Val Mandersloot visits nursing homes to share her antique dolls and their history. 23213 Picture: Luke Plummer
By Casey Neill
MORE than 200 antique dolls will be on display at the annual Tecoma Uniting Church Spring Fete on Saturday 11 October.
Upwey’s Val Mandersloot will show off the unique collection she has built up over the past five years.
More than half are over 100 years old and many date back to the late 1800s.
Ms Mandersloot bought most on eBay, but found others at doll shows and antique stores.
“Dolls that have been played with by kids, they’re the ones that I prefer,” she said.
Her collection began when she had one of her childhood dolls repaired and spotted a few others she liked.
Ms Mandersloot regularly visits nursing homes and aged care centres to share her dolls and their history.
“I take them around so they can feel them, hold them,” she said.
“You should see the reactions, it’s unbelievable.”
On her first nursing home visit, an Italian lady reached out for one of the dolls, calling ‘bella, bella’.
Her carer was in shock.
“Afterwards, she came up to me and said, ‘that woman hasn’t spoken since she’s been here,’” Ms Mandersloot said.
“She’d been there for four years. She wouldn’t speak to her family, she wouldn’t speak to anyone.”
Ms Mandersloot began sharing her dolls with the elderly after a church fete display.
“One of the ladies came up and said ‘I wish my mum could see this, she’d love it’,” Ms Mandersloot said.
When the woman said her mother was in a nursing home, the idea was planted.
The fete kicks off at 9am at 1566 Burwood Highway, Tecoma.
Books, cakes, clothes, toys, plants and home-made produce will be for sale.
Entertainment includes a jumping castle and local choirs.
Proceeds will go to the East Timor Children’s Foundation and Tecoma Uniting Church programs.
More information is available by calling 9754 2177 or emailing fete@tecomauc.-org.au.
