Silent movies - The Freshman

Two weeks ago we had a college football hero, last week Harold Lloyd, how about Harold Lloyd at college today?
Here's "The Freshman" from 1925.

Public domain via Wikipedia

Today we have a proper plot. As Lloyd says in his autobiography, films like the "Lonesome Luke" ones are gag type comedies, films like "The Freshman" are character comedies which start more slowly and develop.

Harold Lamb is a young man excited for college. He copies a greeting - a little jig and a handshake -, the outfit, and the nickname "Speedy" from his favorite college movie, he has saved some money, he has high expectations about becoming a "college hero" like his movie idol.

On the train he meets Peggy, he gets interested in her crossword puzzle and they get along splendidly.

Once arrived in town, Harold falls right into the hands of the College Cad (no names, it's practically a tpye) for whom he's the perfect victim due to his desire to be popular in connection with his incredible naiveté.

The Cad shows him the "car assigned to him" which is in fact the dean's car and lures him on the stage where the dean is supposed to hold the opening speech by making him save a kitten from a height (if that wasn't enough already to hate the Cad, just wait, there's more to come), then tells him he has to make a speech during which Harold is laughed at by the whole assembly.

Harold holds the rescued kitten, but puts it under his sweater when he needs both
hands free. Mama Kitty urgently wants her baby back.
You understand that I was legally bound (by Gundel) to include these pictures
(and it was hard to keep it down just to these two, the kitten is adorable).

The Cad and his friends - male and female - cheer for Harold who thinks he's on the best way to be popular and invites the group for ice cream, but the Cad keeps inviting more people on the way to the ice cream parlor.
Look who follows them, too!

Again, legally bound.

After spending a good deal of his savings like that, Harold has to downgrade in regards to his living quarters.
There he meets Peggy again who happens to be the landlady's daughter. Harold's shirt has been ripped up when the kitten climbed up it under his sweater and Peggy sews the button on for him. You see him secretly cutting off more buttons.

To up his game, Harold tries out for the football team, but the coach isn't impressed. When their only tackle dummy is damaged, however, they use Harold as a live dummy and even the coach is impressed by his unbroken spirit at the end of the day. To "reward" him, they make him water boy and let him think he's one of the substitutes.

Harold thinks his leg has broken apart, but it's the dummy's leg.

Do you remember Pete from "Our Gang"?
This is his dad, Pal the Wonder Dog, at
six months old. He actually had a three
quarter ring around his eye while
Pete's ring was makeup.
(Gundel wasn't sure you needed to know
that. Always those dogs.)

Harold hosts the "Fall Frolic" dance.
He gets a new suit for the occasion, but his tailor has dizzy spells and therefore can't make it in time, so the suit is only held together by basting stitches and finally falls apart.
From the phone booth he has hidden in, Harold sees how the Cad tries to force himself on Peggy and teaches him a lesson.

The Cad retaliates by telling him that he has never been popular and that it all has just been a big joke.
Harold is devastated, but Peggy comforts him and tells him to stop trying to be someone he isn't and make them like him for what he really is.
Harold sees his chance at the big football game still thinking he's in the team because Peggy who knows the truth didn't have the heart to tell him. When the coach runs out of substitutes because of injuries, he has to send in Harold to avoid the game being forfeited.
Of course, Harold manages a touchdown in the last minute - and with just one shoe on, too!

Sweeter to him than being celebrated by everyone, however, is this note that Peggy slips him while he's being carried into the locker room ...

Let me get something out of the way first.
I hate bullying of all sorts and I really felt for Harold. You are supposed to do that of course, but also still to be able to laugh. Therefore, the scene of him as a live tackle dummy is cut rather short and a scene at the ice cream parlor was actually cut completely according to Lloyd's autobiography because it made the test audience feel too sorry for Harold to be funny.

