wacky toybox!

this is a plushie, toy collecting, and art blog! come here for your jellycat, stuffed animal and weird (autistic) artistic content//linden//(it/its)//early 20s//boygirl//lifelong special interest in stuffed animals//severely disabled autistic w neurological, cognitive, and physical conditions

[8irdies]

Welcome!

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My Ko-fi (shop, commissions, tips!): knoofel

Plushie Portrait Commissions

Art tag: #radiofrogs

Art blog: @rovercore

[8irdies]

hi! I have some interconnected questions about your experiences of being nonverbal and having Tourettes: have you ever had words or phrases as tics? If so, can you tic words while unable to produce voluntary speech? Has the way your vocal tics manifest changed as your capacity to produce voluntary speech has changed?

Thanks in advance for answering. Have a lovely rest of your day/night! Your account brings me a lot of happiness and comfort, thank you for doing what you do 😊

hi! this is very interesting of a question and i do have answers!

in addition to being functionally nonverbal, sometimes (but not all the times) i can't make any noise at all, even crying or screaming or laughing or anything. so during this i don't get any vocal tics, though i still have some breathing tics that can be loud. generally my motor tics are the most disabling aspect of my tourettes

but when my vocal chords are working and i can make noises (not speak, just meow or exclaim or whatever, and still not voluntary), i do get vocal tics and often full words or even sentences (sentences usually happen during tic attacks or meltdowns which tend to go together, they are not reflective of what i want to say and are often entirely nonsensical). the word tics are actually the same as they used to be. cat, pony, puppy, and i do sometimes tic the name of whatever im looking at/doing (book, draw, toys, etc. this isn't me communicating, again, its just a thing that happens, not in response to a question or with awareness of me doing it)

this is actually something i've been thinking about. since we try to emphasize nonverbal IS a permanent state of not being able to communicate via mouth, but also not having control over what my mouth does can be confusing to people who think nonverbal means always completely silent. hard to have to explain tics to people when they get confused or upset.

(also ty!!! i appreciate it :D)

[8irdies]

hi! i had an idea to make a "favorite items this month" piece because i have a little too much love for everything. so here are some of my favorite thingies!!! from the month of may.

[8irdies]

i also am making these available as monthly coloring sheets :3 💛

[8irdies]

hi! i had an idea to make a "favorite items this month" piece because i have a little too much love for everything. so here are some of my favorite thingies!!! from the month of may.

[8irdies]

bug buddies, amphibious pals, and cats and other critters! 💚

[8irdies]

hello i was wondering what’s currently your newest plushie, and do you have any on your wishlist? :>

hi! my newest plushies are in fact the webkinz jr pals i got, leapfrog and catnap. but i also got this little tikiri ladybug rubber rattle toy yesterday!

my wishlist is long and disorganized, i won't lie. but i really want the webkinz pumpkin puppy, maileg crocodiles (that still havent been released), several jellycats among the retired lists, especially bashful fawn and fuddlewuddle fox, the dumbo and eeyore steiff plushies, and some plushies from the brand senger naturwelt and moulin roty!

[8irdies]

my webkinz jr plushies! i love them so so much! 🎈🌼🌈

[8irdies]

clinical sources def aren't the end all be all of autism information, but i wanted to throw in that what my therapists and a lot of the tests and stuff say is that special interests are often difficult not to talk about. a lot of things describe it as "an interest the autistic person may bring up at"""inappropriate""" (i don't like this word but it's the one they use and i'm not sure how else to convey what they mean) times, or may have trouble changing the subject from". not a 100% way to tell, but it's been a helpful factor for me to remember! and i don't mean just really wanting to talk about it, i mean like it's Hard not to talk about and a lot of the time it'll result in unprompted infodumps. ofc every autistic person is gonna vary so im sure some don't have this but a significant number do!

yes! thanks thats true. i'm nonverbal so i don't usually infodump inperson since typing on aac is time/energy/language consuming but i do mention it every chance i get. infodumping is way too exhausting for me when i only have the energy or motivation to communicate an immediate need (however my immediate needs are often plushie related anyways)

[8irdies]

I hope this question makes sense..

