Children’s choice of games was as big as their imaginations, coupled with the ingenuity of their elders. The favorite of most little girls was “playing house” with the “family” made from hollyhock flowers, corn shucks, acorns, old socks stuffed with rags or sawdust, or maybe a fancy doll with a wooden head, arms and feet, or one with a corncob or apple head. If a little girl owned a china-head doll, it was usually a “pretty” and rarely, if ever, went outside the house.
—Appalachian Livin’ – Summer
I loved playing house with my dolls. I was blessed to have many dolls. I knew all their names and took care of them like they were real.
I had many play houses, but my favorite was in the backyard under the laurels and a dogwood tree.
I wanted my girls to love dolls like I did, but they never did. They preferred playing with stuffed animals. One time they were playing outside and I noticed they had a piece of stove wood wrapped up in a baby blanket. They enjoyed playing with those stove wood babies more than they ever did the dolls they had in their room. They still talk about how they loved their log babies.
I met one of my best friends when she was in third grade and I was in fifth. She loved to play dolls as much as I did so we really got along good. Her parents became dear friends of Pap and Granny so we got to spend a lot of time together.
She had the prettiest blond haired baby doll. It was a soft rubbery doll. It was our favorite to play with at her house. One day her daddy took the trash to the dump and found a box of dolls. He brought them home to her and inside the box was an exact replica of our favorite doll. The only thing wrong with it was someone had poured or spilled paint on it’s backside. Once it had clothes on you didn’t even notice the paint. We loved the dump baby as much as we did the one she already had and couldn’t believe how blessed we were to have twin baby dolls to play with.
Last night’s video: Lemon Zucchini Cake, Freezing Zucchini, & Zucchini Onion Cheese Sauté for Supper.
Tipper
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I love dolls. I got a walmart brand american girl doll a few yrs ago and I sew and crochet clothes for her. We made dolls from Rose of Sharon and toothpicks. I made some with my neighbor several yrs ago. I had barbies and played with them till I was married when I was 18. T played with them again when I had my daughter a yr later and until she was 15. I also love paper dolls. We used to cut up the old Sears catalog for those, but only the people pages cause the rest of the big book went to the outhouse.
My favorite Christmas memory is waking up and going out to the living room in the dark. The tree was lit up and under it sat a small table with two chairs; and a doll was sitting on each chair for my sister and me. I couldn’t believe what Santa had left! We never had more than one doll at a time. We both had a Barbie later on and I had this little cheap plastic baby with black curly hair. I pretended it was my real baby and I fed and rocked it and put it to sleep on my bed all day. I was in the 7th grade and even though it lay on my bed, I didn’t tell anyone I played with it. One day a young cousin was visiting and played with the doll and wanted to keep it, so my dad gave it to her…not knowing anyone played with it…and not asking me. I didn’t say a word. I just cried to myself after they left. My dad was a sweet man, but he had a habit of giving things away if he thought someone else could use it, and this time it was mine. This may be why I bought my daughter dolls…many, many dolls when she was a kid. I made her homemade doll clothes all the time…and guess what…she didn’t play with them much. She liked stuffed animals best, and that’s ok! The grandkids love playing with her old Barbie’s and with a couple dolls of hers I saved, even an old cabbage patch kid.
At the mother to a 10 year old girl who LOVES dolls, babies and playing house with anything she can find, this post totally warmed my heart. She’s been known to make families out of clothes pins, rocks, modeling clay and just about anything she can find! Even with her stuffed animals she always wants there to be a mommy, daddy and baby! It’s precious how deeply entrained the concept of a family is in us. In addition to her more creative doll playing, she has dozens of actual dolls in all shapes, sizes and different eras. She knows them all by name and plays tirelessly with them. I think she may get this from me as I loved dolls as a child. 🙂 I am going to let her read this post and the wonderful comments as I know she will really enjoy it!
What wonderful memories Tipper. I was a baby doll girl as well.❤️
Oh baby dolls! I loved my babies and took such good care of them!
My daughters aren’t into dolls either. Maybe one day they’ll change their minds. They both prefer to play the same as their brothers.
I love your baby doll story. That’s the sweetest thing!
❤️
Tipper, I loved my dolls so much too, and I too had several. I thought my daughter would also love them and she played with dolls some but my little granddaughter hadn’t ever cared for them either. Now she loved her Barbies, but like Corie and Katie, she LOVES her stuffed animals and she has a ton of them. When I was little, my paternal grandmother would make me a pillow case doll like she played with as a child. She would fold the pillow case in half and then she would roll each side inward to meet in the middle which was actually the back of the doll, then she would tie a string around its neck and then she would take a pen and draw on eyes and a mouth. I loved it and always played with it when I was at her house which was everyday. She babysat me during the Summer. We lived a stones throw from my grandparents house and our bus stop was at their house. I loved my grand parents so much and feel so blessed to have had them with us for a long time. I enjoy reading The blind Pig and the Acorn and I love watching Celebrating Appalachia so much.
