Lonely Lisa Restuffed!

Lonely Lisa loses her head...

I'm so proud of myself! Ergo, I had to share here. Except for a broken porcelain doll given to me once upon a time that I pieced back together with super glue, I'd never done anything like this. When I created the Lonely Lisa Facebook Page I was extremely inspired to get constructive.

The bent wire armature pulled out from the body.
You can see here just above the knee how she's been shrivelled up for some time.
Much of the stuffing has deteriorated into dust.
Some have stuck to the cloth body and stained it.

I first got my very own Lonely Lisa doll in 2011. She was in excellent condition with one flaw. Her stuffing had shrivelled up. She was 47 years old after all. I like to keep my dolls in pristine condition so I shipped her out to get re-stuffed not too long after and she came back all huggy and with a big booty again. I can be very finicky so I'd always been fearful of doing this sort of thing myself.

...What Rosco said!

About a year or so later, I stumbled upon another Lonely Lisa on Ebay in very good condition and my fingers clicked the bid and buy button. When I received her, I realized that her body was actually in a poorer condition than my first one. She was definitely skinnier and I could feel most of her wire armature inside. At the time, I believe I was on a fashion doll collecting high so getting my second Lonely Lisa doll re-stuffed went on a back burner.

I wanted to make sure no water pools in her hands and feet.

2017 has just begun and I was feeling brave and inspired. I decided that it was time for my second Lonely Lisa doll to get in shape...You see, even some dolls require getting into shape! Hahaha! The labor of love took two days. I wanted to make sure she was clean and completely dry. My first doll has a water mark on one knee. I don't think she was completely dry when re-stuffed.

The brilliant Build-A-Bear idea came into light!

I was pretty amazed at the end result. I hadn't hand-sewn anything since...I can't recall, meaning it's been a long time. The heart you see above was actually my exercise run of testing whether I still remember how to do simple stitches. I got the idea from Build-A-Bear where they stuff their bears with hearts that you've made a wish on. So I stuffed my second Lonely Lisa doll with a heart too! I didn't have any red fabric though. She ended up with a quilted type of satiny brown fabric heart.

From left to right: Lonely Lisa and her sidekick Rosco, Laurel and her sidekick Yukon

And voila! Two of my 1964 Lonely Lisa dolls, now both washed and re-stuffed. The one wearing the checkered dress is the one I re-stuffed. I've decided to rename her Laurel so I'm not doing the whole Lisa One and Lisa Two thing. The Laurel name comes from the laurel tree, symbolic of honor and victory...And I'm feeling very victorious right now. It's fitting!

You might notice how Laurel's grown a good inch and a half taller. They used to be very close in height as seen below...although even then, Laurel looked ever so slightly taller. And your eyes aren't tricking you. The one wearing a heart pendant has a slightly bigger and rounder face. Interestingly, I checked the back of their heads and they are both marked 1964 but one has a number 18 stamped below the year and the taller one has 19. I was pretty mystified about that too.

Laurel's before photo.

I don't think I pushed the wire armature deep enough in her feet. Or maybe the wire armature was meant to curve on her butt? Or was she just so shrivelled up that she ended up looking like she was the same 17" tall as my first Lonely Lisa... Either way she's looking fantastic now.

For more photos of Laurel's re-stuffing, check out my Flickr. And if you haven't yet, like us on Facebook!