The Babydoll Drama

Meet Juli.

She’s the one on the right. Chloe named her after her cousin Julianna.

Chloe LOVES her Juli.

Juli has been with us since the beginning. I’m not sure who, but someone gave us this babydoll for Chloe before she was born. If you’re the one, please let me know! I’ve always wondered where we got her. Since Chloe was able to play with toys, Juli has for sure been her favorite thing. EVER. {Besides her Ya-ya, of course}

Everywhere Chloe goes, Juli is with her. This babydoll is a great doll, but not very practical. You can’t change her out of her pj’s, her hat doesn’t come off, and her lamb lovie is stuck to her forever. It’s just not a doll that you would think a little girl would fall in love with. Isn’t half of the fun putting on a diaper or a cute doll dress? Well, for her 3rd birthday, we took Chloe to the American Girl store to pick out a Bitty Baby. Ya know, the expensive ones that are every girl’s dream. The one that you can actually change her clothes {unlike sweet Fisher Price Juli!}. We thought she’d pass on her old doll the minute we got home with her new doll. But…

Um. No. She still only plays with Juli. Ellie {the expensive American Girl babydoll} is only played with when a friend is over, or when I’m playing dolls with Chloe. She’ll gladly share her AG doll with anyone, but she is never willing to share Juli. We’ve had lots of “we need to share everything” talks and a few time outs related to her love of this toy.

I have tons of pictures of this babydoll. One day I found Chloe putting Juli in time out.

Well, last week, Chloe spent a few days in San Angelo with my parents. Juli, of course, made the trip too. Chloe took Juli to the high school football game on Friday and….

Friday night at 10pm I get a text from my mom saying Juli is missing, but that my dad was going back to the stadium to look for her. Mom said Chloe knew that she must have dropped her somewhere at the game. My poor parents were worried sick. Of course, it wasn’t their fault. Things like this just happen! But, it didn’t stop my dad from going over there at 10pm to try to find that doll.

I get a text Saturday morning that Juli was not found. I knew Chloe would be so sad, but I wasn’t too worried about it. Every kid loses a favorite toy, right?

Then my mom calls about an hour later and says “We found her, but…she’s been ran over. At least a few times. And her head is about to fall off. And she has tire marks all over her.” It is so bad that mom wraps her in a grocery bag and at first doesn’t tell Chloe that they found her.

Then Chloe and her talk about how they found Juli, but she is “sick” and needs a bath, but that mommy can fix her.

So, Chloe and I talk all the way home about how we are going to sew her head back on and give her a bath.

But then I look in the bag.

Y’all. There is no hope. Juli is dead. Seriously. Even if I could get her head sewed back on {which I can’t}, the reek of the tar plus the dirt plus the germs… there is just no way. She can’t be washed in the washing machine because she has batteries and such.

So, being the good mom that I am, I realize this needs to be a teaching moment where we talk about how if we don’t take care of our things, they can break and we can’t use them anymore.

But instead, I get on Google. And I search and search and search. And I find another Juli. On Ebay. The current bid was $12 so I bid $15 immediately. I was later informed that was a huge mistake. Trey said you’re not supposed to bid until the very end. Who knew? I had no idea there would be some other crazy mother out there like me totally desperate for a replacement babydoll.

So, I show Chloe the one on Ebay and tell her that the sweet mailman is going to bring us a new Juli, all perfect and new. At first she wasn’t too excited about the idea, but then I showed her the old Juli and she was sold.

So, because of my lack of Ebay skillz, the bid war starts. Y’all. This other momma brought her A game. It got up to $40. Seriously??? I had to stop. And this other mother is way cooler than me because she totally saved the day. She got her daughter a new Juli and my kid’s Juli with a half-sewed-on head is sitting in the garage in a trash bag. And now I’ve already told her that she’s getting a new Juli. UGH. What was I thinking??

But then, guess what? I get on Ebay the next day. And lo and behold there is ANOTHER Fisher Price Little Mommy Bedtime baby. And the current bid?? It was $6.95!! YAY! So, taking Trey’s advice, I just put it on my “watch” list, and was planning on bidding when the auction was close to being over, Friday at 11am.

I checked it a few hours before the end time, and no one else had bid.

I set my phone to go off at 10:50, and I had my Ebay app loaded on my iPhone because we were going to be away from the house all morning.

And my phone didn’t go off.

And guess what.

I forgot all about Juli.

So, the Second Replacement Juli went for……….

$6.95.

Worst. Mom. Ever.

The. End.

{That is, unless you can find me another Fisher Price Little Mommy Bedtime Baby.}

Honestly, I know it is just a toy and it doesn’t matter. And of course, Chloe will be fine. She’ll get over it, like all kids do. I’m really not worried about it. She hasn’t asked about Juli in the last couple of days. But, this kid remembers EVERYTHING. It’s only a matter of time until she asks when the mailman is going to bring her new Juli.

And hopefully by then another one will pop up on Ebay.

And hopefully this time I’ll remember to bid. ;)