Three Years

 

3 years ago on this day:

A little 4th grader, 10 years old.  She obsessed over doll blogs.  She loved her four dolls, Molly, Emily, Saige, and Kit.  She woke up.  She woke up with a dream in mind, a dream that had been on her mind for weeks.  With a timid spirit, she asked her mother for her very own doll blog.  It was the morning after Easter, and she excitedly chose wordpress.com for her doll blog.  She chooses her favorite doll, Molly.   The doll that meant so much to her.  The one that she begged for until she received her and her best friend for Christmas in 2014.  Somehow, that little girl knew that she would play with this doll for longer than she would ever expect.

For her site image, she chose, of course, her favorite doll.  It has remained the same for three years, in the spirit of her love of Molly.

As she set up her little background, used her clay and blurry phone camera filter to snap photos of DIY clay macaroons for your ag dolls, she had no idea what her little corner of the web would become.

She didn’t know her collection would triple in size.  Or that her room would be taken by the dolls she loved.

Or that she would be the first thing that came up when you googled “ag doll blogs” (try it lol)  Or that she would be so close to 500 followers over the next few years.

She had no idea that she would meet 4 of her best friends in the entire world through her dolls.

She certainly had no idea that this would become part of her childhood.

The part of her childhood that she would latch on to.  Maybe it was her only piece that she could salvage, in today’s world of pressure to change and “grow out” of things like dolls.

But the one thing she hadn’t the slightest notion of what would happen was the fact that this blog would last three years.  Even longer than three years.

Because that little girl grew up.  She grew up in from the username samanthadolls to Samantha, the author of two major blogs.

The next 168 weekends would be consumed by venturing out with a doll in hand, a camera in the other.

She would go on to use her talents of writing to make something… beautiful.  She used her dolls as characters to propel her stories.

The most amazing thing is how many friends she has made through the internet.

They always tell you to be careful of the stalkers of the internet.  And while there certainly are stalkers, there are also so many beautiful and wonderful people out there.

People that share your interests.

People that absolutely love your dolls as much as you do.

Even if they grow out of dolls before you, the friendship still lasts.

Even though they live so far away, they find their ways together.

There’s a lot of things that little girl still doesn’t know.

She doesn’t know when the thing society calls “growing out” of this will happen.

She doesn’t know why silent, nostalgic tears are streaming down her face right now.

Thousands of memories are coming back to her.

The total of 7,782 comments posted on this blog.

The countless likes, and sweet words.

The lack of hate, that she is so thankful for.

She thinks back to the three summers she has gone through, with a doll (or 12) in hand…

The places she has taken her dolls, the things she has done with them.

She thinks of how she has spent so many nights in bed, dreaming of what she will do next with her hobby.  Her passion.

Yet also so many nights questioning things.

Questioning whether or not she should still be doing this, as a teenager.

She’s not 10 years old anymore.

But at the same time, she’s not ready to let go of everything she has.  She’s not ready to type that final sign off.

To pack up her collection, everything she has cared so much for.  She’s not ready to let go of every trace of every doll.

She knows it will have to happen eventually. But it won’t happen yet.

Three years is a while, but she knows she can make it even longer, before the pressures to break away from the doll’s hand gives in.

She doesn’t like thinking about giving in.

She has built this from the ground up.

She started with one follower.  (yes, she followed herself)

 

(and still does)

All the scenes come rushing back.

The time she went to the American Girl Store for the first time.  The time she looked around, and loved everything with her whole heart.  It’s a strange passion, but it’s hers.  All hers.

She doesn’t think of it as “surviving” for three years. More like… blossoming for three years.

If it weren’t for you, all 485 of you…

This post wouldn’t exist.  The blog would have been dormant a long time ago.

It wasn’t all her.  She can’t take credit for building this up. Nope, only a bit.

Sure, she works hard.

She does some of it for herself.  For her own pleasure.  Because after all, it is her passion.

It’s for all of you as well.

The motivation to strive for every sweet person, lovely soul, that is reading this.

I am that girl.  I think back to not only what I have given this blog, but what it has given me.

It gives me somewhere to turn to, even when times are hard and people are bitter.

It gives me a place to feel ten years old again.

A place to be truly happy.  A place where I feel like I belong.

This is a place that I have strived to work on.

With every photo I have posted in this post, a memory of the feelings I felt is relived.

This is AGDollAwesome.  AGDollAwesome is a place of happiness, a place to let out all the feelings other than happiness, a place I feel that I am a true part of.

A place that has changed so much.  Just like I have.

 

Here’s for not only what this blog is, for what I am.

For what this blog and I will be,

and for what we have been.

❤ ❤ ❤ ❤ ❤ ❤ ❤ ❤ ❤ ❤ ❤ ❤ ❤