HEART STRINGS

I'm starting a new category on my blog called "Heart Strings". These posts will be about things that touch my heart. This is the first one, though I may go back and re-categorize some previous posts that should go under this title.

A GIFT OF LOVE:

This is a Raggedy Andy that my good friend and co-worker's mother made for Dylan. She just calls them "Raggedys". I was amazed at how detailed the hand work was in the doll. All of the yarn hair is hand sewn on the head. The face is hand embroidered and there's even a heart on the chest that says "I Love You", which is hidden under his clothes. His little outfit is hand made too.

This is the story behind this doll: My friend (Ann), bought the pattern for the doll in 1972 when she was just 14. It was a Simplicity pattern. She wanted to make the doll for a baby gift for someone she knew and worked on it the entire summer that year. She never made another one, but gave the pattern to her mother, who has made lots of them since then.

Ann forwarded a picture of Dylan to her mother and she thought he was so cute that she made him a "Raggedy". She's never even met my daughter or Dylan. Isn't that the sweetest thing? A gift from the heart with no strings attached!!!

Ann's mom is also the person who regularly gives me bags of scraps, which I love!!!

When I give this Raggedy to Dylan I'm going to take a picture of him with it and send it to Ann's Mom with a big thank you and I'm sure Lori will send her a written thank you note too.

This inspires me to make more baby gifts for people that don't expect it. There is a home for unwed mothers in one of the tiny towns near me that accepts donations of baby items. I've often thought of making baby quilts to donate there. I understand that the home requires the mothers to do jobs around the house to earn the gifts and are required to go to school and be responsible for their babies after they are born. I've seen the girls getting on the school bus and they went to school with my daughter at the local high school. Its a great program. My church donates to them at Christmas because this type of thing is pro-life and encourages girls to have their babies and not to get abortions. Each Christmas we are given baby bottles to fill up with change. We turn them in and the bottles and the money are donated to the home.

I hope you have a great Saturday! I want to do some sewing and I "have" to do some cleaning and laundry. I bought some Winnie The Pooh fabric that you make a baby book from that was marked down to $1.00 yesterday. All you have to do is add quilt batting, which I have plenty of. I think I could make more using the same size fabric squares and rectangles, especially picture books. I suppose you could use a fabric pen to write words to go with the pictures.

We escaped any storm damage last night, but there were several tornadoes and severe thunder storms not too far away. Tornadoes were spotted and touched down just a couple of miles from my daughter's house, but she didn't have any problems. It just scared me half to death... I called her and told her to make sure they were prepared to get into the center of the house and put something over their heads. Thank goodness, it wasn't necessary.

Thanks to the Lord, we did get 2.3 inches of rain according to our rain gauge!!! But, its too late for most of the poor farmers I fear!!! They certainly are at the mercy of the weather.