My Little Friends

I can't remember how long ago it was when I first started to accumulate my collection of 'little friends'; it must be well over 7 years ago because I remember having quite a sizeable collection on the bedside table of my old house. I have neglected these friends quite a lot recently, left them sitting there on their pretty pink mat with no new friends to play with. This is probably a result of me getting older and not really receiving or delighting in receiving miniature creatures any more; in fact I can remember one of the last ones I received (it's one of the sitting ducks, I'm not sure which). It was christmas several years ago, we were on holiday and my parents had decided we wouldn't have any presents . My sister and I were gutted. On the way back from the airport however, my parents dropped some hints about presents under the tree; I was so excited. We got home, looked under the tree and there was the duck, they'd bought him at the airport. Ungrateful as I realise this sounds now I was even more gutted. Through time, the blue hedgehog appeared but it was a while before he joined the rest of my friends and I have no idea where he came from. But recently by friend came back from holiday and gave me a little turtle, which I delighted in. If you look carefully you can see her at the forefront of the photo.

If you'd have asked me a few years ago, I could have told you the name of every single animal you see in this photo. Now, I can't remember any of them but I can remember quite a lot about where they all come from. The teddy you see at the back, poking his head over the standing duck in an attempt to be seen by the camera was my first acquisition. Unfortunately, he has a broken arm. The snowcouple standing in the right upper corner smiling in a creepy sort of way used to have their own house, made out of a cardboard box, with plastic see-through windows and everything. I painted them myself. The locust (front right) is from the British Museum and was always destined to be worn on a necklace. Etc etc.

There's not much point to this post, but when I added Rica (as the new turtle is called) to the collection, I thought they were really cute but then started wondering if they were actually really creepy, like some perverted remembrance of a lonely childhood, or something. But I decided to post anyway.