A Family Treasure

I have the amazing benefit of having grown up with all of my grandparents, as well as several of my great-grandparents. It's something I wish all kids could experience, but most of my friends growing up missed out on it. My great-grandmother is almost 100 years old. In 1917 she turned 7. Her gift from her parents were 7 dolls. The dolls were later stored. 5 of them were ruined beyond repair, while two of them were rescued from that fate. Currently those two are in need of some TLC. One of them is a bisque doll with a leather composite body with bisque hands and feet. It's in okay shape, but needs to have it's eyes reset and possibly it's wig replaced...at the very least restyled. The second doll is a large china head doll with a pieced together cloth body and disintegrating leather hands. This doll needs some serious repair. It has a crack along the breastplate and the body is practically irreparable. The head can be dated to somewhere in the 1860-1890 range, and the doll was not new when it was given to my grandmother. I plan to try to restore both of these dolls...and document the restoration here.