Teddy Talk: Creating, Collecting, Connecting

OK I just spent the whole afternoon driving to OHIO , which is 1 1/2 hours away to buy these stuffed animals, our town is completely sold out and my son, LOVES THEM!!!!!!!!!
Does anyone else have a son or daughter that loves them?

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That looks like my cat with bunny ears
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My husband just said the funniest thing, I showed him this picture and said  "do you think this rabbit is real and that big?"
He goes "maybe the guy is just really little"
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Karen the Vegas story only makes us love you more!

This is how the house looked today

Again thanks everyone for your kindness and loving words.

Happy Easter to everyone.

Shelli, Thanks so much, I LOVE these cards and the ones everyone else posted

Jodi That was wonderful!!!!!!

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Here's some more, aren't the colors wonderful.

Bear Hugs
Jodi

I have a ton of the old brightly colored illustrations that I just love and I am going to post a few to share , copy them if you want and if you have some and want to share post them here.

I LOVE these , I wish they still had these type drawing around

Bear Hugs
Jodi

Great puppy picture!!!!!
Happy Easter everyone!!!!!!

I am going to start on one this weekend, I plan to make 10 and if anyone wants to do a trade let me know.
I am so excited about this!!!!!!!!!

Bear Hugs
Jodi

Mindy , I would LOVE to go to Vegas, I will see if I can work it out, even without George it sounds like fun 
I would also love if we did something on the east coast, 
Hmmmmmmm I am just going to have to try to make it to the Vegas ...............PARTY!!!!!!!
Karen remember what goes on in Vegas stays in Vegas  :crackup:
Bear Hugs
Jodi

Shane I think that would be great, I know they have done threads before, but I never made one and as we can see from this thread, there are others who haven't, I think they are so cool, maybe we could even do a trade thing, I think thats been done too but it would be fun to revisit it.  What we could maybe do is try to get like 10 people or so and those ten make 10 cards and we then send them to each other.  I think once I work out a design for one, doing 10 wouldn't be that hard. or is that not what you do , are they supposed to be one of a kind??????? I think it would be really cool to collect these .
Bear Hugs
Jodi

I would love to have one in Schaumburg too, I would be there with bells on.

I just found this link that looked good
http://www.cedarseed.com/air/atc.html
Hope it helps

Roxanne, I was just going to post this same question, I just went to Bid4bears and saw Kims ATC and I loved them, then went and looked at all of the ones posted here and I want to try one, thanks for asking this question.
Roxanne when you get one done post it here and I'll do the same.
Bear hugs
Jodi

Great cover, very eye catching and so appealing, as a mom of boys, you really captured that little boy look,  when my littlest was about 4 he wore a backwards cap just like that, I LOVE IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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Madison is just so lovely.
What a beauty.

Carrot cake is sooooooo good and the cream cheese icing is wonderful, it's snowing again here in Muncie Indiana, tomorrow may be a perfect day for carrot cake, thanks for sharing the recipe.
Bear hugs
Jodi

You guys are the best,   
The kindness you all have shown has made me feel so much better,  it's funny, coming here and posting and having such encouragement and kindness has kind of felt like I did, when I went to my grandmas, I always left feeling better. 
I am sending you all a big hug tonight!  :hug:

Jodi it's funny I thought the same thing, isn't that so funny, I always get excited when I meet a Jodi, even the Jody's with a Y, and the ie  Jodies, but the Jodi's spelled with just an "i" I get a feeling of sisterhood, does other like name people feel this way or is it just goofy me?, but I am like you the more I read about you and see your work I feel like I know you really well. Maybe it is as Anne of Green Gables always said, maybe we are kindred spirits.

Chrissi, what a cool way to display that oil can, and the work bench looks so great on the wall. You know the thing that makes it hardest  is when the house was still there I could drive by and it was kind of like a tangible proof that they were real and now that it is gone and soon to be paved over, it will feel like they were just a really wonderful dream. I know this all sounds goofy, because I know they were real, I hate going to their graves to remember them, I always thought I could go to the house and remember them and the wonderful times we shared there, and now that is gone.  They had wonderful hostas around the house and I sure wish I would have dug everything up and replanted here at my house. I know a thing like a house shouldn't matter but they do , I mean look how excited people get to go to Stonehenge, it was a place people created memories and it is still standing so it makes those that were there real, without it they vanish forever. I think what I need to do is maybe  donate a park bench and put a plaque on it with their names or plant a tree in their memory.   thank you all for letting me cry on your shoulders, your kind words mean more then I can say.
Big Bear Hugs

Thanks so much everyone, you are all so sweet and it really does help, Jane it's funny you did that, you sound just like me, when my parents moved out of their house, which they lived in for 43 years, I took a set of the doorknobs that was on my old bedroom door, I always thought it looked like a diamond, then when Grandma passed away I took one of her doorknob sets, that led to their backporch, I know I am starting to sound like Aunt Gladys from the show Bewitched,  but I had made a memory box of my parents and of my grandparents house, then for christmas I made my sister who lives in Florida, a memory box that had one of the doorknobs and other things from my Grandmas, in a box for her to open when she misses home.  I felt bad taking the doorknobs when I did it, but I am so happy I did now, (I replaced them with new knobs).

Here is what I put in the box I made for myself:
the picture of her house that is in this post
the doorknob
a spool of thread from her sewing kit
my favorite picture of my grandparents together
my grandma's measuring spoons
a tool from my grandpa's tool box
a christmas cookie cutter
a piece of my Grandma's jewelry
a recipe card she had filled out
a picture of some of my family at a Christmas gathering at their house

everytime I look at it, it does make me happy.  I am not saying everyone should take doorknobs, but those little bits, that don't seem really important by themselves, sure do help when they are all together to bring back some fond memories.

They tore down my Grandma's house today, and I am so sad. She died a year ago this past Nov. and she lived near the local college and they have wanted her house for a very long time to expand the college and now it is gone, I miss my grandma so much, sometimes my heart aches and finding out they torn down her house makes me feel like I have lost my grandma again. She lived a block away from me when I was still living at home and I loved her so much, we were so much a like and we were truely best friends, her house had a garden and a big yard to catch lightening bugs in and my favorite time was to sit on her front porch on her swing and just talk, drink lemonaide and make doll clothes.  She taught me to sew in that house, she made wonderful sunday dinners in that house and my grandpa would watch the Cubs every year in that house, always hoping this would be their year.

We had so many wonderful Christmas memories there , they were too numerous to pick just one,  I gave her the news I was going to get married, in that house, each time I found out I was pregnant, I couldn't wait to go to grandma's to share my wonderful news. Sometimes I just needed a shoulder to cry on and I always seemed to feel better after a visit. Grandmas are good at that. Grandma lived until she was 89  and she passed away at home, as she wanted, the second to the last visit with her , I went to say hello, she was in bed most of the time, I woke her up and she looked up at me and said "oh honey you look like an angel"  she got up for just a few minutes and said she was tired and went back to bed, but not without giving me a hug and a kiss and telling me she loved me.  Two night later I went to see her and she had gotten worse and the docter said it wouldn't be long, I whispered to her it was OK to go, that we all loved her and would see her again. I got the call at 2:00am that night, she had left us.

I know that it wasn't the house that made it special , it was my grandma and grandpa and the memories we shared there, and those can't be torn down, but when I found out they had tore it down,  it made my grandma being gone more real and it was harder then I thought it would be.

Love
Jodi