{"id":5270,"date":"2012-11-06T09:04:19","date_gmt":"2012-11-06T09:04:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.blog.virtuosewadventures.co.uk\/wordpress\/?p=5270"},"modified":"2013-02-12T18:05:30","modified_gmt":"2013-02-12T18:05:30","slug":"reconstructing-cecile","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.blog.virtuosewadventures.co.uk\/wordpress\/2012\/11\/06\/reconstructing-cecile\/","title":{"rendered":"Reconstructing C\u00e9cile"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Face<\/a>

Face of C\u00e9cile<\/p><\/div>\n

Allow me to introduce C\u00e9cile.<\/p>\n

Grandmama made her for me when I was about two or three, we think, and\u00a0 I remember her as a constant and beloved part of my childhood. We rediscovered her recently in my parents’ loft, and I thought it would be nice to have her in my own living room, as a footstool and a seat for visiting children. Unfortunately, when I sat back and put my feet up, the stuffing collapsed, and\u00a0C\u00e9cile began to look very sad indeed. So we skinned her (as it were!), washed the skin, and started looking for a suitable replacement for the padding.<\/p>\n

\"Padding<\/a>

Padding For C\u00e9cile<\/p><\/div>\n

In the end, we used a spare cushion pad, and rearranged the stuffing slightly to leave the cover free to be stapled through. I think my grandfather must have made the basic internals – four sections of square wood for legs, screwed firmly into some equally solid half-centimetre thick hardboard.<\/p>\n

I have all of Grandmama’s books about needlework and crafts, and there’s nothing like C\u00e9cile in any of them, so I think Grandmama must have made her up as she went along. I can’t imagine how she managed to assemble the whole thing unaided, because it took the combined efforts of my mother and myself to put the stockings on, and covering the assembly with the body was even more of an adventure.<\/p>\n

\"C\u00e9cile<\/a>

C\u00e9cile Reassembled<\/p><\/div>\n

But we got there in the end!<\/p>\n

I added more stuffing while I was doing the assembly, to make sure that the finished piece would be nicely padded, and swapped the ears around – there was a hole in one side of one of them, which is now the underside.<\/p>\n

I’ve also replaced the feet. Grandmama had glued small sections of carpet to the bottom and then stitched around the edge with wool. The carpet was looking distinctly sad and tatty, so I removed it – not without considerable effort! – and replaced it with two layers of grey felt.<\/p>\n

C\u00e9cile is now reassembled, and just needs some of her finery re-instated. I’ll write about that when I have returned her to her former glory.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Allow me to introduce C\u00e9cile. Grandmama made her for me when I was about two or three, we think, and\u00a0 I remember her as a constant and beloved part of my childhood. We rediscovered her recently in my parents’ loft, and I thought it would be nice to have her in my own living room,… Continue Reading Reconstructing C\u00e9cile<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[43],"tags":[98,25,28],"class_list":["post-5270","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general-posts","tag-cecile","tag-experiments","tag-grandmamas-embroidery","radius"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.virtuosewadventures.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5270","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.virtuosewadventures.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.virtuosewadventures.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.virtuosewadventures.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.virtuosewadventures.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5270"}],"version-history":[{"count":25,"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.virtuosewadventures.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5270\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6307,"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.virtuosewadventures.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5270\/revisions\/6307"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.virtuosewadventures.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5270"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.virtuosewadventures.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5270"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.virtuosewadventures.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5270"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}