For the first time in many, many years, I have hollyhocks growing by my home. I got seeds last summer from FarSide of Fifty and planted them. They came up last summer and I protected the small plants with lots of dry leaves over winter. Now they are tall and beautiful…. with deep wine- colored blossoms swaying in the wind each day.
I just went outside to collect seed pods from the lupines (FarSide sent me those seeds also and now the new plants have made their ripe seed pods after blooming). While I was there, I plucked a green bud off the hollyhocks and a nice big flower as well. Then I picked a smaller coreopisis (yellow daisy) bloom and went inside the house to make the first hollyhock doll I have made since I was about 10 years old….back when the dinosaurs were still roaming the earth.
For anybody who has hollyhocks and has children or grandchildren of an age to enjoy this, you need a toothpick, a holly hock bud (green one) and two blooms from flowering plants. The hollyhock is best for the doll’s skirt. Put the green bud on one end of the toothpick..this is the doll’s head. Put the hollyhock flower on the other end of the toothpick..this is the doll’s wide, beautiful skirt. A smaller bloom like a daisy or similar size flower goes on top of the dolls bud-head. She is a lovely little lady and girls can spend hours playing with her, fantasizing about her home, how she lives, that she loves to dance with her wide skirt swirling about her toothpick body…..I used to imagine all sorts of things with my little Hollyhock doll-girls and ladies. I made whole families of them using various flowers for hats and skirts. I picked whole wardrobes of "clothes" for my hollyhock dolls. I entertained myself for many summertime hours in July when the hollyhocks bloomed by our house where I grew up.
With the current trend for spendy , unimaginative toys for children, there may be some kids who think this is really a dumb doll! But for those kids who have great imaginations and like to make things…a Hollyhock Doll is a great summertime toy…..only when the hollyhocks are blooming. But oh, how sweet it is… when the child loves to play imaginatively and loves flowers as well. Moms and Grandmas can go back to being little girls again , just for a little while with their kids or grandkids.
Martha Stewart told how, in Victorian days, genteel ladies would ask, “Where are the Hollyhocks?” when nature called as hollyhocks were used to hide the outdoor toilet. Toilet being an uncouth word in those prudish days. My late mother-in-law called them “toilet flowers”.
Thanks for the memories. Haven’t thought about hollyhock dollies in years. We used to play with them, too – in the evenings after we’d circled the wagons . . . .
We had hollyhocks growing outside our house when I was growing up. I would make dolls from them too and spend many fun hours playing with them. Thanks for bringing up a good memory.
I LOVED hollyhock dolls. I just saw a picture of one in BIRDS AND BLOOMS and it came with instructions on how to make them!!!
So little girls are still making hollyhock dolls like we did Lori.