CAYCE, S.C. — A South Carolina grandmother has become a sensation among stressed-out U.S. military men and women around the globe by sending the most incongruous of gifts: pliable, google-eye dolls.
Not that soldiers, Marines and airmen are doing much cuddling with her hand-stitched, foot-tall playthings. Carol Davis' "Dang-it-Dolls" are built to take punishment from homesick, frustrated troops and her work is getting rave reviews.
"The legs are shaped so you can grasp onto them," Air Force Staff Sgt. Rachel Staub wrote in a recent e-mail recalling her homesick days based in the United Arab Emirates. "It returned with me to the States with an eyeball missing and the stitching around the legs loose with some of the stuffing coming out."
The little doll "was used mostly for laughs and to keep my mind off being homesick," said Staub, of Melbourne, Fla. "It brought a smile to all our faces!"
Nearly 17,000 of the goofy dolls have been shipped around the world in the four years since Davis made her first one and sent it as a joke to her grandson, who was in the Air Force then in Aviano, Italy.
The dolls themselves are not a new concept. I had one that I had bought from another sorority when I was in college during one of their fundraisers (back then called a "Dammit Doll"), and I've seen these at craft fairs. But it's a great idea to be able to send these to the troops to give them a laugh.
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