Memories in the attic

I am in the process of de-cluttering my flat and making space for my new life. My loft is stuffed with goodness knows what, from old fancy dress costumes to numerous fabrics and tins of paint.

Last week, with a friend and her daughter visiting, I got down the bag of toys saved for when children come to visit. At the bottom of the bag was a felt bag full of fabric dolls I had made over twenty years ago.

It had been a project for my mum's school, the dolls were all the characters from the Roger Red Hat books.

I spent hours, days, weeks & months stitching and creating each doll and making a bag of The Village with Three Corners. I was probably about fifteen when I made them, and so much teenage angst must have been poured into every stitch.

Twenty years on and as I looked through the torn and tattered dolls (covered in what could only be moth eggs) I realised it was time to throw them away. A week of avoiding the issue, and tonight I finally said goodbye.

So, in memory of the dolls, here they are in all their tatty glory:

Roger Red Hat & family

Billy Blue Hat & family

An old couple?

Sita & Ramu - weirdly, none of their eyes survived!

Percy Green Hat, don't know where his dad is...

Johnny Yellow Hat may well have lived with his Grandparents.
Sadly his twin sister Jennifer is nowhere to be seen.

It's strange how much we cling to things and find it difficult to throw them away. Even if they become a millstone around our necks, it can be hard to let go.

In the end, it wasn't actually as difficult as I had anticipated. It feels good to have photographs to remember them,  and even better to feel just that little bit lighter.