Deborah, thank you! We are so glad you enjoy what we do!
Sweet memories !
I bought my daughter a Stretch Armstrong when it first came out. She was 5 or 6. We played with it together. It was fun trying to rip it apart. Trying but never succeeding. I don’t know what he was made of but it was tougher than me. If you can call him a doll then yes, I played with dolls.
I was never much on dolls, too much of a tomboy I guess. I just wanted to compliment the beautiful hollyhock in your header. I’ve never seen one exactly that color. Lovely.
Oh the sweet memories that have flooded my mind as I read your post about your childhood dolls and your friend who shared the love of dolls. I had many dolls too growing up, but my favorite was any type of fashion doll. I had many Barbies, but I also had Tammy dolls that was the first that had hair that could be short or by the push of a button her hair would grow from the top of her head. To shorten her hair again one just had to turn the button on her back for the hair to go back in. She was indeed my favorite of all the fashion dolls.
I remember playing with dolls, playing house and at times pretending they were my patients and I was their doctor or nurse. Many times they would be wrapped in towels recovering from some calamity that I made up for them.
My favorite doll was a “Tiny Tears” doll. I had the one with the bisque head and painted on hair. A few years later they came out with the doll that had hair. I still have my tiny tears packed safely away.
A few years after my nanna died my Pop-pop gave me her doll. My nanna had her repaired in the 1960’s and told me one day I could have her…..when I was old enough to appreciate her. She is from the early 1900’s and today she sits in a doll case in our den.
My father-in-law recently passed away and in the process of cleaning out the farm house we found my mother-in-laws doll. She’s from about the late 1930’s and is in pretty rough shape. We did find her hair
and my husband said he’d like to have her restored. For now she’s in a Kirby vacuum sweeper box.
One day I will pass these dolls to my daughters and grand-daughter.
The memories that come to mind when I look at these dolls.
I loved my dolls and I saved my favorites from childhood. My girls like stuffed animals more than dolls, but they did like dressing their Barbies, and they loved their American Girl dolls.
I have a huge collection of dolls tucked away here and there, trying to fill the void from my childhood. I don’t recall having many dolls when I was growing up. The ones I remember were fashion dolls, and only one was a life-sized soft and cuddly baby girl. My girls never liked playing with dolls, but I kept buying them. Mrs. Beasley and Drowsy are still waiting in the upstairs bedroom for some little girl to love them.
I always loved dolls. I didn’t have a lot but have kept them or with some, only the heads, all these years. With two sons and grandsons I’m not sure what will happen to them eventually. I made playhouses in the woods on mossy spots. My grandmother had 4-o’clock flowers and I pinched off the tips of the flowers and stacked them to make ruffled skirts, used a stick for arms and a seed for heads to make dolls. I also still have a little box with a tiny doll, fabric and sewing kit for making doll clothes. I have a couple corn shuck dolls I made about age 9. So I guess I’ve made dolls of some sort all my life of 70+ years. For several years I’ve made dried apple head dolls and they are fun too. I guess I’ve gone from the baby doll stage to the old folks. But I never had one like Randy’s. I have heard of that kind though.
Your article, Childhood Dolls, brings back sweet memories of my own childhood and my own collection of dolls. Your story shows that GOD provides – even dolls for little girls.
Coming from MARGIE who is real-that’s a great name for a doll-regardless of how she is taken in! Lol I loved the twins playing with their log babies and the dump baby was brilliant too! When I was a child, I had a bunch of dolls and I remember a Hollie Hobbie type doll who I thought all these years was the REAL MCCOY but when I found her on EBay she’s a Japanese knockoff! I never knew all these years and was so proud of her sucking her thumb. I had the Bionic Woman Barbie and she had “bionics” that you could put in or take out of her arm. She was cool. Every now and again daddy would go on a cleaning and throwing away rampage and I remember he would throw old dolls down the steps to go in trash because they were missing arms, legs, etc and my sister and me would holler about it and rescue our buddies til the next year. You had to hide stuff from him cause he would drink a WHOLE LOT and get very irate and angry. I walked on egg shells as a child… but I had a great grandmother and grandfather who made up for daddy’s folly and foolish ways. They were loving and kind… oh well I now have the Jackie Onassis doll and will content myself with her in a box hid away in a closet…mommy told me of broken china dishes her mom had trashed and used a stump for a table and dolls made of corn husks in early 1900’s growing up in Wytheville, VA…
We have a special needs daughter soon to 47 years old. We couldn’t imagine her life without her 5 real babies. Olivia goes EVERYWHERE with her. She always takes her to church, doctors and the library. She puts so many clothes and socks on her that I am always scared that her arms or legs are going to come off. I tell my husband all the time that Bradford Exchange will never know what joy and comfort those dolls have brought her and when God takes her home, Olivia will be buried with her. Hope everyone has a blessed day. Hope Granny continues in health. You have a sweet family.