If you read my post about "Brown of Harvard", you may wonder why I even watched another college movie (by the way, it's said that "The Freshman" kicked off a college movie vogue).
The difference is that I knew bits of "The Freshman" from the olden days when I was still an innocent, fresh-faced kid. Seriously though, I did know parts from the old compilation films. This was Lloyd's financially most successful silent movie and I knew it would be hilarious.
Tom Brown annoys me, but I route for Harold even though they both end up in a big football game, a sport I know even less about than others.
Also Harold's football game is fun because he's still Harold. He's not athletic, he's struggling, and it's a miracle that he suceeds. Tom's isn't because he is a sportsman and we know that he just needs to shed off the old wisecracker's shell, get serious and do it. You know what I mean.
Something that I thought was funny, though - Lea Stans from "Silent-ology" also pointed it out - was that there was absolutely no mention of studying. Even Tom held a stack of books once even if not for long 😂
Then again one of the intertitles said: "Tate University - a large football stadium with a college attached." I wonder if that was the reason why the Germans literally called the movie "The sports student".

Most of all, however, Harold is relatable. He is the ordinary guy who wants to be popular, who wants to be liked, who wants to show what he can do. Probably we all have been there one way or the other, haven't we (I mean, isn't blogging and hoping for reactions a rather good example 😉)?
We can relate to his reaction when the Cad tells him the truth, the shock, trying to laugh it off like it's nothing, then the breakdown. And it's so sweet to see Peggy comforting him and building him up again. The chemistry between Harold and Peggy (Jobyna Ralston) is great.

Yes, and then it is just nice to see the ordinary guy succeed even if it's not very realistic and we know it. It's something we maybe hope for sometimes in our own lives.
"Wait a moment, though," I hear you say. "What was it you said about sports heros?"
The difference for me is that in the end you don't find Harold letting himself be celebrated in a crowd or a parade. You find him alone in the shower - which he turns on by accident without even noticing - with what's important to him. Peggy's note.
 

I love this movie and think it's really funny and sweet.


Sources and further reading:

1. Stephen Winer: The Freshman: Speedy Saves the Day! A Harold Lamb Adventure! On: The Criterion Collection. Essays, March 25, 2014
2. Lea Stans: Thoughts On: "The Freshman". On: Silent-ology, May 23, 2016
3. Harold Lloyd (in collaboration with Wesley W. Stout): An American Comedy, New York, NY, Dover Publ., republication of the 1928 edition

Cats, cats, cats, and more cats, part 4

Over half a year ago I wrote I wasn't done with showing you cats and more cats from my place.
If you are interested, you can find part 1 to 3 here, here, and here. There I said "I have quite a few around the place, some because I fell in love with them myself, others because for some weird reason people think I like cats and have given me a lot of items over the years. Really strange, I know. Why would they think something like that? 😂"

Let's start with a tiny one. An online friend had sent me a surprise parcel and among other things it had a cute little glass cat in it.
The very first miniature basket I crocheted from wire in 2010 had a little black polymer clay cat in it and some colored wire loosely stuffed in to mimic yarn. I thought I still had a picture of it, but it's probably in a "safe spot", too ... anyhow, it was my first clay cat, a little creepy looking because I was really bad at it then, and also my baskets have improved a lot after that. So this single earring is kind of a homage to my (very humble) beginnings.
I have been searching for similar glass cats since then, but never found one that worked as well as this one (it's not a bead and I don't use glue, so it needs to be a specific way for me to attach it safely).

This sweetie with the sparkle eyes was a gift, but I have to admit I'm not sure anymore by whom. It's rather heavy, so I think it would work better as a bag charm.

Bikky's print has been on my blog before, but I love it so much that I want to show it again. Bikky's model for her digital paintings is her own cat Broccoli which also gave her shop the name - "Broccoli Cat Art".
A cat on a book holding a teddy, could it be any more perfect for me?

As a kid, I had one of those animals which collapsed if you pushed on the hidden spring with your thumb although I don't remember which animal it was. I had to look up what they are called - one name for them is push puppets.
A Swiss toy maker invented them (some sources say 1926, some 1932) and called his company Wakouwa using the first letters from his name Walter Kourt Walls. Originally, they were from wood, but soon other companies began making them as well, and plastic was used, too.
Here's my (nameless) cat.

