Dollieh Sanctuary

Urgh, ok... this is semi-doll related I guess, though not BJD. Lemme see how to start.

One of the first dolls I ever actually wanted when I was little was when they came out with Cabbage Patch Kids. I'm not sure how many people here will be old enough to remember the complete madness that surrounded those when they really started to get popular in 1985. There's an amusing old story about how my gran took advantage of our family's generally small size (most of us are only 5 ft tall) and ducked between two much larger women, snatched a doll from the shelves, and sprinted for the checkout. And that was how I got Jake. Some time later Ivy was added, and while I try not to play favorites, well... Jake really had more sentimental value just because of the history.

Skip ahead about seven years and someone in my immediate family stole both of my CPKs and they most likely went to a yardsale.

Skip a much later bunch of years, and ten years after my gran's death, and I find a near-match for Ivy at a church rummage sale. I couldn't remember if her eyes were blue or green at the time, and this one's was blue (I've since painted them green, after a good stretch of it just 'not quite looking right'). I still need to find a good way to remove gelpen on her face, and some very strange little light-grey spots.

Anyhow, for reasons of wanting some emotional closure to this old ball of wangst, I've gone searching more than once in attempts to 'find Jake'. So far this always ends badly, which has only really made the situation worse. Usually, I just plain can't find a match. Sometimes, I see matches but they're MIB or still have their papers - I don't want one where I'm certain it's not Jake, if that makes any sense. I know the odds of finding the exact same CPK are astronomical, but I'll be fine as long as I can tell myself there's the slightest chance. Most often I don't find a match at all. In fact, since I've gone looking, I've only found a loose match once...

That was last night. I found a match on ebay. This morning I was outbid by someone who has automatic bidding and more than $20 lying around. (Technically, I only had that much by dipping into where I'm saving to replace my desk before it falls apart.)

Part of me thinks I shouldn't have looked now, because somehow this just makes it that much worse. Anyhow, I'm depressed, I'm going to get myself some chocolate in a few minutes... and while I feel a bit guilty dumping this here I'm also half-hoping someone has some funny stories or something else that might cheer me up, or maybe some sites that resell CPKs for a price that's in my reeally tight budget.

For reference, I'm looking for one that looks like this: 1985 Preemie with a tan tuft and dark blue eyes
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Vintage-Cabbage ... fresh=true

I'm going to go get chocolate now...

Well you should be going to the Goodwill online auction site.

http://www.shopgoodwill.com/search/SearchKey.asp?itemTitle=cabbage+patch+kid&catid=0&sellerID=all&closed=no&minPrice=&maxPrice=&sortBy=itemEndTime&SortOrder=a&showthumbs=on

Keep checking there. Short of going to every garage sale in America, this is your best place to find him cheap.

Thanks, I didn't know about that site. And sorry about the ball of wangst above. This has just been really frustrating. (Idiot me actually started out thinking it'd be therapeutic, resolve some old issues, etc... getting a good lesson in not picking at scabs.)

Again, thanks a lot for the site. I'll set up an account and keep a watch on that one. Until then, well... just telling myself that wasn't the right one or I would have got it.

Don't worry about it and you're right, he wasn't the right one. Dolls have a way of knowing this. I have found with many important things there will be a premonition or a close but not exactly what I'm looking for that shows up first to make me alert to what I'm looking for. I spent 30years looking for a book with an illustration of eyes on butterfly/moth wings, turns out I more than likely saw the fish from Codex Saraphinianus.

And I have some Cabbage Patch kids somewhere in a storage tub, I don't remember one like that but I can check.

ADAD September 25: H is for Hugs by richila9098, on Flickr
Richi says hugs always help.

Nope, not that one. It's a Koosa that color. And no digging them out because it's in the midst of a hoard. I was able to peek inside.

Technically it's called ADH-Squirrel!

I remember those dolls, and the insanity that surrounded them. People getting trampled in the hoards, ect...
If I recall, with the originals, no two kids were made exactly alike. They might have the same eye and hair color, but different styles. Some had dimples, others didn't, ect.
I have one named Angelina Laurell. She was a gift to me from one of my classmates in 2nd grade, after I'd severely burned my arm. I didn't have one at the time, but I wanted one SO BADLY, we just didn't have the money for stuff like that. So this popular girl in my class comes to visit, and she has two CPKs in her arms, and imagine my absolute shock when she hands one with pretty red braids and a yellow flowered dress to me. I think I might have cried a little. lol
Anyway, I still have her, too. She is one childhood doll that will never be gotten rid of, just because of the history of her and the memories she holds. We went through a lot together.