I enjoyed my dolls too. But I also had buch of stuffed animals. My mom called them my menagerie. Found it interesting you mentioned you and your friend had “twin” baby dolls to play with. Perhaps a foreshadow of the future? lol
I remember my Mama had a corn shuck doll that she had had when she was a little girl
I loved my dolls. I wanted a Thumbalina doll for Christmas. I wasn’t the type to look for my presents, but that year, I went into my father’s drawer to look for his candy stash, and what did I see? Thumbalina! I never said a word that my snooping for candy showed me the gift I had wanted do much.
Of course, I had a Barbie doll, and her friends Midge, and Ken. But those weren’t “baby dolls”
I don’t recall any other dolls that I had. My last doll I received was when I was 12 years old. By that time, I was crazy about the Beatles, and my poor dolls laguished in a heap in my bedroom.
I remember all of my sisters playing with dolls. Our daughter had several including some Cabbage Patch ones. We were in charge of an ESL ministry when refuges came from Chernobyl. One little girl was so enamored with the dolls in the nursery. I bought a doll and gave it to her. She named it “The doll that Jackie me.”
I never played with dolls, but my sister loved them. One of my brothers and her played house sometimes and would pretend it was their little girl. I remember one year I received a “Chatty Kathy” doll. I was interested in it only because she spoke when you pulled the tab on the back of her neck. After the newness left, I gave it to my sister. My little girl loved dolls. She would dress them up with the clothes I made and pretended they were real. She even put the clothes on the cat, put her in a doll buggy and pushed it around the house with the cat growling all the time. I remember standing in line for an hour or so at a store to buy a “Cabbage Patch Doll” for her. She later took an interest in stuffed animals and had a hundred or so of them by the time she went to college.
I was always a tomboy growing up. Dolls were okay and playing house was fun but I preferred horses to anything on the planet.. Plastic horses, books about horses etc. My oldest sister did buy me my favorite doll, a Mary Poppins. She wore a sweet turn of the century dress, a coat, hat, umbrella and a carpet bag.
However, nothing replaced horses. I remember daydreaming on the school school bus of running up and down the fields riding along side the bus.
Your post brought back some childhood memories. I remember making ballerina dolls with my cousins in the summer from a pretty wildflower that grows along the roadside in Upstate SC. Does anyone know what this might be? I don’t think it is hollyhock.
Randy, you asked if girls even play with dolls these days? I have a 4 year old granddaughter and she almost never does. I found her a set of small wooden dolls meant to go with a doll house and every once in a while she gets them out but doesn’t seem to recognize that there’s a pair of grandparents, a mommy and daddy, and a boy and girl. She doesn’t play pretend family with them, I guess is what I mean. We go to a used toy store sometimes and she is never interested in the dolls, not the babies and not the Barbies, which I’m actually ok with. We played with baby dolls and Barbies a lot when I was growing up but my 2 girls never had Barbies. My granddaughter is much more into small plastic animal figures and stuffed animals. Since she’s the baby of the family, she probably wouldn’t know what a babydoll is even all about.
I am 69 years old and still have my worn little teddy bear given to me by my grandma when I was just a baby and my Tiny Tears doll. I have had her as long as I have a memory….so she is pretty old. I don’t have grandchildren to pass them onto…..but I just can’t bear to part with them. Sweet memories.
Your mention of the “log babies” and “dump baby” is so cute. I loved my dolls. I played with them long past the time it was “normal” for girls to play with dolls. I had nieces by then so I could “get away with it”, playing with the little girls. I liked making clothes for the dolls. My sister and I were just talking yesterday about making hollyhock dolls.
My oldest daughter found a forlorn and unwanted doll buried at the bottom of a box in my mom’s basement and adopted it. She was named Margie and a dress was found for her. That baby doll got more love than any store bought toy and still sits on the foot of her bed even though she rarely is caught playing dolls these days. Playing house is a big one here too. They love to play under a cedar tree and use all kinds of mud and nature finds in their “kitchen”
I remember the time when my sister and most other girls played with dolls and had “play houses” and made mud pies. Do today’s girls even play with dolls? Shoot, I even started liking dolls after I got to be about 15-16 years old. I liked those live, breathing “dolls” that were in my high school classes! I carried on many one sided love affairs, I liked them but they didn’t like me! Then one Sunday night at church when I was 17, I found my all time favorite lifetime doll and she liked me, I had my doll for 50 years before she went to be with God, now most of my days without my doll are filled with sadness. I am lost without my doll.
Something, my nephew will never let me forget. One year when he was about 14, 15 years old he kept saying he wanted Santa Claus to bring him a doll for Christmas. Being the good uncle I am, I bought a cheap doll, wrapped it up real neat, wrote from Santa Claus on the present, and put it under the Christmas tree at the home of our family get together to give to him.