The last two are from the MUTTS universe and new additions.
I just noticed that I never really talked about cartoons here. I love cartoons and comic strips and like to say that the cartoonists I follow and who so generously share their work publicly (I wish I could support all of them) help keeping me sane in these times.
There are the timeless ones, the bizarre ones, the witty ones, the smart ones, the satirical ones, the silly ones, the creepy ones and so on (although cartoons and comics can be more than one thing, of course) - and if I could share just one word for MUTTS, it would be "warm-hearted".
Patrick McDonnell created MUTTS in 1994 telling the everyday adventures of Earl the dog (based on his own dog), Mooch the cat, and the animals and people around them.
On the website it says that "Compassion for all creatures is at the heart of MUTTS. Throughout their adventures, Mooch and Earl befriend an adorable array of creatures, including neighborhood pets and their guardians, wild animals, adoptable shelter pets and rescue workers, animals at farm sanctuaries, and more."
The stories make me smile, laugh, and sometimes cry, like the story of Guard Dog, for example, or the pleas of Shtinky Puddin', the kitten "who cares passionately about protecting endangered animals".
This magnet of Shtinky gazing into the night sky is now on my fridge.

"Hopeful Stargazing"

Then there was this comic strip.
When I looked in the shop, I couldn't find it as a print. So I reached out to the team on social media. They said they'd put in a request with the design team to resize it for a print, confirmed shortly after that it would get made available, and a few weeks later it was.
It only arrived a few days ago - much faster than I had expected, though - so I haven't chosen a frame for it yet, but I just had to show you.

For personal reasons that I don't want to go into, this strip hits really close to home in more than one way, therefore I was so glad they did that.
"Some days you hold your cat. Some days your cats holds you." 💕

You can find MUTTS on their own website, on Instagram or Facebook, you can also subscribe to a daily comic strip (I really don't have many email subscriptions, but this one gives me a boost).
I should add that I'm not affiliated with them in any way, I'm just a huge fan, and if you are an animal lover and don't know the strips yet, you maybe should have a look, too.
Also, as usual I asked beforehand if it was okay to share this.

A little warning at the end, there will definitely be a part 5.

Nostalgia - Frankenwolf and friendship

Let me tell you a bit about my girl Frankenwolf.
Frankenwolf has to thank my friend Jenn and a mutual friend of ours for her existence. Said friend - also a collector - had asked her at one time to take a Steiff puppet and a Steiff figure and turn them into a new creation.
That inspired Jenn to do the same with Frankenwolf.

Now that might sound quite gruesome to you, beheading two Steiffs and sewing them together, but of course that's just part of the story.
Let's have a look at Frankenwolf's donors.

Steiff has a long history of making German Shepherd dogs, they have been around for over 100 years. Their ancestors, however, still had a bad image which was probably the reason why it took until 1956 before they appeared in Steiff's production.
The first Steiff wolf was a hand puppet named Loopy after the Latin "lupus" which means wolf. That's not surprising to me as there weren't just nice, cuddly puppets, but it could also be useful to have a "villain" (like our childhood non-Steiff devil who was my favorite with his red head). Loopy was produced from 1956 to 1978. He had an open mouth with four fangs and a long red felt tongue. It wasn't unusual for fangs and/or tongues to get lost during play eventually, though.

I always called the one on the right Grandma Wolf,
she seems to be a very happy wolf.

The wolf remained a rare animal in Steiff's line. There are two sizes of a standing Loopy - the smaller one has a closed, the bigger one an open mouth - which were only made for one year in 1964 (one of my personal favorites). Later wolves sometimes turned up as a companion, for example with a Red Riding Hood doll or a polar bear.
The puppet used for Frankenwolf was in very bad shape. Actually, it's surprising that it still had all the fangs. Before throwing the head away as well, though, this was definitely the better choice.

