail for interesting play.

First, the dolls, 

which have yarn hair. There is the shorter style,

the longer style,

(which can be tied back, braided and manipulated into other hairdos),

or none at all.

The round heads, incidentally, were hugely important (to me, at least). 

Now, I understand that most people don't really care about the shapes of doll heads, but folks who've followed this blog for a while will know how obsessed I am with all things round, heads included. Ironically, my Owie Dolls did not have round heads - for a completely practical reason: felt hair. The multiple seams required to produce a round head did not do well in felt, and flat heads were simply the more rational choice. Yarn hair and round heads, however, are a perfect pairing. A happy side effect of shaping a head with multiple seams is being able to introduce cute noses - again, something that could not be integrated into the profile of the Owie Dolls. 

OK, maybe you've had enough of heads. Shall we move on?

Next are accessories you can make for your dolls. First is a wrap gown. The construction is super-simple: unlined, fastened with ties similar to real hospital gowns (and much more stay-in-place than the ones I've had to wear myself!). 

There's also a bouffant cap and thermometer, 

a reversible sleeping mat,

an arm bandage, an arm sling, a foot cast and strips of wrapping bandage.

Also, a face mask. 

Two years ago, the set did not include a face mask. When I was rewriting the pattern this fall, however, I remember thinking, "it feels like something's missing," and then it dawned on me: how odd that I could actually see the doll's entire face. 

I realized I would need to add a face mask to the list of accessories, at least because it was a sign of the times.

This one is reversible - not because it's fancier, but because lining the mask is simpler and neater than finishing tiny exposed seam allowances. (Reversibility - and fanciness - is bonus!)

This is the medical center. 

There are three medical stations, one on each panel/wall. If you're familiar with the Owie Doll's add-on Med Hub, these are the same three medical stations.

Station 1 is the blood pressure monitoring system, 

Station 2 is an ultrasound system,

with a transducer,

and a display screen (the blob is supposed to be a kidney but you can create any symbolic shape you like).

Station 3 is an EKG/ECG system

with a set of electrodes.

The grey medical center reverses to a red-and-white storage bag -

saves space, keeps all the disparate parts organized and portable, and feels a little bit like magic at the same time.

Tomorrow, the pattern goes on sale, so do check back then for all the specs and details! 

Next week sometime, I'll put a couple of Medical Doll Sets in my Etsy shop for you to buy if you'd prefer the finished thing to DIY. 

Also, what do you guys think about having a kit to save you time shopping? Folks have often written to me about the challenge of finding the materials they need for their projects - not so much because the materials are specialty per se, but because they don't have easy access to a large enough fabric store that carries more than the absolute basics. Add to that the difficulty of going out in person safely these days, or finding the right stuff online (if they're even in stock). I get it. 

Here's a photo of what such a kit might look like. There's a LOT of stuff in there - fabric and interfacing and notions and whatnot, everything except maybe the stuffing and sewing thread.

Here are the lists of materials you'll need for the Medical Doll Set: 

The plan is to offer a limited number so that I'm not overwhelmed, and make up each set as I receive an order. The kits are $75, plus shipping, and each kit contains enough materials to make one doll, one medical center and one set of accessories. If you want to make two dolls instead of one, I should be able to customize the yardage to accommodate that so you don't have to buy two kits. 

Stock on hand permitting, I'd also like to offer you a choice of skin colors. Some of you might be sewing with a specific individual in mind, and it can be a wonderful thing for a child to have a doll that looks like them. 

The kits won't be ready till the end of November/first week December, but let me know in the comments below if you're interested so I can start pre-ordering ASAP some of the stuff that takes a while to get here. The aim is to get the kits to domestic addresses in time for Christmas. I'll let you know later when and how to submit an actual order for a kit. 

Stop by here tomorrow to buy the sewing pattern for the Medical Doll Set! Meanwhile, if you're interested in ordering a kit, do let me know in the comments below.

Round heads, or what I'm working on

Last week was a curiously warm one for November. And after 8 weeks of hybrid in-person/digital school, the kids are returning to a fully on-line education this Wednesday. No one's thrilled but considering that the prediction at the start of the school year was a very conservative 1 week, 2 whole months is a medical miracle in itself. And having everyone finally in the same learning environment, albeit virtual, must surely be a relief for the teachers who'd had to deliver instruction over multiple disparate platforms thus far. All (ultimately) good things.

