Sunday, January 1, 2012

Happy Handmade Holidays!

The thing about being a family that believes strongly in handmade gifts and that also is a handmade business, is that we suffer a little bit from what we call the "cobblers children syndrome". What we mean by that is that the things we make for ourselves and our kids are always the last things we make. This year, it meant a very hectic week before Christmas finishing up projects and late, late nights those last two days.

On the plus side, we were able to watch The Fellowship of the Ring, and The Two Towers, as well as the first three Harry Potter movies that week too. Ha-ha-ha!

Maybe some of you remember the little house that Mr Handmade made for Abby last year. Well, He's been planning on adding little wooden houses to his product line for about a year now, and has spent his time planning on how best to do that. There were a lot of kinks to work out before it was a feasible idea. Finally, he made a new prototype for Abby's gift this year, and it came out GREAT! We're so excited about them, and have several in the works. They'll be ready for the beginning of show season in March! YAY!
Here's some progress pictures from beginning to end.
And the front of the final house. Mrs. Handmade requested a couple of hero's too, that we could give as gifts to the girl's cousin, so Captain America and the Hulk are visiting here.

At the beginning of December, Mrs Handmade had asked Abby what she was going to ask Santa for, for Christmas. After looking around the room for a moment, accompanied by the "ummmm"s of a three-year-old, her eyes settled on the picture on her pajamas...a monkey with a banana. A monkey with a Banana is what she decided she was going to tell Santa she wanted for Christmas. She remembered to tell him, and told everyone else the same thing all through the month. Somehow, in spite of that, we both forgot all about it. Fortunately, Abby said something about it as we were buckling her in the car at Nana's house... on the 23rd. We were leaving for Grammies in the morning, so Mrs Handmade had one night to make a miracle monkey munching a banana.

Luckily, she's Just. That. Fierce. Mr Handmade remembered the felt banana that she'd made a few months ago, and found it, Mrs Handmade did an awesome job stitching the monkey together, and Mr Handmade added the peeled banana button to his lapel. Finished.

Abby was very excited.

We hope the holidays were fantastic for you and your families too! Until next time, take care and be good!