Just as every person is different, so is every doll. Gracey is one of those. Her Mom dressed her in her finest clothes for the first day of school. Gracey was not happy at all in all the clothes.

She didn't mind the color so much but all the lace and her hair. She looked like all the other Hitty's and she wanted to look like herself. She longed to be different.

Different was not something her Mom embraced. So each day, she would walk thru the woods to get to school and dream.

She began collecting different fabrics and fibers that the other girls at school didn't want. She secretly worked on her new outfit and hid it in the woods on her way home from school.

Gracey smiled as her Mom layed out the same ol' dress type that everyone else had. She knew that today would be different. She walked to the woods and changed into her new outfit and carefully stored the outfit all the others had. She added one more item and she was done. She was different than all the others. No more sausage rolls in her hair and no frilly dress. Ahhhhhh, she was herself. She was different now than all the rest.

Gracey enjoyed the wind in her long hair. She also liked the shiny short skirt.


"Hey, what are you doing here?" a tiny voice called.


Gracey spun around to see a funny looking rabbit standing there.

"You look different than all the others!" the rabbit squeeked out.


"Good. I don't want to look like all the rest." Gracey said.


"You like being different looking?" the rabbit questioned.


" Yes, I do!" Gracey said. " I am Gracey."



" I'm Sally," she said. Wanna go sit on the log over there?"

" Your hair is even different." Sally said. "Can I touch it?"

"oh, it is soft." Sally said.


A single sound echoed thru the forest. It made Sally leap high into the air.

"Oh, I have to get to school and see what the other Hitty's think of my look." Gracey said and off she went.




While she was happy with her changed looks, I hope she is ready for the opinions of others. Some may like it and others may hate it. She will have to decide if she truely wants to look that different from the others. Only time will tell. Some of us follow the crowd while others step out into the light and walk a differnt path.

Almost a whole year has gone by since I last blogged. I have been busy with real life and of course making dolls. I have also started my own dollsite www.handmadedollsandfriends.com So I am going to try to take a little time to post more often. I have a Sweetgum doll named Abby (after one of my favorite characters on NCIS) Sweetgum. She was an odd one on the tree, much darker than the rest. The other kids made fun of her and she slipped further and further into the shadows. I brought her in and showed her a little kindness and she seems to be coming out of her shyness. The kids used to call her evil but she seems ok to me. Anyway, here comes Abby to tell you her own story about finally getting a home of her own. I found a suitable container for me to live. It says CSI on the case, which means Crime Scene Investigator. Me, I like being the crime scene instigator. (Evil laughter). I drug it away from the dump site. My person helped me take it to her studio to paint it and clean it up. It had a few things still inside of it that I think have potential. Some spent bullet casings made wonderful table legs for my lab. My person also made me a bed and nightstand to put in my loft. Queen Whodunit loves my loft and my bed. She lives in the forest with some of the outcast gnomes and fairies. Her name is really Sarah but no one would be leary of a Sarah. She caused a lot of mischievous in the forest and everyone asked who done it so she adopted the name, Queen Whodunit. While she was doing that, I made a couple of acquired fence panels from Lester's garden to make a bench. I used some chunky brass for legs. I painted them purple but oh my, it was too cheerful so I used a secret formula to mingle black onto the purple for a less bright color. My stairs and door are still bright purple but I may keep it that way. My person being cheap, made a chandelier for my tall ceiling. She used silver and black beads with a purple glint and even found some fat birthday candles to go in it. I wouldn't want ot gush, but she did do a good job on it. My lab is coming along quite nicely but I have to be careful and not let my person see everything in the lab. I have some rotten Easter Eggs I managed to acquire from those silly Hitty's last Easter. They have been fermenting and I just dug them back up. They are almost ready to give back to them. (evil laughter) But that is another story. I salvaged some bloodwood boards fromt he back of Lester's old barn and made a shelf for some of my experiments and collections of oddities. Queen Whodunit brought me a wonderful mirror trimmed in black. She said I needed to check my scary face before I opened my secret door, just in case anyone was near it when I snuck out. Queen Whodunit loved looking thru the CSI magnifying glass that was left in the kit. It isn't quite a microscope, but that will come later. I am not finished but it is beginning to look really good inside. I think I will drag it out to the forrest into the deep shade away from those clothes hogging Hittys.