Daily Gratitude Journal

I have 5 wonderful sisters, but Alice and I were only two years apart in age, so we spent a lot of years together, growing and learning and dreaming of the future.

We played paper dolls together - it was a whole world to us - we saved our allowances to buy particular ones - a weekly trek to the dime store was a treat - sometimes just to look again at the set we were saving up for!! Our favorites were the movie stars and the bride and groom sets - so you could get males to be the fathers in the families in our paper doll world!

At some point, we started cutting out pictures of furniture, appliances, bicycles, toys, and other items to set up for our paper doll world families. We would glue them on to cardboard to keep them together. Then we graduated to photos of rooms - and we started setting up whole houses. We were so excited for the Sunday paper and The Home Magazine that came with the LA Times - it was the high point of our week.

These elaborate cardboard homes were basically flat, so they fit nicely under our beds - we had to be careful though, because Mom would sometimes get tired of the volume of them and just toss them out! But we would just start over again.

We were a little jealous of Judy next door - her mom subscribed to regular slick magazines, so her paper doll world houses were a bit grander than ours. Her mom also gave her an expandable file box to keep hers in - I thought that was the height of luxury. Maybe that's why I keep buying file boxes!!

Over the years when I've talked to Judy, she has commented that she has never met anyone but the three of us who played paper dolls quite the way we did. I tried to influence my own daughters to do so - but I think it's something that has to occur; you can't force it.

I am so grateful for a wonderful childhood memory - and a sister and a friend who shared it with me.