My Own Baby

When I was a wee thing, I named my most beloved doll, My Own Baby. It was a clever, most original name. This was she: (or rather she with me)

My Own Baby was a Madame Alexander doll, which meant nothing to me. She was My Own Baby, and she went everywhere with me.

Once I turned My Own Baby into a WMD. She was the torpedo I launched from the back seat of the car to the front seat where my parents, who did not give me my way, sat. They were very mean. My Own Baby knew it.

I snuggled that doll so tightly I wore her soft cloth body down to rags, until all that was left was her dirty, plastic head.

Then I grew up and forgot about My Own Baby.

One day Mom, who was on a trip back East, stopped in a store where she discovered a doll. It's name was: My Own Baby, because she *supposedly* looked like a real baby. Filled with nostalgia, and sensing how delightful it would be for me to have another doll that I could pass on to my children, with the same moniker, she snatched it up from the store shelf and bought it for me. I was in college. 

My Own Baby (The Imposter) was a little creepy with her open, gaping mouth and eyes with their blank stare. She was quickly relegated to her box and placed on the top shelf of some closet and I moved on with my life.

That is, until I was about to have a baby of my own (a human one).  When I was pregnant with Isabella, Mom returned My Own Baby to me, so that Mark and I could use her to practice our swaddling techniques. She was, after all, slightly weighted and had all the correct physical features that a real baby has, making her the perfect model on which to practice. We became swaddling experts. Then my own baby (the human one) arrived. She cried. She moved. She had colic. She pooped once she was swaddled and had to be unswaddled, changed, and swaddled again. She constantly broke out of her swaddle. She was NOTHING like The Imposter. My Own Baby was quickly relegated to her box and was placed on the top shelf of some closet, and we moved on with life with our human baby.

That is, until I was pregnant with Matthew. Mom brought the box around again.
"My Own Baby will be perfect," she said, "for Isabella, to get used to being around another baby," The doll was, after all, around the same size of a real newborn.

"That creepy baby?" I said, under my breath.

My Own Baby was presented to Isabella, who was 3 at the time. She looked at it. She cuddled it.

"Ooh, ahh," Mom and I cooed.

Then Mom asked, "What do you want to name your baby, Isabella?"

Isabella looked up in earnest and said, "Creepy Baby".

Mom and I laughed so hard, one of us, may or may not have peed our pants. Just a little bit. Creepy Baby was quickly relegated to her box and placed on the top shelf of a closet, somewhere.

That is, until I was doing some early spring cleaning this year. I saw the box on the top shelf and decided it was time for The Imposter to go. I asked Mom if she had any reservations about me donating the doll. Her only request was that I take pictures of it, for posterity and all. But pictures in my household mean stories, and stories go on the blog.

Here is My Own Baby's last photo shoot. Matthew couldn't leave her alone. Either he thought she was as creepy as the rest of us did, or he loved her. I guess we'll never know.