Perfectly Precious Puppets

Good morning, my friends. Oh my goodness! I have so much to show you today. As I mentioned in yesterday's post, I met up with Matthew yesterday for a visit to the Portland Puppet Museum. His house was looking very festive. Not bad for two single guys sharing a household.

The Portland Puppet Museum is one of just ten puppet museums in the United States, and it's the only permanent puppet museum on the West Coast. The collection boasts over 2,000 puppets from over 38 countries, and is so large that the museum rotates exhibits every four months. The current exhibit is Fairy Tale, Television, and Super Star Puppets.

It's located in this old house in the Sellwood neighborhood of Portland.

We asked for the "guided tour," and I can't possibly remember everything he told us. I've zoomed in on some of the placards and posted them below the associated image, and that will help you to understand what you're seeing. 

So, this was the first puppet we met. 

She's dressed in what might have been a little flower girl's dress. He told us they'd caught the dress on the door knob bringing it into the museum, and all the beads fell off. They were painstakingly reattached. He told us that was how they learned there were over 5,000 beads on the dress. He said when they reached 5,000 in their count, they stopped counting. Across the room, he pointed out this puppet. She was wearing some little girls' riding boots from the 1800's.

I'm posting these images mostly in the order I took them. I can't remember what we were told about these two characters.

I think most everyone will recognize these characters.

I don't recall hearing the story about Bean Bunny, but the Kermit story was this: Cheryl Henson, Jim Henson's daughter, came to Portland with the intention of delivering a Kermit puppet. When she arrived she realized she'd forgotten to bring the Kermit. No problem, she said. Just give me some felt in green, red, white, and black, and she created the Kermit puppet below overnight.

And lookee here! It's Lambchop!! A gift from Shari Lewis. (Please tell me you're old enough to remember Shari Lewis.) I never missed her show when it was on, and I absolutely loved Lambchop.

This was our guide. He is a performing puppeteer, and his tour was an absolute hoot. Ordinarily, I wouldn't ask for a guided tour. Matthew spoke up for that, and I was really glad he did. There was so much to know about what we were seeing. The tour greatly enhanced our visit. Here, he was demonstrating how this puppet worked in a sword-fight. It's a little hard to see, but there is a wire attached to the puppet that hangs on his left wrist. Then he operates the hand holding the sword with his own right hand. He said this would ordinarily have a hook that would hang from his right wrist.

This puppet was a little before my time...hard to believe, I know.

These two were also before my time. Gosh...by the time we left, I was feeling so much younger.

Here's another grouping, and I can't remember much of what he said, and I regret cutting off the head of the snake puppet. Mainly, he told us how these puppets were constructed, and he mentioned a woman puppeteer who could take apart and restring a puppet in about 20 minutes.

This is the candy house of Hansel and Gretel. Originally, it was made with real candies. While it was stored, the original candy house was eaten by rodents and insects, and so it was recreated with the candies safely encased in some kind of plastic (wrong word, but I forget the right word...polyethylene, maybe?).

The puppets below were all created by the woman whose image follows. And I can't remember her name either.

These are some of her puppets. The wolf in the lower left has teeth...from cats. Ew.

There were a number of puppets made by the Steiff Toy Company, including some of their puppets that appeared on Mr. Rogers Neighborhood. The Bunny Rabbit puppet from Capt. Kangaroo was a Steiff puppet.

Another puppet maker from Germany made these characters.

In the image below are the puppets of Mr. Rogers Neighborhood. I regret I was kind of in the wrong age group for Mr. Rogers, and even my kids were more interested in Sesame Street. I learned more about Mr. Rogers after his death, and now I wish I'd paid more attention to his show when it was on.

The puppets below were associated with the Howdy Doody show...just a smidge before my time. I have very faint memories of watching Howdy Doody. Also in this image, Captain Hook and Peter Pan on the left. The Tin Man can be seen on the right.

Any musician friends might recognize these two. This is B. B. King and Ruby Wilson. To their right, an Aunt Jemima lookalike.

Here are some more African-American puppets. The two large ones on the right are from Jamaica.

These are shadow puppets. He explained that most shadow puppets are created in China from the hides of water buffalo. These two happen to be from the Middle East, and they are made from camel hide. The color is added in a process similar to tattooing. Shadow puppets were held up to the light so that their shadows were cast on a screen. You can see a shadow puppet show at this link on YouTube.

While we were there, they were busily setting up 100 nutcrackers for a show they'll be doing on weekends during the Christmas season. I didn't know there were so many ways to dress a nutcracker. This is just a small part of the exhibit they were working on. He told me it would have fluffy snow all around when it was finished.

To say this tour was delightful would be an understatement. We thoroughly enjoyed our visit. I've signed up for the newsletter on their website, and now I'll be kept apprised of their shows and changes of exhibits. Great fun. If you find yourself in Portland, stop in and take the guided tour. It was well worth it.

Rather than drive home in rush-hour traffic, Matthew and I went to a tea house we've visited before. It's housed in a caboose. You can see more about this place at this blog post. They have a whole wall of teas and a long menu. Each tea listed on the menu can be sniffed right here. They're all numbered. Just pick the number you're interested in, uncork it, and breathe deeply.

There was seating in the room where a crackling fire was burning, and we enjoyed chatting for a while before saying our good-byes. I dropped him at home, and then drove home in mercifully light traffic.

The only sewing thing I did yesterday was to get a start on my newest slow-stitching piece.

While I was writing this post, Mike made some waffles. We've already eaten our breakfast, and so I'll get back to my slow stitching. I want to get in a walk on the treadmill, and I'm going to make tonight's dinner of Cottage Pies (think "Shepherds Pies" only made with ground beef). It's my way of using up leftover mashed potatoes from Thanksgiving. I can make them earlier in the day, and then pop them in the oven when we're ready.

An atmospheric river is passing by with rain, rain, rain. It's a good day to stay in and sew. I'm really hoping to finish off the last Kitten in a Cup today. Fingers crossed. Wish me luck.