Never A Girly-Girl, But I Had Dolls

Just before Christmas I had to go to Dillons to pick up my husband's prescriptions. As I was making my way out of the store I saw a display of dolls on sale. Something about the doll caught my attention. She could walk. Wow, that brought back some memories. I used to have a doll that could ride a horse and a tricycle and if you laid her on her back she would kick and wiggle her legs. I remember she had pink pants and a yellow and pink shirt and blond hair. I headed home and got on the internet to see if I could find pictures of the doll from my childhood memories. Jackpot, you can find anything on the internet!

   

Tippee-Toes Doll 

After doing some Googling I came across some pictures. She was called Tippee-Toes. I don't think I was much of a doll kind of girl since I wasn't really a girly-girl, but I do remember Tippee-Toes. She was so cool and I'm sure as a 5 year old I was quite impressed with the fact that she could ride a tricycle and a horse.


Thinking about my Tippee-Toes Doll got me to thinking about the other dolls I had when I was a little girl. There weren't many of them, like I said I wasn't a girly-girl, but I remember three dolls that I had as a little girl. Besides Tippee-Toes, I had Buffy and Crissy.

My Buffy doll had her very own miniature Mrs. Beasley doll. That was so cool! A doll with a doll! The Buffy doll was based on the little girl character from the TV show "Family Affair." Mrs. Beasley was very important to Buffy in the show so it would stand to reason that the Buffy doll would have a Mrs. Beasley doll. Of course the toy manufacturers produced a "real size" Mrs. Beasley doll just like the one on the TV show and a lot of little girls had that Mrs. Beasley doll, but I didn't get that one, just the miniature one that went with my Buffy doll. My Buffy doll had different clothes too. She had a short dress that was white with red polka dots and a red ruffled skirt. She also had a sleeveless orange jumpsuit with a short-sleeved white shirt that went under it. I think she had some pajamas too, but I don't remember what they looked like. Oh, I mustn't forget, my Buffy doll could talk. You just pulled the little string at the back of her neck and she would say something. I'm sure back during those days (late '60's/early '70's) a talking doll was impressive, at least to a 5 or 6 year old it was impressive.

Besides Tippee-Toes and Buffy, I only remember one other doll that I had. Her name was Crissy and she had red hair. Crissy was amazing because her hair could be either short or long, and if it was short you could make it grow by yanking on it. Well actually you were probably supposed to pull gently, but I thought it was pretty neat to just yank it, remember I wasn't a girly-girl. Then to make her have short hair again you just had to turn this dial on her back...and magic she had short hair...to my 6 year old mind it was magic! Crissy was really tall, had long legs, and a blue satin outfit, and she had that magic hair,that made her a spectacular doll.



Although I remember these three dolls, I don't really remember playing with them much. I'm sure I did, but by the time we moved to the farm (when I was 7) I was more of the jeans, cowboy boots, let me go outside tom-boy girl, with the exception of my Barbie Dolls. I loved my Barbie dolls and probably played with them until I was 10 or 11.

I remember being so excited the year I got my Barbie Camper. Now Barbie, Ken, and Skipper could go camping. I played with them at the top of the stairs and the stairwell was the lake. The could swim for ever in that deep lake. After their long day of swimming they'd go back to the campsite, cook dinner on the camper cookstove, then curl up in their sleeping bags and go to sleep for the night, only to repeat the adventure the next morning.

My barbies had quite the collection of clothes too. Barbie even had a pretty lacy dress that worked as her wedding dress. I must have been obsessive-compulsive even as a child, because my Barbie suitcase was always neat and organized and I knew where every outfit was. I spent hours and hours changing their clothes taking them on adventure after adventure. Even as I grew older my barbies had a soft spot in my heart. I never got rid of them. I really thought I'd end up keeping them for my own kids. I'm sure A.J. and Daniel would have loved getting my barbie collection, lol!

Since my mom and dad were still living at the farm and had plenty of room to store stuff I just left my barbies and the camper out there. Since I had boys and I knew they wouldn't want them I guess I was thinking maybe I'd save them for my grandkids. Who knows! When something brings us so much pleasure as a child I think we think that surely these toys/things will bring the same pleasure to someone else so we hang on to them hoping to bring that same pleasure to our kids or grandkids.

So what happened to all these dolls that were part of my life as a child? I don't really know what happened to Tippee-Toes, Buffy and Crissy. That is a question I'll have to ask my mom. We never had garage sales, so maybe she donated them to Goodwill or gave them to someone. Since I'd hung on to my Barbie collection I was able to pass that on to a special little girl. There were two kids who came to our church with their aunt when I was a young mother. At that time I was teaching Children's Church so I got to know Melvin and Amber. I had a soft spot in my heart for them. I don't think they had a lot, not like most kids did during those days. One day their house burned down and they lost everything. I don't know if the family had insurance, but it didn't matter to me, I knew exactly what I was going to do with my Barbie collection. The next time I made it to my parent's house I packed all my Barbie stuff up and the next time I saw Amber I gave it all to her. I don't know if Amber had as much fun with the barbies as I did, but in my imagination she did.