Dollmaking and Guilt

I guess I only have experiences with other doll makers online. I've come across a few people who make dolls in my city, but they have always had different interests than I.

My experience is that once a doll has been started , even if it is just at the armature stage, it a doll. We don't throw dolls away.

I have dolls I've repainted 4 or 5 times, have carved again, buried in more clay or otherwise altered. Working in quarter inch scale, I'm limited to carving and sanding, because painting or adding clay adds inches and feet.

Which means that this little guy, even though more unfinished than finished , is a doll, and has his own character -
(and I guess is male, since that is how I am referring to him) . He is way too big for quarter inch scale.

I made this little lady , Vesta, while inspired by a family picture. She is the only doll I've made that looks similar to my original vision . Most dolls seem to choose their own gender and size and character. If you try to do more than influence those decisions, it seems to end up in the creation of a spiritless plaything. An interesting note on Vesta- a close friend who only tolerates my dollmaking , and knows that I often repaint them, saw her and made me promise that I would not rework or repaint her, because she had, "Something about her." This from a woman who literally never owned a doll in her life.

If you think I'm being weird , and personifying dolls because I make them , think about all the people who hate dolls or are disconcerted by " Little eyes looking at me." I once had a friend stay on my living room couch, where the china cupboard was filled with china and bisque dolls, probably all 100 years or older. When I went to check on her in the morning, she had turned all 23 dolls in the display case so that they faced the wall on the other side of the room instead of looking toward her. The dolls seemed to have kept her from sleeping. She said she couldn't turn them toward the back of the cabinet because then they couldn't see out.

Not just doll makers or people who love them think dolls have their own character!