The body was taken from a Micki figure who had a different problem.
First a (very short) word about Mecki. He's a hedgehog who originally came from a German puppet film and became the mascot of a TV magazine where he got his own cartoon. Mecki's wife is called Micki, the children Macki and Mucki. The character had always been quite popular (to be honest, I have never been a fan myself), so Steiff got themselves the licensing rights and made their own versions of the whole family from 1951 on.
Now the early versions had a little problem. The heads were made from rubber which tended to dry out and deteriorate. Later versions were made of a different material.

Pictures by NoName_13 via Pixabay

Well, and Micki had the same problem, but her body was quite okay (even if she had lost her apron and her shoes are a bit scuffed).
Jenn also added a tail and different arms.

Frankenwolf means more to me, however, than just being a unique addition to my collection.
A few years ago I told a little about how I met Jenn. The ex and I were in the USA for the first time and got the chance to visit FAO Schwarz in San Francisco (which closed down over 20 years ago). Steiff made some wonderful and desired FAO Schwarz specials over the years some of which you can see in this video. We were like children in a candy store ... no, wait, toy store 😉

FAO Schwarz Manhattan, picture by Rob Young
 from the UK, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia

When we had exhausted ourselves (and our wallets just a little bit), we asked if there was something like an American Steiff club or a way to get in contact with other collectors. They didn't have any information on that, but they gave us Jenn's number (let me remind you that data privacy wasn't such a big thing yet back then and in this case I'm very glad about that). Jenn had repaired studio Steiffs - amazing lifesize plush animals - for them before.
Then we sat in our hotel room and the ex decided I had to call Jenn. I was so nervous. How do you explain best to a stranger that you got their number from the toy store because you are a German Steiff collector? I needn't have worried. After five minutes, she offered to show us around everywhere. I told her that unfortunately we were leaving the next day, and that could have been the end of it - but it wasn't.
We exchanged addresses and started writing each other letters, then we went from letters to phone calls which might show you how important this had become for us. This was before cell phones and texting, emails or chats.

The next year we went to the US again and that time we would meet Jenn in San Francisco and I would go home with her where the ex would join his conference was over. That was also when I fell in love with White Dude, by the way, the cat that the previous residents had left behind at Jenn's place and who went back to Germany with us as her own cats didn't want him there, little punks (I loved them, anyway).

That was almost 35 years ago.
We visited Jenn, she visited us, later just me. We have a lot of stories and memories, good ones and not so good ones because that's how life is.
I wish we didn't have about 5,800 air miles between us and could just hang out, have tea (or tap water that she insists on 😉) and cake, talk, laugh, and do fun stuff. The distance makes spontaneous dates just a tad difficult. Time difference and work schedules can also make it difficult to talk, but when we do, we get a lot of stuff covered.

When I said that Frankenwolf means more to me than just a toy, this is what I mean. Friendship. She does ... and my little gnome you have seen before does ... and the surprises Jenn got me on fleamarkets, the teddies she taught me how to sew, and the time she gave me a duplicate key to her place as a sign of her friendship which actually made me tear up.
Can someone please finally invent that transporting device that I need so badly?
But even if we haven't seen one another for several years, we think of each other, and I sure hope I made her ears ring now. As we always say to each other at the end of a call .... love ya, my Jenn.

Weekend Traffic Jam - Week 156

Welcome to the Weekend Traffic Jam Reboot!
My posts for the link up will go live on Thursdays at 9:30 p.m. EDT or, if you live in the future like I do, on Fridays at 3:30 a.m. CE(S)T.

Dawn is ready to embrace the spring sun and go on her first trip of the year.
How about you, do you already have trips planned or do you travel all year round?

But first, are you ready for the weekend?

As part of the reboot, we will be featuring a different blog every week.
How about stopping by and saying hello? Let them know we sent you.

This week our spotlight is on InkTorrents Graphics.

