Miffy

A couple of months ago, Tom discovered a couple of Miffy books in our local library. He liked them so much we had to renew them and he was quite put out when we eventually returned them. The books (by Dick Bruna) are ideal for young children as they tell simple stories and are all very simply and brightly illustrated. Miffy is now so popular with the Podlings that we have started building our own little collection of Miffy books (including our own copies of the two we got from the library!). Tom keeps looking at the pictures of the other available Miffy books and telling me which ones he would like next.

They've been enjoying the stories about Miffy so much, I thought the Podlings might like to have their own little Miffy dolls to play with. Yesterday afternoon, using the illustrations in the books as a guide, I drew out a pattern for a small Miffy toy and cut two dolls out of white felt. They were actually quite fiddly to put together and I wish I'd had enough felt to make the toys a bit bigger, but they didn't turn out too badly for something I just threw together. I finished them up when the children were in bed last night and made dresses in the colours requested by the Podlings (yellow for Tom and pink for Lily).

The completed Miffy dolls. They are far from perfect, but I'm quite pleased with them. Thankfully the Podlings overlook my many mistakes.

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The dolls were well received, particularly by Lily, who has been trying to get Tom to give her his all morning. She has been carrying Miffy around for much of the morning and I was particularly amused when she put it in her fishing net and wandered about the playroom pretending to be the child catcher from Chitty Chitty Bang Bang (the film is very popular in our house at the moment and is frequently requested by both Podlings). I'm not sure 'Miffy and the Child Catcher' is a title that will ever catch on with the pre-school crowd however!

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