The first two festivals I attended, I wrote all my blog posts after I returned from the festival. They were based on whatever struck me looking through my photos, and not on the schedule of events. When Boo joined me in 2011 I had plenty of time in the evenings while she was in bed, so I wrote a post at the end of the day describing the events of that day. As she got older and her bedtime got later, that became more difficult. This year I decided to move away from daily posts in the evening, but I know people want to hear about the festival as its happening so I tried something new ... quick, real-time, very short posts of each event, using low-resolution photos taken by my iPad to make it quick and easy. I wound up with 25 "Live from AZ" posts, which freed up my time to enjoy the festival - I spent more time talking than I have in years. Now that I'm home, I plan to write a few more posts, not just about the festival souvenirs and other things I brought home, but about people as well.
I hope I don't embarrasses her too much, but I want to share a story. I received an email from Doris about a month before the festival. She introduced herself as a reader of my blog and let me know she was going to be at the upcoming festival in Phoenix. Doris was one of the first people that I ran into as Boo and I headed to registration. I'm so glad she introduced herself beforehand, as we had an instant connection.
I had a great time getting to know her, hopefully the start of a long Sasha friendship. If you looked at my album/slideshow, you saw Doris, her friend Annette, and Annette's doll Gretchen (a childhood portrait studio doll made in 1972, imagine discovering that a hiking friend had one of those?!) in many of the pictures. Such a fun connection -- Sasha serendipity all around. Boo took this picture of us, a memento until we meet again. Hello Doris!
5 comments:
That's such a wonderful thing about collecting Sashas.....you are continually making new and good life long friends.
I think that we all wish that our parents could have had Sasha make a replica childhood doll of us!
It's lovely how having these Sasha's introduces us to people who have and will become long standing friends.
The Sasha universe is an ever expanding one. It is wonderful how often new friends are made through these lovely dolls.
Last week, I met a lady who is almost 100, hugging a little Sasha baby for comfort as she waited for a scan in what she refered to as, 'that space-ship machine.'
I nursed her baby, Julietta, until she came out to tell me the scan didn't hurt a bit! She insisted on waiting in her wheel chair to make sure I wasnn't lonely or frightened (!) before my turn and we discussed Sashas. Julietta was bought in the 70s by her employer as a retirement gift. She showed me at least 15 beautifully knitted outfits in her bag before she was wheeled back to her ward. I'm going to visit her next week and taking my toddler girl along to play with Julietta.
I think this year worked very well for us 'stay at homes' as the snapshot live blogging gave us an ongoing sense of the festival and freed you up to enjoy more conversations and make more friends. Did your original camera every turn up (I do hope so)?
Such a wonderful story jenann, thanks for sharing it. If I live to be 100, I hope that I do it with at least one Sasha by my side. I have certainly made many friends through Sasha dolls, and all such nice people. In fact, much as I love the dolls and the auction, and the sales tables, my favorite part of a Sasha Festival is the people.
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