Soma from InkTorrents Graphics says: "As a child, I was mesmerized by the world of ink and paper, which turned into a lifelong passion for art. As an eternal lover of stories, it is important for me to have a background story to the art I'm creating.
Whether I'm playing violin, guitar or piano, I use melody and dynamics to tell stories.
I deeply love science. Seeing nature through science-coloured glasses gives me a profound joy. When it is dark outside and I am not in the midst of an ink-and-paper adventure, I am most probably playing with my telescopes, catching starlight.
I feel at home in nature, looking for small hidden surprises and geological clues while hiking along trails.
All these different interests and venues fuel and inspire my art.
I am happiest when I am travelling and experiencing the world up close. My camera and I are inseparable. I use it for journalling and for creativity, capturing the abundance of colour and movement around me.
I have been painting ever since I was a child. I have always loved watercolour, but I also let the subject of painting dictate the media. I use oil, oil pastel, ink and markers as well.
My husband and I live with our lovely kitties. They do provide a lot of fun inspiration for my artwork and stories!"

Marsha from Marsha in the Middle started blogging in 2021 as an exercise in increasing her neuroplasticity. Oh, who are we kidding? Marsha started blogging because she loves clothes, and she loves to talk or, in this case, write!

Melynda from Scratch Made Food! & DIY Homemade Household - The name says it all, we homestead in East Texas, with three generations sharing this land. I cook and bake from scratch, between gardening and running after the chickens, and knitting!

Lisa from Boondock Ramblings shares about the fiction she writes and reads, her faith, homeschooling, photography and more.

Cat from Cat's Wire has what she calls a jumping spider brain. She has many interests and will blog about whatever catches her attention - crafts, books, old movies, collectibles or random things.

Rena from Fine Whatever Blog writes about style, midlife, and the "fine whatever" moments that make life both meaningful and fun. Since 2015, she's been celebrating creativity, confidence, and finding joy in the everyday.


Here are some of my picks from last week's link up.

Jill shares ten spring tops with us.

Linda tells us about a sanctuary for many.

Nancy's highlight of the week was a concert she didn't even want to go to at first.

Lisa's book/movie recommendation made my ears go up!


Let's link up!

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Please do not link to videos, sales ads, or social media links such as YouTube videos/shorts, Instagram or Facebook reels, TikTok videos, or any other social media based content.
Please do visit other blogs and give the gift of a comment. 

Notice:
By linking with Weekend Traffic Jam Reboot, you assert that the content is your own property and give us permission to share said content if your post or blog is showcased.
We welcome unlimited, family friendly content. This can include opinion pieces, recipes, travel recaps, fashion ideas, crafts, thrifting, lifestyle, book reviews or discussions, photography, art, and so much more!
Thank you for linking up with us! 

 

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Silent movies - Lonesome Luke, Messenger

Have you ever heard of Lonesome Luke? Chances are good that you know the actor who adopted a different and much more widely known persona after Luke, but will you recognize him?
Today I have a short from 1917 for you - Lonesome Luke, Messenger.

Here's the "plot".

Luke and Snub are messengers.
 

One day, they are supposed to deliver some big parcels to a girls' seminary school.
Luke gets "invited" in by one of the girls and immediately thrown out again by the matron which only increases his and Snub's urge to get back in.

That's no stuntman rolling down the stairs!

Snub makes it in as a contractor asks him if he wants to fill in for his "paper hanging assistant" who's late.
Luke finally manages by posing as a lineman and announcing that it's "free telephone sample day".
As you can imagine wallpaper, glue, ladders, and cables allow for ample slapstick action.

It's pure chaos from here - people trying to escape from one another, running here and there, crawling down chimneys, dangling on telephone wires, and in the end everyone chases Luke!

Pouting girls, but Luke hasn't given up yet.

The first escape.

Aaaand he's back.

The second escape. Nice jump!

