Worry dolls originated in Guatemala and are said to take your worries away. They may have very crude drawn dots for eyes or faces, or they may be entirely faceless. Either way they are said to help calm the fears of children.
According to The Information Please Girls' Almanac By Alice Siegel - Page 148, "Worry Dolls - These are tiny dolls from Guatemala. You tell one worry to each doll, place the dolls you've told your worries to under your pillow, and by the morning they've taken your troubles away."If you would like to see or read more of this article please click here.
The Utah Museum of Fine Arts created a wonderful Folk Art Dolls .PDF tutorial. The .PDF includes an introduction into "Doll Making As A Folk Art Tradition" and tutorials on making 4 different types of Folk Art dolls.According to the tutorial, "According to folklore, the doll will worry in the person's place, letting the child sleep peacefully. The child will wake up without their worries, which will have been taken away by the dolls overnight. The dolls come in sets of six and the Guatemalan tradition is to use one of the six worry dolls each night. After six nights the worry is gone. The dolls are usually 1/2" to 2" tall and handmade using wood or wire as a frame and cotton fabric or thread for clothing."
Included in this tutorial is a section on Page 14 & 15 on How-To Guatemalan Worry Dolls, like the doll in the picture to the right.
If you would like to see and read the Folk Art Dolls tutorial please click here.
According to the University of Minnesota article on The Legend of the Worry Dolls by Sara McDonnell, "The indigenous people from the Highlands in Guatemala created Worry Dolls many generations ago as a remedy for worrying. According to the Mayan legend, when worrying keeps a person awake, he or she tells a worry to as many dolls as necessary. Then the worrier places the dolls under his or her pillow. The dolls take over the worrying for the person who then sleeps peacefully through the night. When morning breaks, the person awakens without the worries that the dolls took away during the night."If you would like to read that article please click here.
