Creating reborn dolls

by Nancy K
(Asheville, NC)

I have one child, a daughter in her mid forties, who is childless by choice. I finally quit buying her a doll at Christmas when she, at the age of eight, requested it. She had never even picked any of them up, much less played with them. I, on the other hand, have always loved dolls, though I was also an extreme tomboy which my daughter could appreciate. While she was growing up, we shared many camping adventures with our horses. In '93, she and I were living together when, from out of the blue, she received a doll catalog from Ashton Drake in the mail. I thought, how ironic. The person who has no use for dolls gets the catalog while I'm passed over.

I had not thought of dolls since childhood, but "Cute as a Button" was absolutely beguiling in the cover photo. I threw the thin catalog in the trash, but as the day went on I kept glimpsing her photo from the bottom of the bedroom garbage pale. Finally I pulled it out and ordered the little porcelain cutie. On receiving her, I was very disappointed that her eyes' irises were imitation looking, as was the entire paint job. Well, what did I expect? So I decided to start making my own porcelain dolls and paint their eyes to look more real, with more depth and expression. I sculpted a grand total of two dolls, one baby and one toddler. I made molds of them, poured them with porcelain, and proceeded to work my way through all the extremely tedious, dusty steps of cleaning the porcelain up and then painting on the multiple, fired on layers of glazes that comprise china painting. Doing four dolls from the molds scratched that itch. I had enough little porcelain grandkids, and I hung it up.

Several years passed before I started checking out dolls on the internet again. I ordered several vinyl dolls from Ashton Drake, who had switched over almost entirely to vinyl from porcelain. When checking the internet for one that Ashton Drake was no longer offering, I hit on a reborn Charlie by Linda Webb and I was hooked. Had I conceived of painting porcelain as realistically as the art of reborning requires, I probably would still be working with porcelain, as this new realism would have been more challenging and rewarding than the old methods of porcelain painting in which you try to prevent "blotching". I'm glad I'm not still doing porcelain. Reborning vinyl parts is much cleaner, simpler, easier, more forgiving and more rewarding since it's much more huggable when finished. I wondered about these little creations being so endearing and began to really check out my own internal experience regarding them. When I view this little vulnerable looking Paige that I just finished reborning, with her delicately veined, bald pate, I guess that good feeling is from a rush of endorphins. A natural high. And it's ongoing. It's as good in some ways as petting my adorable min-pin or looking at some beautiful mountains. I'm sure these dolls provide the same type of health benefits as having a pet or observing nature. Like so many others, I simply love it. So as far as I'm concerned, and as Martha would say, "It's a very good thing."