With Willow being so small, I thought I'd try some of the Whispering Grass clothes on her to see what would fit, so I'd have a jumping off point when designing patterns for her.  I figured she should fit the Raccoon's clothes, but they were way too big!  As were the frog's.

So I tried on some of the mouse clothes, and the tutu was a perfect fit!!  Who'd have thought??

I knew she was small, but didn't realize she was THAT small.  She is a little taller than the mice though, and does have much bigger hands, so that will need to be taken into account.

Took a photo of my two KID boys, Aaron and Milo, heading off to hockey practice.....

I took the photo mainly to show off their sweater sets.  The brown set belonged to Milo (on right), and I recently finished a variegated dark purple sweater and hat for Aaron. But it was just too dark with his dark brown hair. So I switched them.

Back at the North Pole, with all the Christmas hustle and bustle behind him,
​Santa finally had time to relax and check his emails....

"Oh look. they've sent the recipes!"

"These are the best cookies ever!"

"Well, now we can make them ourselves.."

"Dearest Holly & Coco......Thanks so much for the recipes!  
​The elves agree that your cookies are the best we've ever tasted!"

Lonnie and Milo came down.
"What are you two up to?? You didn't just eat all those cookies did you?"
​"No, Santa took them all. He left a letter..."

"Let me see that.  It looks legitimate enough."
​"Can you help us send him the recipes??"

"I'll clean up all these dishes...and get Grandma's recipe books"

Milo went to get his laptop...

"All the recipes we used are in these books..."

The girls found the recipes they had used...

And Milo typed them all up....

After a while......"There we go. All done"

"...and off they go."

Christmas morning, most of the treats were gone, and there was a note.....

"It's from Santa!"

Coco began to read..... "Dearest Holly and Coco,"        
​"He knows who we are?!?!"

"What does he say??"

He says..."I always look forward to coming to your house every Christmas Eve, not only because you are both such good little children, but also because you always put out the most delicious treats. When I dropped in last night, I was overwhelmed by all the delicious goodies you had left out for me."

"I’m normally not so greedy, and usually just take a bite or two (I have to watch my waistline) but
after tasting a few of your cookies, I just had to take all the rest home to let Mrs. Santa and the Elves have a taste too. I hope you don’t mind."

"Which brings me to the point of this letter."

"You can mail the recipes to….Santa Claus, North Pole,  H0H  0H0  Canada
 Or email them to…    [email protected]
 Thank you so very much!!  Love, Santa"

After putting the gifts under the tree, he noticed the milk and cookies...
"Wow, look at all the goodies they've put out for me!"

He turned to the toys seated on the bench. 

"This house always has the best cookies!"

I've decided to backtrack a bit, and take a few more of the photos that I had originally wanted to take before Christmas....
Like Santa sneaking into the house to deliver his gifts....

Some older photos from the Archives, of special days that just slipped by....
​National Candy Cane Day, on December 26th....

National Card Playing Day, on December 28th....

Something many of us can relate to after the holidays....Bicarbonate of Soda Day, on December 30

And today, January 2nd, is National Sci-Fi Day.....

And after watching the movie, they get to play with Cinnamon's Star Wars Lego.....

Now that I'm finally able to work on my dolls again, I need to decide what to do first.  I think I may still take some Christmas photos, with the 'unwrapping of gifts' that some of them received for Christmas. 

I have three dolls needing face ups - Willow, and the two Feegles - and my Lonnie really needs a repaint.  FID Lawrence is still naked in his box, and needs a wig. I'm not sure how I feel about his face up, which is why he's still in his box. He was painted exactly the same as Steve, and I did grow to like him, so I'm hoping once Lawrence has a wig, I will like him better too. I do have a tux for him, so at least i don't have to make something for him to wear right away. I just hope it goes with whatever wig he ends up with.

​I should make another FID ball gown for my new girl so it's ready for when she arrives. She's coming with a face up, and it would be nice to be able to dress her right away.

The fireplace Jan started before my surgery, is all done, and waiting to be used in photos.  My sister, Marianne, made a whole series of tiny palette knife paintings for me for Christmas, to go above the fireplace. She said she got a "little carried away".  She sure did!!  

They are all 4x6 or 5x7, and she copied them all from photos I took over the years. Well, all except the lovely double tulip on the bottom left.  That's from one of her photos.  With so many paintings to choose from, each of my doll families can have their own painting over their fireplace.

And all these painting have inspired some ideas for upcoming doll photo stories. Now I just need to decide which one of my 'adults' will be the artist.  I'm thinking Isis or Benny.

Two more photos from Saturday's photo shoot in the Ruins Garden....