Work in Progress ... plus a new teddy pattern

 Daughter teddies :

Bodies finished and jointed

Heads and necks jointed

Now I need to work on the all important face.

I have not been getting much accomplished lately due to the heat wave here. We are only about a 20 minute drive to the coast so we don't have an air conditioner in our little house ... we don't usually need one unless we have the (what used to be) rare HOT day or days. Well, last week was sooooo hot! And our California Fire Season is no longer just a season but it is all the time. None of the current fires are near my location but it still effects the air quality. Well, I've been having headaches and one day it was a migraine. Oddly while dealing with my aching head all I could think of is "I need to make myself a new teddy". LOL. So I did. 

This is a new pattern that I drew out. I wanted a chubby little teddy that fit in the palm of my hand.

I wanted to make a teddy that took just one day and not several days or weeks like my mink teddies. So I went through my mohair and alpaca storage boxes and found a scrap of alpaca (my favorite). I drew out a pattern that fit the size of the scrap piece.

I used wool felt for the paw pads which I hand painted.

I took these photos first and that's went I decided that it needed some paint ... seemed a little uninteresting without the paint.

I used to use the mohair and alpaca fabrics to work out my new pattern ideas simply because fabric is faster, less messy, and more fun to use for teddies. Am I going to try this pattern in mink? Probably not because I designed the pattern for fabric not pelts.

I'm quite pleased with the one-day teddy that I made to add to my personal collection.

Forced to change my shipping provider

For the past 30 plus years I have been safely shipping my teddies through the United States Postal Service with absolutely no problems. Now there is a new Postmaster General and since he has been the head of the USPS I have had  several packages gone missing. I reported each one (after waiting over a week past their expected delivery date). I was always given a Confirmation Number for each of my Missing Mail reports ... but I never received any follow-ups. One package finally arrived almost a month late. The package pictured above just arrived today August 25 and as you can see in the last photo it was shipped July 15 (from my neighborhood pharmacy, so the expected deliver was July 16). So that is well over a month late. I have one other package that stopped tracking on July 14 and I will probably never receive that one. My daughter also received a package a month after it's expected delivery date.

Therefore, from now on my teddies will be shipped either by UPS or FedEx. 

By the way, I did go back to my pharmacy after waiting 2 weeks because I was running out of my prescription medication and they kindly replaced the order... and told me that the problem I had with USPS was becoming a common one for their pharmacy. 

UPDATE: a few days after I posted this the package that never arrived suddenly started tracking at my local post office. I received an email notice that it was to be delivered that day. I was home all day and never received it. Then I received another email notice to say that the package was delivered to my front porch (with the time of delivery). Well, I checked my front porch camera and sure enough ... no one came to my door at that time. UUUGH! I was hoping that whoever received my package would return it ... but people are not as nice as they used to be.

Well, that just reinforces my decision NOT to ship my teddies via USPS until there is a new Postmaster General and department starts running smoothly again.