A Crafty Something from my Past

Once upon a time, about 25 years ago, I got the chance to work with a woman who made marionettes. It was part of a project through my county's gifted education program. I wrote a little script, and then we created the marionettes to go along with it. My script featured two girls who were going on a picnic and kept running into problems, like a skunk and a snake. Every Saturday, for several weeks, my mom drove me out to this woman's house, and I and another girl worked on our puppets.

It really was an amazing experience. I'd never worked with papier mache before, let alone made a cast of marionettes. It was fascinating to see these characters emerge from a bit of newspaper, fabric and wood. My favorite part was making the hair. We wound yarn onto knitting needles, got it wet and then baked them. It created absolutely perfect spiral curls.

My mom made the dresses for my girls, and my snake was made from a tube stuffed with empty thread spools. The skunk is made from faux fur, and I have to admit, he's definitely the scariest creation of the lot!

This afternoon, I was thinking about making plushies and other projects, and I remembered these four characters. I went down to my very scary basement and brought them up. I was amazed at the condition they are in! They look much like they did when I made them, other than a few broken strings. I was also kind of impressed with the fact that as a child I managed to create the faces on those girls. I'm not an artist and can't draw, but these little marionettes actually look like people!

Anyway, just thought I'd share a little something from my crafty past!