Me and The Thimble People
I started this blog last year to have a place to work on my struggles to be a more intersectional feminist. Trump had just been elected.
I came to realize that I have no desire to write about that. Read, Google, do the work, shut up and listen, make mistakes…I am willing to do that. Write about it? no. My story of needing to be more intersectional is EVERY DAMNED WHERE.
So it’s time to be low stakes with my writing. Time to center something on myself that isn’t going to affect anyone…anyone except Those Damned Thimble People.
On October 3rd, 2017, my father sent me this cryptic message.
A package is coming to you….The thimble people CAN be your friends
I replied:
WHAT ARE THIMBLE PEOPLE?!
Of course I then googled it, probably as my father was writing his reply “You will see them soon….You may like the illustrations.”
Why was I getting a package? Was it my birthday or Christmas?
No, simply my father and step-mother had assembled enough stuff to send me a package. It should be noted that they are both retired and volunteer at a St. Vinnies. When they say they have stuff to send me I mean I will soon get the finest collection of cast-offs a Wisconsin St. Vinnies can provide a daughter who has moved to Japan.
My family is composed of thrift shoppers. Not fancy sale chasers but “You like this? I got it for 50 cents at a rummage sale”. This is part of how we ALL bond. Me. My Mother. My Father and Step-Mother cannot resist the lure of cast-offs.
Google told me that Thimble People probably referred to The Mary Frances Sewing Book; or, Adventures among the thimble people, first published in 1915. Still, I waited knowing full well that Thimble People could also be the name of some horrid dolls on the way to me. After all, my father once sent me Reggie and Archie dolls..a fact that haunts people who stay at my place.
They hang above my sewing station, lit from below, judging all.
When the package did come it was mostly full of costume bling.
I sew bellydance costumes so I’m always recycling used bling for costumes or accessories. My step-mother, who thinks I am very difficult to shop for, has found my bling needs to be her pathway to what to scout out for me.
Last time I was in WI we sat down and went through bling together so she would feel more confident in her choices.
The box, per usual, was full of sparkle and a few books. Including…
That’s the Mary Frances sewing book.
And these…
Are the horrid Thimble People who have sworn Mary Frances to secrecy about their time together.
And the book actually has most of it’s original patterns included.
As the dark months of winter call me to craft for my life and sanity, I have set on the path of reading this and sewing the doll clothing included within. Because I can. Because the Thimble People will not defeat me and I SHALL tell the world about them.