Paper Dolls

Image result for effanbee rubber baby doll


In 1952, my mother bought me an Effanbee Dy-Dee doll that was similar to the one shown except it had a brown lamb's-wool wig glued on. It took a bottle and wet its diaper.

The reason she got it was that she kept promising me a baby sister or brother but lost five babies in five years, one a full-term stillbirth. She was told that she could never carry another child. After she lost the fifth one, she decided to get me the most realistic doll she could find. Not too long after that, she had a successful pregnancy and, in fact, had two more after that. She said that the doll brought her luck.

I still had the doll up until a few years ago, when it literally disintegrated in my hands.
 

I loved paper dolls. I played with them so much my mom had to keep taping the little tabs back on the clothes. I generally got a new doll every Christmas and put the older dolls around her under the Christmas tree. I guess to welcome her into the family.
 


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