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Chapter 12 The Awakening. It’s about the different states of Life for these composition dolls once they leave the factory. For me, the saddest doll of all is the one who is Mint in Box. Yes, they are pretty to look at with their perfect paint and clothes, and yes they are by far the rarest of these old dolls, and therefore monetarily worth the most, but to me they are sad.

A Mint in Box Patsy.

A loved Patsy, fingers worn, redressed by her “mother.” The happiest state for a doll to have.

Because they have never been loved.

Which is why I like to take the “loved” dolls, the ones that are less desirable by collector standards, and make them desirable again with a second chance at love.

Here’s a Patsy that I cleaned and redressed and did a little touching up to:

She is now in someone else’s home, and wherever she is, I bet she’s being loved once again.

My next projects:

This girl’s poor arm was hanging on by a few threads. Probably from being taken everywhere by the hand, lucky girl!

I’d already started cleaning her face before I took this photo. I can’t seem to help myself!

What is that on her leg? Will it come off?! Oh yes, it will.

They are dirty and cracked. The first doll has had her arm torn and someone tried to reattach it long ago. Her wig’s missing. Both their original outfits are long gone, in fact they don’t have a stitch of clothing to call their own!

I’m going to change that for them. They’ve already been cleaned. I washed the braided girl’s human hair wig, and found another vintage human hair wig for the other. It had a slight green tinge to it, so I dyed it with coffee. Even now, it pinned to a foam ball on a stick and drying on the radiator in my sewing room. Another thing I like about winter! Warm radiators! More about them in the future.

In the meantime, there’s someone I’d like you to meet. Some of Lost Dolls are older than their composition counterparts.

Meet Beatrice. Before:

You might think her body is funny, but it’s actually a very lovely thing. The style of bodies that dolls had back then in 1860 or so when she was made. No need for hoops or corsets!

You can find her ebay listing HERE.

You might think she’s a bit expensive, but it works out to about $1 an hour. I swear, there was some kind of communication difficulty in understanding what she meant when she told me what kind of clothes she wanted. She is originally from Germany and still had a very heavy accent. Here is what we came up with:

There are more photos on her listing, including her somewhat unusual dress.

I had a lot of help with this girl! When I told my Mom I was having trouble seeing because at one point I thought Beatrice was telling me she wanted bead work on her cloak. So my wonderful mother sent me a bright light to hang around my neck, and better glasses!

It turned out that Beatrice just wanted beads for buttons, however! I used the two contraptions my mother had sent for another tiny fix: her necklace chain was broken. It’s a very fine chain, and there’s no WAY I could have repaired it with my eyes the way they were before. Here’s the necklace as well as her underclothing I made from an old pillow case:

And speaking of the chain: a gift from my dear friend Jennifer Trenary. She was at an estate sale and saw a box of old and broken jewelry and thought of me. So thoughtful! This wonderful chain and several other great treasures were in that little container, and different pieces contained therein will be making appearances on my dolls, because I always send them out with a little bit of jewelry as a token of my love for them as they make their way back into the world.

It may take Beatrice a little while to find just the right person, but I hope she does. Because every loved doll deserves a second chance.

Tomorrow! Nina strikes INFINITY.

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