Stitching with Elli

I had been busy doing big people things with Grandma. The dolls had to entertain themselves for a few days.  I don’t know all they did, but they mentioned exploring the house. (They said something about a roller coaster in the house? I’m not sure what they meant by that. I will have to ask them to explain later)  They also did other fun things: such as, playing the dictionary game, relaxing by the lake, and reading during the day. At night they stayed up late and talked to grandma. I think they are learning all sorts of family history!

They also told me they called home and talked to the dolls there.

There is Big news at home……a new doll has arrived!!!!

Her name  is Lea and she is apparently a musician that likes vowels, at least I think that is what they said. It didn’t make a lot of sense to me, but since there were about 5 dolls on one end of the line…and another 4 on this side…well  I’m guessing the message was a little altered. Even if she does love vowels… I’m looking forward to meeting her!

Today I had an errand to do in town. Since they had been wanting to get out of the house, I took them with me. I let them explore a park while I went to a camera shop and got a new lens cover. (I lose those things like crazy!!)

I left them on the bank of the stream and went to the store. (After warning them to not fall in!) As I left, I heard Ellen telling Debbie about the dangers of “rapid currents”. Ellen was very worried about water these days. It scared her badly when Felicity had her accident and fell in. Debbie looked very zoned out..I don’t think she was paying attention to Ellen. She was watching the ducks.

The other two were already down by the water, so they could see the ducks better.

Bonnie liked the fluffy white ones, but Felicity liked the one with the green head the best.

Debbie persuaded Ellen to come closer to the water. She also gently reminded her not to worry so much. Ellen gulped and said okay she would try. She really didn’t want to be a worry wart….she was just so nervous that someone might get hurt.

Felicity wanted to know what they thought about gathering duck feathers for a pillow. Debbie thought it would take too long. Besides, the wind was blowing so hard that it would be hard to collect feathers. They didn’t have anything to put them in…unless they used Ellen’s hat? Ellen was NOT in favor of that idea. She pointed out that it wouldn’t hold many feathers.

The conversation moved on to how to get the ducks to come closer. The idea of holding up grass was suggested. It didn’t work. Then Felicity saw a flower and thought that might entice the ducks. She got Debbie to be ready to grab her legs in case she started slipping towards the water and reeeeeached for it!

Success!

but they noticed there was a bug on it…maybe it was a stinging kind…if so, maybe it  shouldn’t be fed to ducks?….. Back to square one.

They sat quietly for a while, as they thought. Bonnie tried “here ducky ducky”. That didn’t work either.

Then Debbie suggested throwing Ellen’s hat toward the ducks. Maybe the ducks would think it was a piece of bread since it was brown?

Ellen gave a startled gasp and  took her hat back from Debbie. She quickly suggested they go see what else was by the stream. Perhaps there were ducks closer to the bank further up.

Bonnie stifled a laugh at Ellen’s concern for her hat. She tried to keep a straight face as she said that maybe it was better the ducks didn’t come closer in case they might bite. Ellen eagerly agreed and started walking up stream. “Look I see a willow tree!! Let’s play tag! Felicity is it”, she called over her shoulder trying to distract the others from luring the ducks closer with her beloved hat.

The idea of tag was agreeable to everyone. Felicity jumped up and chased Ellen. Laughing, she closed in to tag her….oops! she tripped. It turn into more of a tackle than a tag.

“ahh” “oooph!” They both cried.

“Sorry!! are you okay?” asked Felicity anxiously as she scrambled to get off Ellen. “Are your glasses broken??”

Ellen adjusted them and said they were fine and so was she, not to worry.

They played around for a while. Bonnie had a habit of running tight circles around tree trunks. Debbie couldn’t quite catch her when she did that. Almost! but not quite.

She was concentrating so hard on catching her that she didn’t notice where Felicity and Ellen were.

Ellen came up and asked where Felicity was, because she had been looking at something and now couldn’t see Felicity anywhere.

They stared at each other. They were each thinking “oh no! What if she fell in the water again!!”, but they didn’t want to say it.

Fortunately, before they got too far in thinking of terrible things… as they were just taking a deep breath to yell “FELICITY!!!”….Just then, they heard a laugh and “I’m up here!”

“How did you get up there??” they all asked.

“I climbed. I wondered how long it would be before you all noticed”, she replied matter of factly. ” I think coming down might be a little harder. Maybe I’ll stay up here a bit.”

As it happened, I came back before long and helped her down. After that we all walked down to the bridge and looked at that.

Ellen didn’t want to go on the bridge..so she sat on the bank  with me and chattered about what they had done while I was gone.

We watched the others play a few rounds of pooh sticks.(Debbie’s stick won twice, and Bonnie’s stick won once)

Felicity kept hoping hers would win…but it didn’t happen.

We said goodbye to the ducks and went back to the house for lunch.

The next day we were expecting company. See that story here…

p.s For bonus reader points see if you can…

1. Find how many ducks you can find in the pictures..the last picture is really hard to tell so don’t have to count that one 😀  but I shall be impressed if you do 😉
2. Find the shape of lower peninsula of Michigan in one of the pictures
3.  Name all the dolls in the pictures of this post…you shall be “Super blog reader!!!” if you can do that 😀