 |
| I was talking with Paige about all kinds of things. I wanted to know all about my new home!! "So, what kinds of dolls does Sparkie collect?" I asked Paige. |
 |
| She shrugged and answered me in her heavy southern drawl. "Any kind of doll she can get her hands on. She's not limited to any type." |
 |
| I nodded. "Cool." |
 |
| Then I glanced across the room at the window that looked out across the treetops of Sparkie's front yard. "Are we allowed to go outside?" I wondered. "Sparkie never said we couldn't - but she never said that we could either." Paige stood up. "It was nice talking to you," she said, "but MALUCIA HAS GOT MY BLUE DRESS!" and she ran over to go confront the youngest doll, whom everyone tried to parent. |
 |
| "Hey, Isa, want to go exploring outside with me?" I asked. |
 |
| "Ooh, sure!" Isadora (Isa for short) said. We both made the difficult climb down from the Sparkie's Shelf to the ground, then walked across the room and into the hallway. |
 |
| We turned the corner to the stairway and looked down. I gulped. "How do we get down from here?" Isadora glanced up. "I have an idea!" she said, and scrambled up the railing post. She grabbed on and slid down, falling onto the landing. She ran over to the second post and slid down again. Isadora glanced around to make sure Sparkie wasn't around, then called up to me. "Come on!" I took a deep breath and climbed. Squeezing the railing tight, I slid. Making it down safely, we rushed out the door just as Sparkie walked to where we had been standing moments before. |
 |
| "Now that we're outside, what should we do?" I looked around, still in awe at how big everything was! |
 |
| "We should climb trees!" Isadora suggested. |
 |
| I didn't want to spoil anything, so I agreed. We walked to a perfect climbing tree with lots of branches. |
 |
| Isadora was the one to scramble up first. Her wings, which, with a little button, you could push in and out, suddenly spread out behind her. Isa groaned. "These stupid wings! Why couldn't I have been made with a defect or something?" |
 |
| "Want me to push them in for you?" I called up from a little lower down. |
 |
| Isadora took me up on that and quickly jumped down. I pushed them in for her, and then we looked around the yard again, wondering what else we should do. |
 |
| When suddenly, we heard the door open and a voice call out, "ANNA!! ISADORA!" We smiled sheepishly as she turned her head and saw us. "Hi, Sparkie..." I said. |
 |
| She carried us back inside and gave us both a lecture on the dangers of being outside without her watching. We nodded, but when she was finished, we looked at each-other and grinned. It was not the end of adventures for Anna and Isa! |
 |
| I pushed open the door and timidly walked in. I glanced around the room, and my eyes fell on a shelf high above the rest of the stuff. |
 |
| Suddenly, one of the dolls who was on the shelf turned her head and saw me. She quickly scuffled down from the shelf and walked across the room to greet me. |
 |
| "Hello," she said. "my name is Isadora. What's yours?" "My name is Anna. Sparkie told me all the dolls lived in this room, and she told me to go in, so here I am." I explained. |
 |
| "Ah, I see! Well, follow me, and you can meet everyone else." Isadora told me. She led me across the room to right under the shelf. She paused near a drawer of shelves and gestured towards it with her plastic hands. |
 |
| "This is how we get up and down." Isadora said. |
 |
| "I'll show you how it's done. Then you follow. Sound good?" "Yep." "Okay then." Isadora ran toward the shelves and jumped, grabbing the red ribbon that hung down from the top of the shelf. |
 |
| She climbed to the middle, |
 |
| and then grabbed onto one of the things sticking out of the side. |
 |
| She climbed it like a ladder. |
 |
| Then she took hold of the handle of one of the baskets sitting atop. She swung herself around, and she was on the shelf at last. All of this had taken only five minutes. I looked down at the toe of my boot nervously and wondered if I could even make that much of a climb. |
 |
| "Come on!" Isadora called down to me. "It's not so hard once you get used to it." I gulped and made my way (slowly) up onto the shelf, without getting hurt. Then Isadora introduced me to all the dolls. |
 |
| (From left to right) Isadora, Paige, Elsa, Cat, Malucia (Millie), Scarlet, and Tylie. |
 |
| "Hi everyone," I said, waving. "It's a pleasure to meet you all." |
