I went through helping a friend move her dolls to a larger house a couple years back and know what you mean about making one look closer at a personal collection. Gracious, even moving to a larger area makes one realize how fast the space fills up and creates wonder as to how everything ever even fit into the smaller space to begin with, LOL!

We collectors are either geniuses or nuts enough to manage finding one more inch of room to fit a new acquisition into, :-). Every single time I try to thin or cut back I find the pocketbook opening up for that next doll or whatever, that I just have to have. Trying to sell or give away for thinning becomes virtually impossible because if I wanted it badly enough when I bought it, or received whatever it is as a gift, like you, it remains precious and keepable in my eyes. My family constantly reminds me that I am a pack rat.

Suzanne

In a message dated 1/21/2002 10:29:43 PM Central Standard Time, jhawkins1320@charter.net writes:

<< My friends & I , for the last couple of days & for at least another week, Have been helping a recently divorced girlfriend , whose children are all grown & on their own, move from a very large , expensive house to a house a third the size not to mention price. This friend collected dolls of all kinds...as a matter of fact , it seems she collects absolutly everything, stuffed animals, Mac Donald things, dishes, Xmas decor. little houses, miniatures...well you name it. She has , easily, over a thousand dolls. She can't throw anything away & likes copies of many of the things...which is why she has so much. We have been able to convince her to give away, throw away , or sell very little...I guess a divorce is a wrong time to do this, you've already lost so much. Her new , smaller house will have to have little else but shelves in it to hold all these collections... but then, I never noticed before how little furniture she had even in that big house...dolls are everywhere, on the floors & stacked & in every cabinet & over the top of kitchen cab. space...this has been a truly Herculean task that seems neverending. But it made me take a look at my own life & how many more dolls do I need when I don't have a place for the ones I have now. So I tried to >>