From the autobiography: "The cunning thought behind all this, you will observe, was to reverse the Chaplin outfit. All his clothes were too large, mine all too small. My shoes were funny, but different; my mustache funny, but different. Nevertheless, the idea was purely imitative and was recognized as such by audiences, though I painstakingly avoided copying the well-known Chaplin mannerisms. ... Not only was the get-up imitative, but it was an offense to the eye originally. I cleaned it up as time went on until it was self-respecting before it died, but I do not like to recall it ...
I was convinced both that the character had gone as far as we could take him and that I had a better."

And he had. Did you recognize him?
It's Harold Lloyd before he came up with the "glass character" that we think of when we hear his name today.

Actually, the look with the glasses - which didn't have lenses, by the way - became so iconic that it seems every time someone else wears round glasses in a silent movie, people comment "He looks like Harold Lloyd!" although the glasses are the only similarity. People even had a hard time recognizing Lloyd if he didn't wear them.

Back to Lonesome Luke, though.
67 films were produced between 1915 and 1917 - one reelers took them about a week to make -, but most of them are lost now. I read in a post that only 14 of them survived, in a later comment on a video it said they found some more and are now up to 18. Still not that much.
If you think that today's short doesn't sound like much, you are right. However, you have to keep in mind that this was in 1917. The idea of films and of comedy in particular were still very different then ... or was it? To be honest, seeing some of today's comedy it really doesn't feel like that sort of humor is gone completely.
Take falls, for example. Why have been home video shows with people falling into lakes, off chairs or stages, etc. been so popular? Schadenfreude. Falls were a big thing in silent movies, and as you know by now, the actors often did their stunts themselves. How about Lloyd rolling down those stone steps? I sometimes have a hard time watching these things and yell "ouch" a lot, but I know enough people who'd still find that as hilarious as an audience over 100 years ago.

Luke was popular with the audience, but Lloyd wanted more than chases and pratfalls.
Actually, before starting to read his autobiography I hadn't known that his beginnings were not in being a comedian, but a stage hand, grip, stage manager, assistant electrician, etc. - at a young age - but also playing small and then bigger roles.
"Hence I knew my theater from Shakspere to the xylophone players." (That's no typo, there used to be different spellings for the Bard.)
Then his father moved to California, Harold started working as an extra in movies and met Hal Roach who was another extra at the time but then started producing at the Bradbury mansion (torn down in 1929 for a parking lot).
Do you recognize the stairs?

Picture by Lemuel S. Ellis, ca. 1887, via The Huntington Digital Library

I can see how someone who had worked theatrical ambitions from early on might get bored with Luke eventually, and of course Harold Lloyd will stay "The Boy with the Glasses" for most of us which I'm sure he would prefer.


Sources and further reading:

1. Harold Lloyd with Wesley W. Stout: An American Comedy. New York : Dover Publications, 1971 (unabridged republication, with minor corrections, of the 1928 work)
2. Trav S. D.: Lonesome Luke's Lively Life: Hal Roach, Harold Lloyd and the Rolin Film Co. On: Travalanche, July 31, 2025
3. John Bengtson: Harold Lloyd Takes A Chance on Court Hill. On: Chaplin-Keaton-Lloyd film locations (and more), January 1, 2014
4. John Bengtson: Lady Cops (and Harold Lloyd) Reveal 1914 Lost LA Treasures. On: Chaplin-Keaton-Lloyd film locations (and more), December 12, 2021

Nostalgia - Snails

"When Mr. Peter Knoppert began to make a hobby of snail-watching, he had no idea that his handful of specimens would become hundreds in no time. ... 'I never cared for nature before in my life,' Mr. Knoppert often remarked - he was a partner in a brokerage firm, a man who had devoted all his life to the science of finance - 'but snails have opened my eyes to the beauty of the animal world.'"
That's from the beginning of one of Patricia Highsmith's short stories about humans and snails, this one being "The Snail-Watcher", the other one "The Quest for Blank Claveringi" (both of which you can find here (although there are two versions for "The Quest")).

