Where to begin?

 I've been thinking a lot lately about these dolls and what draws people to feel connected to a particular one over all others.  I decided to start blogging about them as I'm making them, so that if someone sees that doll and likes it, they can also see the process of bringing it to life.  We'll see how it goes.

For now, I thought I would give a little bit of background into how I started making these sweet dolls.  Back in 2009, my mother passed away unexpectedly. I was home one day watching something on TV and I saw a segment on Reborn Dolls.  I had never seen or heard of anything like it.  I am not a doll person, and I never have been, but I adore all things baby!  Baby clothes, baby gear, baby smells, babies....everything.  Even as a very young child, I would love to look at all of the baby stuff in the sears catalog.  I immediately started looking them up online.  I visited Ebay every single day, just looking at the different dolls.  I learned about them, and how they were made.  I determinted that Romie Strydom was my favorite sculptor, and Poppy was my favorite kit.  After at least a year of studying them, I decided that I would try to make one.  I had just moved from Florida back to my home town, I wasn't working, I was in a state of depression, I had a falling out with my best friend, and I was mourning my mother's death, and trying to be a good mom to a teenage son.  It was a lot and keeping my hands and mind busy seemed like a good outlet.  I bought an oven, and a starter kit, and my one and only reborn doll, Poppy.  I needed an example, after all :)

I made my first doll, and I liked him, but he was little and didn't really give me the feeling I was looking for.  So I ordered another one.  Then I decided to make one for my grandmother as a Christmas gift.  Before I knew it, six months had gone by and I had a dining room full of dolls and no money.  And that's where it all got crazy. I decided to try doing a flea market.  At the time, the flea market in my town was in a safe place, and was indoors.  There was a fee to get in (it makes a difference), and there was no one else selling dolls like mine.  It was one weekend a month, and after a couple of months, the attention was crazy.  By the time Christmas rolled around, I would have sold all of them before noon on Saturday.  This went on for quite a while and it started to turn into me just taking orders.  They want this doll, this eye color, this hair color, this gender, etc.  All of the creativity was gone, and so was the joy.  I stopped making them entirely in 2015.  I tossed everything and I was done.  

And then I saw Levi, by Bonnie Brown.  I was living with my boyfriend and we were in the process of planning out future home together.  Immediately, I said I needed a room to make reborn dolls.  He made sure it was added to the list of must haves in our new home.  He's a good egg.

We built our home in 2019, and my baby room was everything I wanted.  There was a great place to put a work table, right by a window, it was upstairs away from everything else...it was perfect.  We moved into our house in January of 2020 and I ordered Levi, and a few other, less expensive kits.  Then Covid happened.  How perfect was this?!?  I was at home all the time!  I even got to work from home, so I could make dolls and work at the same time.  The only problem was my heart wasn't in it.  I made a couple of dolls and then stopped again.  Eventually, I never even went upstairs unless I needed to get my guest room ready for company.  

In 2022, I had one doll that had been sitting in my "doll room" for about 2 years, and I decided to donate it to someone for a silent auction benefiting a dog rescue.  She sold it weeks before the auction even took place.  I had another kit, so I decided to make another one for the auction.  And so it began again.  My heart was in it, and it was fun again.   It's been almost a year now.  I'm so happy to be painting and making these dolls again.  I love each and every one of them.  I choose each one of them.  I don't just make the dolls that I think will fetch a good price, and I don't do the same ones over and over again.  I did do three Quinbees because I love that kit so much.  The vinyl is so nice, the face is so beautiful, and she is such a pleasure to hold.

Anyway....stay tuned for all of the sweetest new babies that are coming to my nursery!