I've been doing this a lot, I realize - reframing and Bright-Side-ing. This year has been psychologically exhausting that way. If you will forgive a Physics metaphor, it takes formidable energy to sustain a net forward momentum, after all. And if conservation laws are to be upheld, that energy is expended at the expense of something else. Mass, often. But more usually sanity.

I hope everyone's been doing okay. I haven't blogged much in recent months, but I've missed you guys and I think of you and wonder if you're still keeping your creative energy alive (or maybe it's the other way around), and if your families are thriving, and if you've found new things to be thankful for and excited about. I'll give you a quick update on things on my end: the girls are old enough now to be fairly independent students, so the typical school day proceeds without much input from me or their Dad. Sometimes I get asked a Math question, or the location of a particular piece of furniture needed for a music lesson on Zoom or - if I'm really lucky - the children will let me talk about Science for a bit. They're doing well on the whole but they don't like school at home, largely because they don't enjoy digital instruction. I've thought about why digital learning is so hard on kids at this age - and any age, really - and tried to juxtapose what I'm observing in my own girls with my past experience in the classroom. Here is my one-sentence analysis: good instruction (and learning) is often methodical but not overly linear. Beyond just the social aspect of being with other humans, a classroom, with input from (hopefully systematic) teachers as well as laterally from classmates, is set up to achieve that. The current online school formats, which are typically uni-directional, not so much. Although I have seen other online courses admirably try to approximate that with forums and discussion groups and such (bravo!). 

Interestingly, lunchtime has become the high point in the school day, so I've tried to make that predictable and something to look forward to. We have a three-week rotating roster with something hot and home-cooked (but easy) at the start of each week - tacos, sloppy joes, baked mac-n-cheese, along with the usual portable cold sandwiches and such. This ambitious plan was also partly inspired by discovering that as my children turn into teenagers, they're increasingly ravenous in ways that only Real Food can satisfy. Initially, I was aghast: who eats a hot sit-down meal in the middle of a school (or work) day? And, I further extrapolated, what will the children do when they go out to work as adults if they get used to this now? But these are very strange times, and if this is one thing I can do that will help my kids with their non-ideal stay-home school experience, why not? So I prep or -pre-cook these special meals on the weekend and come lunchtime Monday, the kids set up, feed themselves and clear away before heading back to their rooms. They don't always do a perfect job but they're teenagers, not saints, so I cut them slack.

The cats like that everyone's home, I think. Rather than flee whenever we're in the room, as we've heard some pets do in response to the overstimulation, they seem to have developed a language to tell us that they want even more attention. Crazies, both of them. The girls sometimes kidnap a cat or two for company when they're ensconced in their rooms doing school. In lieu of classmates, probably.

My own workdays have become very fluid. Because everyone is home 24/7 now, the vast majority of my time revolves around family needs in some way. The earlier part of the year was especially tough because I was still mired in grief from losing family in Singapore, and then Covid-19 arrived and shut down borders - and thus any hope of communal mourning - along with swimming pools and other opportunities for psychosomatic respite. I was unmoored and anxious; I held it in my body and knew it, but couldn't unseat it. I finally turned off the news notifications, lost myself in frothy escapist books and some wonderful novels on actual grief like this and this, joined a gym just so I could get underwater again, and made myself cry. 

Crying, let me tell you, is hard. And the hardest part isn't the starting - it's the continuing. There've been so many times when I'd eased into a promising cry only to get distracted and peter out seconds after. Like in the shower, or while driving to the supermarket. Wretchedly unsatisfying. See, a good cry, one that takes time, one that really uproots the anxiety and unlocks the hard little knots inside and finally, finally relaxes your diaphragm enough so that you don't feel like you're about to have a heart attack - those are the ones well worth the misery that fuels them. A good cry is intentional. You must choose to participate. You have to make yourself stay in the pain until your soul touches the parts of you that are ugly and all dread and lost and dark and ragged, and you have to converse with it, and let yourself think things and say things and accept things that have no reframing, and no Bright Sides. It's very exhausting, evidently, which is why so many of us don't do it. So much easier to stuff it down or do the stiff upper lip or plastered-on-smile or patronizing cliche (or worse - the ill-timed religious verse bashed upside the head). When we do persuade ourselves to complete the Good Cry, though, we are remade. I know I am, at any rate. Washed clean. Able to breathe again. Stilled on the inside. Unkinked. Empty but not bereft. Ready to take the next step, whatever that may be. 

