A Stitch in Time

It started raining right after we took Amelia home and it hasn’t stopped since.  I don’t believe we have had more than one or two days without rain since July 1.  There is water everywhere and the mosquitoes are out in full force.  And those one or two days occurred in the middle of the week not on the weekend so that has made the summer weekends pretty boring.  When I sit around and watch TV or read, I feel guilty like I should be doing something productive which has resulted in my floor being mopped more this summer than ever before.  It seemed futile to plan a camping trip in the midst of all this bad weather.

So you can imagine how quickly I moved to action when Amy casually asked me if I still had the doll bunk beds that she played with when she was a little girl.  Of course I have them!  I’ve saved them for the past 30 years just waiting for the day when she would ask for them.  Immediately I began to think about dragging out my 1975 sewing machine and making new mattresses, blankets, and pillows for the bed.  I used to sew a lot.  In fact I made Amy many outfits as well as clothing for myself.  I even made an ET costume that won a prize, but the sad truth is that I don’t consider myself much of a seamstress.  It always took me forever to make something and never came easily to me.  But I remember when I was a little girl, my Papa J. made me a doll cradle and my Granny made the mattress, pillow, and blankets for it.  They had three little granddaughters who were about the same age and this was our Christmas present from Papa and Granny.  It was special to me so I wanted to make these beds of Amy’s special for Amelia.

I surfed the internet until I found some simple directions.  Then I went to Hobby Lobby where I discovered that the 75 cent thread, I used to buy was now $2.39 per spool.  I chose the materials and went to work.

I cut the pieces for the mattress as directed – no problem.  Then I stitched the pieces together – no problem.  I stitched across each corner giving it a box look – no problem.  Then I stuffed it – no problem.  Then I realized that the internet directions were not going to work for these beds.  The mattresses were too thick so I had to pull out the stuffing and re-cut each piece; however, I must say that this did not take too much longer.

The next Saturday we returned to Hobby Lobby when I realized that the board that the mattress sits on needed to be pink since its original covering was red.  Thankfully, Paw-Paw handled this part of the project since it required measuring and gluing neither of which is my strong suit.

I took apart an old baby blanket, cut it in half and edged it with the same material I used on the mattresses.  It turned out pretty cute.  Pillows were made for each bed and finally it was done.  

The scraps were put away, the sewing machine went into the closet, and the floor was swept.  Project complete!  I was feeling pretty good and could hardly wait for Amelia to see it.  Then the call came….Amelia’s doll has a cat.  Could I make a bed for the cat also?  Oh my, here we go again!