Spooky Dolls

Once again, we have studied Halloween, El Dia de Muertos, All Souls and All Saints Day, The Samhain, and Thanksgiving. I always bring a few calaveras, and skeleton dolls, and of course, my "spooky things," the broom, locally made that is the official broom of the Salem Witches, the Living Dead Dolls, also a game, sometimes Erzebet Bathory and her bathtub shadow box, all those good things. I have vampires of all types, from Elvira, to the little holiday candles. My newest candle is a soy candle witch, black as ebony, and well-detailed. She is locally made by a friend of a friend. I bring the Frankenstein's monsters, and lanterns, and Jack o' lanterns, my little man in the Electric chair, the toy guillotine, handmade with a a real blade, the skeleton that walks the gallows and says funny things, the pumpkin that plays the Italian funeral march, all in good fun. We have cornhusk dolls, and corn cob dolls, and corn dollies and wheat dolls, a few of broom straw, and these must surely harken to grim Celtic and Druidic rituals described by Anne Rice and by many, many Celtic scholars.

We always watch The Halloween Tree in these classes, and sometimes I make sugar skulls for them to eat. I actually have a sugar pig, preserved these 23 years, a friend brought from El Dia de Muertos in Mexico. This is a solemn, dark time, but a perfect time to tricksters, for history, for being grateful for the harvest, for full moons, and cool days and nights.

It is now that I feel my childhood, when all the traditions come back, when I feel my mother near. We loved going to the fall dolls shows; my first Schoenhut came from one, and my puppy, Killer, went to a doll show road trip the second day we had him. He was so small, he rode in a shoebox and was nearly blown away at what later became his favorite rest stop on other trips. My mother started me on decorating the windows with Halloween cutouts, and we made many. There is a witch out of construction paper I still have from third grade, and an Anne Boleyn paper doll holding a tray out in front of her, with her head. I made her in the 4th grade. Had I been a better artist, I might have been in serious trouble at school! As it was, I got in trouble in second grade for making a kite with a doll on it that represented a Geisha. The teacher was scandalized. I'm not sure now, as I wasn't then, what she was thinking.

Now is when I want to curl up on the porch, scary book, doll magazine, or needlepoint in hand, hot coffee, or sipping chocolate, at hand, to get lost in my dreams and my memories.

The papers for our Articles of Incorporation are in the hands of my lawyer. Oh, for a builidng! But, the web museum will be next.

New additions to the museum, not too many, but a few choice dolls from the 40s and 50s, some nice penny dolls, a vintage Mme. Alexander, and some other ancient Hungarian and Italian dolls, the latter of carved wood.

More from the metal doll book, soon, and from The History of Dolls.

Happy dolling, and make an apple doll to celebrate the harvest.