The Never-ending Charm Of A Cabbage Patch KidLooking back to when you were a little girl, more likely than not, you wanted, no absolutely, positively needed a Cabbage Patch Kid. Everywhere you looked, left and right, your friends seemed to be getting those adorable chubby cheeked little darlings and yet, there you were, a kid without a Cabbage Patch. That is, until a darling red headed, green eyed little girl named Barbee Kris appeared under the Christmas tree one Christmas morning when I was eight years old! Ah, what a memory! Barbee Kris arrived in a turquoise blue dress (not the best compliment for a red headed doll, but I’m not complaining!) with white lace trim, matching diaper cover and cute little white baby shoes. The vision of her, I will never forget. It has been twenty five years since Xavier Roberts created the Cabbage Patch Kid collection with his famous signature stamped on the behind of every doll that has gone through production. A strange place for a stamp of approval, but it has become expected, so it has stayed. Since that time, many other variations of Cabbage Patch dolls have emerged. Soft faced Cabbage Patch Kids, hard vinyl faced Cabbage Patch Kids, Mini Cabbage Patch dolls, and lest we forget the CPK arch nemesis, the infamous Garbage Pail Kids of the 90’s? Almost as exciting as getting Barbee Kris that memorable Christmas Day twenty five years ago, was getting her Cabbage Patch doll clothes along with her. Oh, those darling Cabbage Patch doll clothes! What a treat they were! I remember treating this little doll as though she were a real baby, dressing her and changing her diaper ever so gently. Every morning before school, I would change her into a new outfit always seemingly cuter than the one she had on the day before, feed her a pretend bottle and put her in my backpack for the long trek to school. At recess, all of my friends (who loved their Cabbage Patch Kids as much as I did) and I would lovingly take our Cabbage Patch Kids out of our backpacks and take them to the playground where we play with them until the last second when the bell rang and we had to go back in to school. Cabbage Patch Kids have brought such tremendous joy to children of all ages for a quarter of a century. Here’s to another twenty five of making children happy. Perhaps this season there will be another Barbee Kris waiting under a Christmas tree for an eager little girl to love her.
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