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russian dolls ...

After trawling through lots of blogs I have noticed that many of you either own a set of Russian dolls, or have bought Russian doll related items. Also know as Matrioska (various spellings), these were given to me when I was young back in the 1970s, by a friend of the family. They are the real McCoy, (marked made in Russia) as one of the couple was a Latvian who joined the German army and who during World War Two became a Prisoner of War here in England. Like the majority of German POWs, for obvious reasons he didn't go back (thanks Steve for the information). I cannot get the exact provenance of the dolls, as both have sadly passed on.

As you can see the colour on the wood has faded, looks like I had them all lined up in direct sunlight, I didn't know any better at that age!

Have you got a cherished item that tells a story?

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remember daisy ...

Who remembers Daisy, in fashions by Mary Quant?

When I was young, most Saturday mornings my granny and grandad would take my brother and I, in the Hillman Hunter, into the village to the mecca of a toy shop, Arbors. We were given pocket money to spend on whatever we wanted, music to the ears of us kids! I usually bought dolls clothes or accessories for either Sindy, Pippa or Daisy.



Here, Daisy is wearing a flirty little number from the London range, a filmy white-spotted red muslin frock called Dotty.



When I did the first rough drawings of my designs I used to mark the focal point with a daisy so I could decide later. But the daisy always looked better than anything else. The daisy was always lucky for me so we used it again for the cosmetics - M.Q - and of course for the doll.

Click on this link to see some of Mary Quant's iconic fashion designs from the 1960s, they are fab!

Michele had a daisy bedspread and a lovely MQ dress, lucky thing, and reminded me of Biba and AquaManda, of which I do remember the jazzy packaging. Carol's dad had a Hillman Hunter, my grandad's was a white one! Joanna has Sindys in her loft, maybe we could get to see these sometime? And Kim had a Sindy wardrobe, well funny you should say this, my best friend Stephanie had the wardrobe, dressing table excetera and I was always insanely jealous, still haven't quite got over the fact even after all these years!

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pippa doll ...

A short while ago whilst clearing out his loft, my Dad unearthed some boxes containing little girl items from my childhood days, needless to say after having been up there for what must be over 30 years everything was somewhat grubby. Luckily these two dolls and their outfits have survived relatively well considering many years of neglect, along with this pair came some extra outfits, some of which survived a cycle in the wash, some didn’t make it, and numerous accessories.

Some interesting facts I discovered about Pippa on the internet:
She had an oval face with painted eyes and eyebrows. The thick eyelashes were made durable by two or three painted strokes. However, the well-detailed ears of the doll were located a little higher than those of normal humans. The nose of the doll was slightly upturned. All Pippa dolls wore pink lipstick, except for Mandy who had a peach-coloured lipstick. Most of the Pippa dolls had waist–length, straight and silky hair. The colour of the hair ranged from blonde to black. This doll had flexible joints on all her limbs. Her hands had other intricate detailing lines such as the love line, the life line and finger nails. Besides, her palms faced down. Her toes had no details.

Do you remember Pippa?