Actually interested in taking the next step, whatever that may be.

I miss family in Singapore. I suspect we're still many months out before travel restrictions are lifted to allow us to both enter Singapore and return to Minnesota without detainment, quarantine and other such things we can't afford to squeeze into our usual two-week trip. I haven't been back to see my folks since we lost Auntie Laura. Some days I think: was her funeral really this year - the same year as this present madness? It seemed like an utterly different era, her loss rudely indistinct - yet another impersonal catastrophic headline in a season of numbingly bad news. When I last wrote about her, I thought I might be beginning to process my grief from losing her, possibly even separately from that of losing my Dad. But the pandemic descended - a shroud upon shrouds - and that grief's been put on hold. Not intentionally - it just happened. Not enough energy for forward momentum, as it were; I'm barely overcoming the inertia from the backlash of a world crisis.

Mum, bless her, has been evolving in ways for which I am unspeakably grateful. I can't be with her physically to surround her with the kind of support that she needs, but the extended family has been marvelous. Much has been stereotyped in the West about the power of the Asian Extended Family, but there is truth in it. When dysfunctional, it can make soap operas look like children's tantrums on the playground, but at its best, it's a personal army of kaki-nang (Teochew: own people) who excel at practical help at the highest level of dignity and thoughtfulness. My one regret is that Dad isn't around to see how strong and amazing Mum has been. How honest and authentic and giving and gracious. He'd have been so proud - and smug. "That's why I married her," he'd have said. 

But maybe you're wondering about the title of the post, so let's get to that. 

Recently, we welcomed a new pastor to our church and some of the women met his wife in small get-to-know-you groups. We were asked to bring a favorite thing to give her, and of course my first thought was a cardboard box, but she probably had enough of those after moving across the country to get here. So I painted her a peg doll rendering of her family, plus a random Christmas tree, for no reason other than I'm addicted to painting Christmas trees. But those round heads! Love round heads.

Speaking of round heads, 

I have a story to tell you soon, and a new pattern. 

Unbelievable, I know, that LiEr's actually written a new pattern after going on and on about inertia and momentum and the lack thereof and other such drivel. The story will reveal all, I promise. 

Halloween 2020

Boy, was Halloween weird this year. The younger children were pastel cows from the game Roblox, together with their neighbor who isn't in the picture. The cow spots are handmade, yes. And also the bucket hats (and their cow spots), using a pattern we borrowed from our neighbor (thank you, S!) Kate cut out all the cow spots with the good intention of stitching them on herself but the time crunch - not to mention the inanity of the task - moved me to help, which turned into Mother sewing on all the cow spots and Kate half-stitching and half-gluing the cow faces. It is not fun to sew cow spots on sleeves, let me say. 

On the plus side, so that the girls can reclaim their clothes for other non-theatrical occasions, the cow spots are removable. The cow nostrils, sadly, not so much.

The costumes, though, were not the weird part. By that, I mean compared to some of costumes from past years, pastel cows are amusingly benign. And I loved working alongside Kate, not to mention only spending one night on the outfits instead of the typical three or four manic weeks. The weirdness in question was setting out a buffet table of candy for the neighborhood kids to help themselves from while the doorbell stayed eerily silent. The eldest child, who as of last year had decided she much preferred greeting trick-or-treaters at the door to going on a candy round herself, thus found herself obsolete this year, and stayed in her room working on her Etsy shop orders instead. It was all kinds of sad in a year already overrun with strangeness. That said, it's interesting what you discover when you let kids pick their own candy - judging from the copious amounts left on the table at the end of the evening, our neighborhood doesn't care for Twizzlers or Starbursts apparently. Even free, and set out where the house owners couldn't see you grab the whole bunch if you so wished. Huh.

One of Us Has Been Drawing

When I began this post a couple of weeks ago, fall had just kicked in.