Oh, I also remember I had the hardest time trying to pronounce Angelina's name at first, but it was so pretty I was dead set against officially changing it. lol

I had one very similar to that.

I missed the official start of the craze because my mother didn't have the money at the time. It was a slightly sad Christmas when all of my cousins showed up to the holiday dinner and the grandparent's house with their brand new CP kids and I didn't have one. (2 of my aunts actually gave her money to buy some for their kids, since she worked at a store that sold them and quantities were being limited. They figured that since she couldn't buy me one, that they shouldn't waste the chance of them getting some. )

A couple of years later the craze died down enough that they came down in price and my mom got me one. I think he was sold at a yard sale a number of years later.

Actually my favorite one came many years later. They had their revival, I don't know...maybe 10 years ago? I saw one in the store I fell in love with and mentioned it to my mom. She actually rushed to the store the same day to purchase him but didn't let me know until months later on Christmas morning! He's still with me.

Good luck finding yours! I know what it is like to want a certain childhood toy back and not be able to find it.

Back before they were readily available the artist had a booklet that had patterns and how to make one yourself. I have that booklet somewhere. And I understand about finding the doll that was lost. In my case it was a playset, not a doll. Have you any pictures of yourself with the doll?

richila wrote:Richi says hugs always help.

Richi is exactly right. I ended up pulling Ivy into the bed last night...

DollyKim wrote:Nope, not that one. It's a Koosa that color. And no digging them out because it's in the midst of a hoard. I was able to peek inside.

Thanks for looking anyway. I'm sure I'll find him if I just keep at it.. meaning no more on-and-off searching and getting in a funk when it doesn't work.

Stormlight wrote:If I recall, with the originals, no two kids were made exactly alike. They might have the same eye and hair color, but different styles. Some had dimples, others didn't, ect.

Yeah, there's something like a dozen head molds (not really sure how many), multple hair styles, eye colors, hair colors. I think it'd be possible to find 'twins' if one hunted long enough, but it's a headache. In a way, I'm lucky Jake was a preemie from 1985. They only came in bald, yellow hair in a tuft, or tan hair in a tuft for the caucasian ones, and about 3 or 4 different eye colors (brown, green, blue, and I'm honestly not sure if there's a lighter blue or if it's just some pics look that way... CPKs aren't really a specialty except for the sentimental value of my specific pair of em XD)

Stormlight wrote:I have one named Angelina Laurell.

My little Ivy Augusta is a redhead too. And I also kept the original names, even if I lost the paperwork decades ago. Some toys are just important because of the memories. Jonathan, one of the 'stuffies' I have that I'd never get rid of (and managed to hide during the summer when so many of my toys started 'mysteriously' vanishing) is just a generic baby doll from somewhere with a hard head and flannel body... that was used to prop up my baby bottle in the crib when I was an infant. Recently I've had to start 'patchworking' over his body with cotton flannel because it's just started falling apart. ... This may be partly a good thing, because I can do it in blue flannel prints and, after 36 years, no longer have that odd question about why a dolly named Jonathan is covered in little pink flowers. XD

quidam wrote:Good luck finding yours! I know what it is like to want a certain childhood toy back and not be able to find it.

Thanks! I know I was pretty lucky to get Jake the first time around. I don't remember what the prices were like in Xmas of 1985, but I do recall there being limited numbers and all that... hence my gran's mad grab-and-dash that became a very well repeated family story.

zirconmermaid wrote:Back before they were readily available the artist had a booklet that had patterns and how to make one yourself.

I remember hearing about a pattern book for the ones with the soft faces. That's a neat thing to have.

zirconmermaid wrote:Have you any pictures of yourself with the doll?

Honestly not sure, though I could go hunting. All my family photos are in two huge bins of unsorted mess, and have been for over a decade. I intended to start scrapbooking to organize them, but then things happened - my gran died, the Evil Overlord moved in, and a lot of my projects at the time got stopped dead. Tho, except for being fuzzy on Ivy's eye color, I've a pretty good memory for what she and Jake both looked like (and in his case I'm sure the eyes were blue XD)

Anyhow, Ivy's managed to come down with 'cabbage pox' over the summer. We had a very wet and moldy year here and also had a black mold outbreak in the back room and my tomato plants got blight... Luckily she only has a few spots and I managed to ID it quick, so I've got zit cream and zip strips on the list of things sent to the Evil Overlord for budget approval. And if I have to temporarily take her head off, I'm going to give her body a good wash while I'm at that. And, who knows, maybe with any luck, Jake will be home by xmas (and I can run him through the same treatment if needed, with supplies already on hand).