Saba's Sandals and New Temporary Home

Saba is part of the Girls of Many Lands series, sculpted by Helen Kish for the Pleasant Company, 2003.

After I acquired her in 2003 or 2004, Girls of Many Lands, Saba has been featured in several one-day exhibits at local libraries, schools, and the African American Museum.  Her last exhibit experience, however, was several years ago.  Since that time, Saba and the other dolls with books, that are featured in an exhibit of the same name, have been stored in the largest piece of my rolling luggage set.

Poor dolls.  I never bothered to inspect them for their condition at any time during the past several years.  Of course, I would have loved to reenter them into the doll population to display with their books.  Unfortunately, there is just no room there.  So they remained zipped up in the luggage until last week when I freed them for another exhibit. 

Saba survived the previous storage, but her faux leather sandals were in a state of deterioration, one more than the other. The soles of the sandals were okay, but the straps of the right one had almost disintegrated.  She needed new straps for that sandal, so I decided to make new straps for both.  I took a few pictures of the process. Those photos and the text below describe what was done to get her exhibit ready.

L-R:  New sole for Saba's right sandal, the sole of her original right sandal, and the left sandal with original but deteriorating straps

In the above photograph, I had already removed the straps from Saba's right sandal and created a new sole for it using caramel foam.  That new sole was later flipped over and traced to create a new sole for the other sandal.  I decided to use the original soles as the innersoles of her sandals.  To keep the material of the "now" innersoles from deteriorating, I applied a couple of layers of Mod Podge (as shown in the next image).

The straps have been removed from the other sandal and layers of Mod Podge applied to prevent the material from deteriorating.  The above photo was taken before the Mod Podge dried.

After the Mod Podge dried, I placed the innersoles on top of the newly created soles to ensure a proper fit before sandwiching the new straps between the soles and innersoles and gluing the parts together.

I used natural colored braiding cord to fashion straps for Saba's sandals.  The front piece of each strap was sandwiched between the soles and innersoles and glued in place.  The pieces had been premeasured to a length long enough to create a top strap that would knot in front, wrap around her ankles and tie in the back.  I used Aleene's tacky glue to glue everything in place.

The front strap appeared to be pulled farther away from the forefoot than I wanted.  I left the straps tied in place as they were and cut an extra piece of cord to use as a forefoot strap.  The ends of each extra piece were tied to the sides of the new strap.  The end result is shown below. 

The new straps of Saba's sandals are tied in the back just below the gold anklets she was already wearing.  The ends of the extra added piece across the forefoot are tied to the sides of the new strap and the knots trimmed snug.

As seen in the next picture, Saba is now in a Dolls with Books exhibit at a local library where she will remain until the first week of March. 

With 21 other dolls, Saba, (the first doll, top shelf, far left) is featured in my Dolls with Books exhibit at a local library through the first week in March.  Depicting fictional and nonfictional characters from the 1800s through the present, this exhibit encourages children to read.  It also provides a visual depiction of how African Americans have been portrayed through the written word and in doll form.  

Saba's object label reads: 

Saba represents a 12-year-old Ethiopian girl in the year 1846, from the Girls of Many Lands doll series, 2003.  Her book, Under the Hyena’s Foot, 2003, by Jane Kurtz, is about the kidnapping of Saba and her brother.  The children must devise a way to escape and return to their family.

Throughout the month of February, as time permits, I plan to feature the other dolls that are on exhibit with Saba in separate blog posts either individually or in group postings.



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