Today marks the 75th birthday of one of my heroes, Jim Henson. I have loved The Muppets since I was a kid watching Sesame Street and still continue to enjoy reruns of The Muppet Show on DVD.
My first watch was a baby pink Miss Piggy watch and I’m pretty sure I still have it at my parents house somewhere.
Several years ago, when the new Muppet movie came out, my mom and I went to every Jack In The Box we could find to collect the Muppet figurine set that came in the kid’s meals. I got 2 Swedish Chef’s, though. One for me and one for my dad, which he keeps in his study at home still today. My dad’s imitation of the Swedish Chef use to make me giggle until my sides hurt, honestly, it still does.
Anyway, you can imagine how thrilled I was today to see that the Google Doodle was dedicated to a man who had brought me such childhood joy and laughter. I took a snap shot of the doodle and pasted it here for you in case you missed it. The idea was to have Google users enjoy being their own puppeteer. There are 6 Muppets for you to play with and they do some pretty funny things if you find the right combination of moves with your mouse and keyboard. I am not sure if there is a way for me to embed a functioning doodle somehow…I will update if I find a way. I also found this great video on how they, being Google, put the doodle together with the Jim Henson Company.
And if that was not enough to prove my love for Jim Henson and The Muppets, I actually have my own Muppet that I designed this summer in New York at the What Not Muppet Workshop(this is the only place in the world you can do this).
It was a very special birthday present from someone very special and I got to design everything about her. Her name is is Libby, short for Liberty, since she was born in New York, get it? and I’d have say she is pretty spunky and the coolest Muppet I have ever met.
Some say we are a lot alike. Personally, I think she is cuter.