Under a brooding ashen sky, it was dim and hushed and a little clammy. Summer had fled like the flighty, precocious coward she is in these parts, taking with her even the memory of flipflops and brats sizzling on the grill. I woke up that morning and voila! Instant and enduring twilight outside the window. 

Such were days on which one must muster all of what it means to be Minnesotan and find one's own Bright Side. While I was writing, some of the children were huddled in the garage painting with the neighbors while belting out the Dear Evan Hansen soundtrack. Another child was busy with a photoshoot on the front step because (a) at least it wasn't raining like the day before and (b) an overcast sky is nature's perfect diffuse lighting. The cats were snoozing and (wisely) not begging to go outside. And because no one else was indoors hogging the laptop, Mother was finally writing a blog post after what'd felt like eons. Hurrahs all around.

And now, as I finish the post, it's sunny and warm again - an encore of shorts weather - but with a bit of a bite, a passive-aggressive version of August, if you will. September in the Midwest is nothing if not volatile. 

Well, how has everyone been?

Our summer was very odd. The waterpark was closed. The museums were closed. The churches were closed. Opportunities seemed much curtailed and meetings with friends and family felt furtive and fraught. Yet - heaven be praised - Things Happened. I look back over the past months with gratitude - if not also bemusement - that summer was somehow still very much eventful. One of us had all four wisdom teeth out and made videos of themselves being loopy while under the influence. One of us rekindled a friendship with a classmate from elementary school and spent many happy days together swimming and painting kindness rocks. One of us made a new friend from an unexpected source. One of us began music lessons with a brand new instructor via Zoom. One of us was fortunate enough to take springboard diving lessons just after athletic restrictions were lifted. One of us made mochi and boba from Youtube tutorials. One of us hatched a plan to start a neighborhood music group because school band lessons have become defunct. One of us is clocking driving hours toward a license. One of us, having only ever been in the ocean, swam in a lake for the first time in her life (it was green and weird and unlikely to be repeated). And all of us finally met our newest baby cousin for the very first time in person, albeit six whole months after he was born.  

And because she has had so much time on her hands, one of us has also been drawing.

And has launched her own shop on Redbubble, at which her designs are featured on various items on a print-on-demand basis. 

I am very excited today to invite you to visit Kate at BunnyBubbles!

In case Redbubble isn't familiar to some of you (I certainly hadn't heard of it until my kids introduced me to it some months ago) here are some quick facts. As mentioned earlier, Redbubble is a marketplace for artists. Anyone (we'll call them Sellers or Artists) can create a free account, upload their original designs and select items on which they'd like their designs to be featured. Other people (we'll call them Buyers) can browse both the Seller's individual home page or the larger common pool of artwork and choose items on which these designs can be printed-on-demand. Redbubble creates those items for the Buyer and ships them, and the Seller gets a small percentage of the sale.  

Here are some of Kate's designs. Their kawaii aesthetic - the quality of adorableness and cuteness made popular in Japan and which can be applied to anything, including inanimate objects - is something that resonates strongly with her generation. Currently, she has largely food designs in her shop: breakfast items and fruit. In the future, she plans to add animals and other things.

Here's a sampling of those designs rendered on various items. 

Blueberry waffles on a Tshirt.

A face mask with strawberries

and a happy watermelon slice in a different layout.

Blueberries on zippered pouches (those little faces  are such characters!)

An avocado on a light cotton hoodie,

and watermelon on a fleece pullover.

A pineapple sticker. Incidentally, these stickers, which are waterproof, were the reason we discovered Redbubble in the first place - we were looking for ways to personalize the kids' water bottles for school and were thrilled to find all kinds of original art here that made wonderful and inexpensive stickers. Apparently, tweens and teens still love stickers!

Jam toast on home linen

Fried eggs on a shower curtain

Cherry twins on an apron.

And butterflies

on a phone case.

Each design can be found on a variety of items - as an example, here's the avocado on clothing

stationery, accessories and home items 

If you have a minute, please stop by Kate's shop. We hope you'll find something you love, perhaps for yourself or the favorite people in your life. Many of these items would be perfect for dorm rooms, kids' and grandkids' back-to-school needs, gifts for the coming holidays or simply to bring a smile to friends and family far away and much-missed. Thank you for supporting Kate!