...Happily Ever After

These are Evelyn's shoes that were made just for her, fit for a princess! Here is a picture of her all spruced up and fresh out of the box. The doll doctor told me all about Evelyn, she is a 1930's American made composition doll. Since she was that old her paint contained lead so she was coated by the doctor to seal that in.

 

Some info from the doctor-

 "During WWI, German goods were embargoed to the U.S. Most dolls were made in Germany. British and American manufacturers scrambled to come up with substitutes. Composition had been used for doll bodies for a long time, but very few whole dolls were made of compo. This started during that time. Usually head and hands were composition, and the body was cloth. This was the start of the American doll manufacturing industry. After the war, bisque-head German dolls were available once again, and were popular through the twenties, but American-made composition dolls were cheaper and less breakable, and mothers liked that."

 

 

Evelyn's box stuffed with good things...

 

 

 Two new dresses for the dolly plus the pattern so I can make more!

 

 

 

What a sweet face, can you blame me for falling in love?

 

Once Upon A Time...

This is Evelyn,

We met on a musty old porch at an estate sale and my inner child prompted me to pick her up and cradle her in my arms and have a tea party with her. But the adult on the outside looked at her skeptically for she was severely cracked and looked ready to crumble.

I wandered through the rest of the house, picking up a few old records, dishes and books, but it was too late. I had fallen in love and I could almost hear Celine Dion..."near far, wherever you are..."

I had a panic moment that someone else had found my treasure and stolen her away as I rushed back to the little porch. There she was waiting and I did pick her up and cradle her in my arms but held back from kissing her.

As you can see from the before pictures, she was a pretty sad little creature. But I found a fantastic doll doctor and little Evelyn came back to me better than new with a diaper, shoes, new clothes and all kinds of goodies.

Watch for Part 2 of the Evelyn Story

 

 Check out this lady's ebay store!

http://myworld.ebay.com/dollilou

Copyright 1936

  

While on a recent road-trip across the entire state of Ohio, we stopped at a very large antique store. After much pleading and begging. You cannot imagine my excitement when I discovered a whole shelf of Grace Livingston Hill books! I quickly dialed my sister's work number and her boss answered. Unfortunately it was a bad connection and I felt bad for bothering her boss. With much "hello-ing" and "are you there", I attracted all the people in the antique store, and the staff were rushing to help me, perhaps thinking I had fallen or been skewered by an ancient weapon. My sister assured me I needed to buy at least several of them. I also had to call my mother-in-law and check her stash of these books by our beloved author and justify my first impression of grabbing them all!

Most of them were in fabulous condition and fairly priced and I eventually chose Maris, Through These Fires, Coming Through The Rye, Rainbow Valley, Silver Wings and April Gold. Also an unexpected book at the end as you will see.

 Can you get over these wonderful covers and original art? These are some of our very favorite titles! If you have not read a Grace Livingston Hill book you really need to, they present such a wonderful view of the past, full of great food and always honest and upright ideals. Mrs. Hill wrote over 100 books from around 1900 to the mid 1940's. I could gush on and on about her....

Surprise! On the way to the check out, how a plain brown book binding caught my eye, I don't know. The dealer could not have known who L.M. Montgomery was and had priced this at a mere $2.00. In fabulous condition, I have not even been able to find this book in paperback. I have always wanted to read it! For those of your wondering, L. M. Montgomery wrote the Anne of Green Gables series, one of my very favorites. As you can imagine I snapped this book up and practically ran to check out.

Note: The wonderful pineapple fabric in the background, I found at a great quilting store in Ohio. I think it is going to become a tablecloth.