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Mother Hen's 'Cabbage Patch Doll' by Carol Wells

The resurgence of Cabbage Patch Dolls commercials reminded Carol of when these dolls first hit the market and their initial popularity. These same commercials also help to remind her of a paticular day, in the past, when she took her daughters to a photography studio in Indianapolis.

The recent Cabbage Patch doll revival reminded me when, in the 1980's, these dolls first appeared on the toy market and sparked a holiday-shopping frenzy to get one to place under the tree for Junioretta or Junior as, originally, the dolls were promoted to both genders. Craftier people, unable to get one of the plastic versions or unwilling to pay 3x to 10x more, bought homemade nylon-polyester clones priced very close to the plastic doll's suggested retail price. I found the dolls unattractive but my two older daughters fell for the commercials, as advertisers hoped children would, so it was inevitable the girls eventually became participants in the Cabbage Patch fad courtesy of a gift-bearing relative or two.

When my third daughter was a couple of months old, and enjoying her brief "baby of the family" title, I dressed up the children for a visit at a photography studio. The first set of pictures was of the three girls together, arranged by age so the second oldest held the baby propped to lean against her. The photographer then started to pose the girls for individual pictures with the baby going first, then placed on a blanket spread out on the floor, when the photographer started posing the oldest child.

The mysterious parental "something's not quite right" instinct came over me and my heart did a back flip when, turning my head, saw the empty blanket. Even though I knew the baby couldn't crawl yet my eyes quickly scanned the room, which was when I noticed my second oldest child was missing as well; then I recalled that a few moments earlier the baby had whimpered … but only for a few seconds. "Oh no, the Mother Hen is at it again," I muttered.

My second-born child didn't like it when her little sister fussed or whimpered so self-assigned herself as the Baby Cheer-Upper. At home, when the baby was in the cradle, I would have to drop whatever I was doing if the baby shared sounds of being restless or hungry because I knew these same sounds also triggered her slightly older sister's Mother Hen instincts. If I didn't, then the second-born child would take her little sister out of the cradle, with the baby's back against her stomach while her little arm were wrapped under the baby's arms and across the chest. She would then try to "help" quiet the baby one of three ways:

• Take it for little walk because it was "bored looking at the animal prints on the blanket"
• Climb up into a chair to sit and hold the baby because it was "bored laying down"
• Bring it to me because neither the above worked so the baby must be hungry or wet.

What I wanted to do was get to them before the older of the two tried to climb into a chair while holding the baby. Not only for safety reasons but also because the baby truly did not enjoy this method of "helping quiet it down".

Recall that I explained that the Mother Hen would carry the baby with it facing forward, sand she didn't think of hoisting and laying the baby down on the chair before she climbed up into it. She never understood why the baby cried more when she tried to quiet the baby down this way, so down she would climb, facing the back of the chair with the baby in front of her, off the chair to bring it to me. To help prevent a later phobia of cushions, I really wanted to intercept the Mother Hen before she started to near a chair.

I looked down the hallway in time to see my second child, attired in a little white and print dress, heading to the lobby-slash-waiting room of the studio. As she walked I could see the baby's little feelt, cald in booties, swaying left to right in tempo with the older child's pace. I quickly told my oldest child to stay put as I left to rescue the Mother Hen's charge.

"Oh look at the little girl with her Cabbage Patch," an older woman commented as the Mother Hen entered the waiting area - and, thus, nearing chairs.

"Isn't that an adorable sight," another woman commented in response.

"I don't see a doll," one child, seated next to his mother, observantly commented.

"Right there in front of her … " his mother's voice gradually faded as the Mother Hen came closer. She quickly regained her voice as I next heard "My god, that doll is breathing!"

Allow me to share that I don't think there is a graceful or non-chalant way a parent can remedy the situation when other adults are still recovering from the shock of what they had just witnessed your child doing. I also don't think my third daughter, now in her late-teens, would find it humorous nor flattering hearing about the time when, as an infant, some people had breifly mistaken her for a non-lifelike looking doll.

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I'm Not Suffering from Insanity...I'm Enjoying Every Minute of It!
[Karen Scalf Linamen; 108 pages]
Karen continues in her usual comedic style with this offering of 14 ways to combat the insufferable circumstances of life by embracing a sort of "insanity" as a solution in and of itself. Can you relate?

Cough and sneezes spread diseases.
-- 1942 UK wartime health slogan

Humor Is Relative thanks Cay Dickson, from the Houston Chronicle, for the compliment!

You may give gifts without caring -- but you can't care without giving.
-- Frank A. Clark

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If children grew up according to early indications, we should have nothing but geniuses.
-- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832)

Meet Humor Is Relative's contributing writers!

The [1950's] era was symbolized by the drive-in--either for fast food or for movies. Parents smiled as they drove to new shopping malls, and kids smiled as they received an endless supply of fads--saddle shoes, Barbie dolls, stacks of 45 rpm records. Parents bought $100 million worth of Davy Crockett coonskin hats, while in just a few months of 1958 kids bought 20 million hula hoops. . .
-- Terry H. Anderson The Sixties [2004] "Cold War America: Seedbed of the 1960s"