Highsmith loved snails and kept hundreds of them as pets. She took them along to parties sitting on lettuce in her handbag and she smuggled them into France in her bra because she didn't want to leave them behind in England.
I read both of her snail stories at a young age in an anthology, but "The Snail-Watcher" impressed me more, and the image my mind formed of the ending has its own little room in my head jumping out every time I see a snail.
If you know the stories, you can imagine why. Have I mentioned it being a horror anthology?

There are other snails in my childhood memories, like the freshwater snails in the ponds of the park near my home.

We used to walk around on the walls and look for snails (we always left them there in case you wonder). From what I remember, my guess is that they were great ramshorn and great pond snails. There were fewer of the ramshorns, and I was convinced that this made them the Queens of the Snails, so it was very exciting to see one of them.

Left: Great ramshorn snail
Right: Great pond snail
Picture by Se90 - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0

Of course, we were also fascinated by land snails (not slugs, they creeped me out, especially after a big rain when the path up to the woods was covered with them, it looked like an invasion). The most common one you see here is the garden banded snail, but it was special to find escargots (which we call "Weinbergschnecken", literally "vineyard snails").
My friend and I once found two of them in the street and decided to put them in a safe spot in a garden, but the garden owner was outside and told us not to dare, so we left them on a wall (although they and other kinds of snails are no pests!). Afterwards, I worried a lot about their fate for quite some time, thinking we should have found a really safe spot. Sorry, little snails!
I would also like to apologize for being one of those annoying kids who sometimes poked your eyes to see you pull them in and for picking you up by your shell, we didn't know that it can hurt you.

Actually, I haven't seen any escargots in the wild in years, but snails kept inspiring me in my creative journey, in wire wrapping, needle felting, and bead embroidery.

And then there is Nelly of course.
Nelly came in two colors, blue and brown with spots, and a size of 10 cm. In the 60s, Steiff had a few designs that were only produced for a short time - 1961 to 1963 for Nelly - and were quite unusual for cuddle buddies.

Beside Nelly, there were for example bats and colorful spiders (and I could still cry over the story the lady from the toy store told us about not being able to sell them and throw them out instead of candy during the town's carnival parade, argh!).
When the ex and I got our first Steiff price guide, we immediately knew we wanted to have all of them, not for their rarity, but because we thought they were really cute (I still think that).

Nelly is made from cotton velvet with faux leather underneath and has a painted rubber shell and rubber tentacles/feelers whose ends were prone to break off as you can see on one of them.
Isn't this little pair adorable?

Did you notice something about them, though? With those shells they are no land snails and I never thought about that until today. I wonder why Steiff made that choice.

There you have it, my snail memories.
I spared you one when I inadvertently ste.... nah, let's forget about that.

Chain of hearts

The beads have been calling to me quite loudly for a while, but with my thumb being stupid, the big projects on my list were still out, so I thought it needed something simple for them to be satisfied for now.
Simple usually means something familiar that I don't have to think much about - experimenting often means ripping out and several attempts - and which I can easily take a break from without risking it turning into a case for the infamous WIP drawer.

This chain of hearts was a perfect little project for that.
Earrings are not my strong suit because I often don't remember what exactly I did with the first one (experiments!) to repeat it for the second one or I'm just getting bored after the first one.
For these earrings I only made one heart at a time over the last few weeks, quick enough to not get bored or stress out my hand. 

I used pearly white seed beads in the sizes 8, 11, and 15 seed beads.
Originally, I had planned to use tiny ceramic hearts made by my friend for the bottom. I had put them in a safe place specifically for this ... Erm, does anyone know where that safe place is? I found the tiny stars, the owls, the foxes, the blueberries ... I found everything but the hearts. So I decided to try size 15 hearts for the first time and although it was a bit fiddly, I think they turned out very cute.

I have no doubt that the hearts are going to turn up in the next few days now that they are not needed immediately.
As that touch of color from the ceramic hearts was missing now, I added a silver bead embellishment instead.
Do you think I should have added tiny hearts in a completely different color?