My Grandma often gave me handmade dolls. In the summer, when we lived together at the dacha if she had a few minutes to spare, she could pick a bunch of grass, bend it, tie it up with something, and soon I had a pretty emerald-green doll in my hands.

My Grandma used to say that when she was a child, she and her sisters made all the toys themselves. When World War II broke out and the “flashes behind the woods” were visible, as the battles were taking place not far from Grandma’s village, the adults said that it was “no time to play”. So Grandma and her sisters gathered all their toys, picked a clearing in the garden, and put in it everything they could play with, or “buried” as Grandma used to say.

They hoped to dig them up when the war was over, but they never did.

My Grandma made dolls out of grass, straw, and fabric scraps. I have only these two — made of wire and knitting thread. As a child I did not appreciate them very much, I was much more interested in Barbie dolls. But I am very glad that I kept them — the value of these dolls for me has grown over the years. Now they are one of the most precious things in my heart because they remind me of my Grandma, her life, and her skillful hands.