Adventures in Dolling

We are past July 4th, and Halloween, Fall, and The Holidays Loom!  Thanks to the nearly 200,000 readers on this and American Doll and Toy Museum Blog.  Thanks for the thousands and thousands of readers on our other blogs, here and on GoodReads.  I also publish on Facebook, LinkedIn, Kickstarter, and Referral Key, and on Antique Trader,the doll column.

Another awesomely wild season of Virtual Doll Convention, Auctions, National Doll Festival and UFDC are coming to a rapid close, but with more to come in future months.  Locally, doll shows and estate sales are in full swing.  My article in Bru will soon be out in Antique Trader, which is rising like the Phoenix and better than ever.  New dolls for young and old will soon be hitting the shelves in anticipation of the holidays, and seasonal decorative dolls like Annalee and Spirit of Halloween zombie babies and animatronics will soon be haunting stores.  It’s a great day to be a collector of any kind of dolls!

I’d like to share a story with you from last week.  I went to a couple estate sales, a big venture for me since I’ve been fighting asthma related respiratory and other infections.  No energy, but my friend who does sales  and dolls got me out.   I had my arms full of nice artist dolls, yes, at bargain prices, and a couple of antiques.  A gentleman who turned out to be a sale helper said to me,” Do you have a lot of little girls, or is that all for you?”  Something like that.  His tone was less than admiring, more than a bit snotty.  “They’re all for me,” I said.  “Would you like to come over later and play?”  That did it; he helped me out with the dolls and a huge cache of their boxes.  Hmph!!

So, collect proudly.  Bespeak it to the world, have fun, don’t blow your budget, or blow it if you can, don’t be a doll diva, and enjoy the friends, fun, and hobby that is dolls.