doll making musings

It is now the end of February, and we have survived another Valentine's Day, not to mention the earlier, dire predictions of Ground Hog Day. I don't like Valentine's Day. It's been host to a number of disasters throughout my life and that was the day in 2001 that I slipped, stumbled, and broke my left foot. The fracture forced me to move more slowly, and to find ways to occupy myself other than fussing around the house putting dolls away and rearranging shelves. One thing I did to keep in line was research dolls; I spent a good part of my evenings surfing the Internet for childhood portraits of Henry of Navarre, reputed to be the model for the Jumeau doll. To my knowledge, no one has included such a portrait in any other book.


Besides serious scholarly pursuits, however, I still dressed and made dolls. I spent one night, a Saturday, putting together doll heads and doll bodies. I seldom used patterns on these dolls, but preferred to use lace, ribbon, old handkerchiefs, and cloth, whatever comes to mind, to create as I work. I used paper or Styrofoam cones for bodies, or bought other cloth armatures at the craft stores. Some dolls I sewed bodies for, and I would occasionally get out a pattern. But, the relaxing part is draping the material against the doll, using the imagination when something seems not quite right, fingering Chinese silk with its rich embroidery, all these go into the making of one doll. Purists would die that I use cotton lace and Chinese material to dress a vintage Parian blonde, or that I put black hands and legs on a white body, then sew lace around the ankles to simulate pantaloons, but who cares? The spirit behind collecting anything is enjoying it; if it is a Divine Madness, why then, use the impetus behind every divine madness, your imagination