So Im rather newly diagnosed with autism and I struggle with finding actually definition of terms that fully make sense to me.

For the lngest tike I thought, that special interests are also about knowing EVERYTHING (or as close as possible) about the thing too.

But I get that it doesnt have to, for example for you with plushies. You probably dont know every singoe brand in the world and when and how they came into existance etc...

And because of that its hard for me to really understand my special interests!

(There are also other words where I get what they mean but I cant figure out how to apply them to myseld)

hi! this is a very good and interesting topic to me.

i don't know everything about plushies, that's definitely true! for me my special interests don't have to do mostly with knowledge about a topic. i simply rely on them to engage with and process the world around me.

so it doesn't matter to me how much i know about plushies when i call them my special interest, since they (and collecting as a general concept) have been since i was too young to talk or read or anything! what matters to my definition for myself is that i need to constantly have access to be able to engage in anything, be it basic self care, learning to knit and sew and any other skills or topics, and being out of the house. they're really just the center to my universe.

the best way i can explain it is that if you could look inside the core of my heart, i would completely overlap with my love for plushies/my collections. there isn't a separate part of my identity that has no relation to my special interests, they are overlayed on top of my everything. the window through which i view and understand the world around me has plushies on the windowsill.

in general special interests for me are more about how they are deeply regulating and enable me to exist, rather than any form of expertise!

[8irdies]

room photos from early may 🌷 love my many little buddies <3

[8irdies]

good morning and happy thursday!

[8irdies]

How do you get over the fear of wearing in your plushies? There are plushies I want to cuddle with (mainly jellycats) but they were so hard to find that I’m scared of them changing from being in perfect condition. Not so much that they won’t be worth the same amount of money, but that if something happens to them I won’t be able to rebuy them.

this is absolutely a fair question and one ive been grappling with for the same reason, both as i have had health scares that lead to plushies getting damaged or suddenly gaining unexpected injuries, since they are very dear to me and also could not be replaced in my heart or physically!

for me buying a second one just never makes sense in my head-i feel they have their own spirits, and a the new one would have its own being as well.

as for the fear-i think the best thing i have is that:

a. i know how to sew and have learned more about mending plushies, to the point where i know if they do fall apart i am able to put them together!

b. for me (especially since it has happened unintentionally during my own crises) i always feel guilty for hurting them, and for this i remind them that i love them so much and will always do my best to take care of them, and have to remind myself that they know how much i care about them and they forgive me. also that the wear took place in the process of bonding/bringing me comfort, so it was in that way worth it, and brings us closer together

[8irdies]

reminders to me (and you) when in bed cuddling plushies 🎂

[8irdies]

I just bought myself the bashful toucan and bashful puffin!! I'm so excited, wanted to ask if you had any name ideas :D

ooh! i'm a lover of birds and the classic bashfuls also, and had a very nostalgic non-jellycat toucan i got at the zoo as a child, as well as the belby toucan jelly who i named bulb :)

i think your toucan looks like a mango, or maybe popsicle? and the puffin i would personally choose a name like scruffy (because i like silly sounding words and textures) but also naming the toucan popsicle and the puffin icicle could be silly and cute! either way thats so exciting!

(also posting some of my birdy pictures for good measure- toucy my webkinz toucan, woodstock and my flamingo beanie baby 2, and suet my birdling next to xylophone my rambler rabbit!!!)

[8irdies]

cats, bunnies, and peanuts comics on an early march afternoon 🌷

[8irdies]

beanie & baby plush corner! my activity toys hang at the foot of my bed, and i do indeed have a cart full of beanie babies there too :)

[firerinart]

Happy 20th anniversary of Neil banging out the tunes!

I made this ceramic sculpture last year and debuted it at Dashcon 2, but I figured it’s time to show him off to the world!