Dolls

I welcome handmade gifts, even more so after I realized how quickly one family can acquire so many unwanted plastic toys.   When I find time, or more honestly right before I have to attend a baby shower or meet a new little one, I quickly try to make something, soft and rattlely and not at all commercial but simple and handmade, to bring along with a gift. I started out making a basic rattle like this one.

And since my daughter has a innate love of dolls I then ditched the handle and made it one.

I am sure it will evolve some more every time I make one.  I haven't made or sold anything like this in my etsy shop because I felt it was too derivative of what others have done but as it evolves I may consider adding it.  Right now I just make these for gifts.  I haven't received any direct feedback about them but my daughter liked the rattle I had made her quite well.  That gave me the idea to make them for gifts.

Oh, because you can't hear or feel it, I will tell you I found the most perfect rattle is a cat toy sometimes called a jingle ball found at a pet store.  It makes a pretty rattling sound.  And the combination of polished cotton, loop edge satin ribbon and felt make for varied textures.  It is stuffed with regular polly fill and the face is hand-stitched with embroidery floss.  The rest is machine stitched excluding the stitching around the rattle handle.