Dude N Dolls

This gal's a beauty.   I believe the Company was to be known as F & B  but instead was spelled out Effanbee.  I am going to copy and past some information, I've found on other pages. " Effanbee Dolls were a fixture of the 20th century. Effanbee Dolls started production of their popular toys in 1912, right at the beginning of the  era of composition dolls . They were well known for creating the first realistically proportioned child doll, known as Patsy. The company had great success with its composition creations, most notably Patsy and her family of dolls.  The Patsy line  was extensive and ranged in sizes from six to 30 inches. So many of these dolls were produced that they are a common sight in antique stores. Later dolls were made in hard plastic and vinyl. The Dydee Baby was the first "drink and wet" doll made of hard vinyl. The company has had a series of owners since its creation and is currently owned by Tonner Dolls." While th

Its a sweltering hot summer day as Lord Dude Bro takes his three favorite dogs for an early morning walk.  Suddenly a pretty young gal walks, stops and pets his dogs, engages in a brief conversation and is on her way.  He stops for a moment and thinks "Wow, she was cute, she'd make a nice doll."  Lord Dude, Dude. or "The Dude" as he's called by his friends is quite the fortunate man.  "Yeah, you see, when people die they often leave behind stocks and bonds, you know, boring financial instruments that easily get converted to liquid funds. Instead, I got my mom's dolls."  When asked how "Dude" spends his days he says "Well, we have quite a few tea parties.   And it was quite fun at first.  But the dolls started getting demanding.  Some dolls wanted Earl Grey and some  wanted Lipton. But then some of the German dolls wanted some pretty obscure German teas, and well,  they didn't sell them at Walmart.   I had to order them on e

Wow, people actually read this!!! Thank you for reading the random thoughts that somehow make up a blog. I guess I have to watch what I say? Anyway, I certainly appreciate you taking time to see the happenings of  the "Dude" with the dolls. Getting sidetracked for a couple of days.   First of all, dude and the dolls don't live anywhere near this fire. It's about 30 miles away.  But these fires can get fairly ugly in the hills in Southern California.  Last year a fire that was buring for around 3 weeks got new life with a morning of bad winds and around 8 houses burned down. I've been working with the local residents of Chino Hills to see if people would foster animals should this fire turn ugly.   And I reached out to the residents of Lake Elsinore but fortunately, so far, things have been very manageable with the fire.   All that stuff on fire in the hills is the Cleveland National Forrest.   It makes me very sad to say that this wasn't an act of na

"I'm on the side of the building at In & Out Burger, please hurry, people are giving me weird looks." I had a most unique first adoption. But before I get into that it's time to backtrack. The one thing I did right was to photograph the entire  doll collection.  I was able to start spreading the images around and right away people were able to help me figure out what was in the collection. I did meet some very nice people.  One lady, in particular, helped level set my expectations.   As it turns out, dolls are hitting a lull.   And yet, there is a new generation of doll collectors.  I saw this video and was blown away with the talent. For example: I have no interest in rebuilding dolls.  These dolls are valuable and perhaps not the best things to start off rebuilding.   The other thing I've learned over time is that sometimes it's better to get something you know is broken instead of something that appears to be fine but really isn't.   I&

How it all began "I don't know where it's at, I'm in front of Pat & Oscars, come find me. "  I gave my dad the address to the little Mexican restaurant in Temecula, California hours earlier.  As he's pushing 80 he doesn't seem to like to be bothered with looking up direction anymore.   So, the Mexican food idea went out the window and we had pizza instead. When I pulled up to his beaten up little Toyota Tecoma pickup truck the bed was loaded and the front seat was as well with one thing, dolls.  We spent the next five minutes putting it into my beaten up SUV before lunch.   I was now taking possession of my late mother's doll collection.  This was a road I had been down twice before with yarn and quilting fabric.  "There's still more that I couldn't fit into the truck" is what he said before we headed inside. So, I'm the dude with all the dolls.  My mom was a math teacher.  Back in high school, she won a $100 sc

It was kinda a surreal time.  My mom had just died at 4:00AM and by 10:00AM  my dad,  brother and I were buying cemetery plots for my mom and dad.  For the record, that is way too much reality to take on in half a day.   By 4:00 PM my dad was sleep deprived and we were at my mom's cousins house.  My mom tended to hoard things and her possessions had taken up all the conceivable storage places and she recently moved  on to having them stored in banker boxes lining the hallways.  My dad had been talking a bit over the previous couple of months about living a more streamlined lifestyle.  It was at this late afternoon lunch that he let it be known that he couldn't stand to have all of her junk  all over the house without her.  It was too painful of a reminder. 92 banker boxes of quilting fabric needed to be sold before the dolls And this is the point I think a lot of people get to, when their spouse is gone they don't want any of their possession laying around as well.