Most people's lives are pretty stressful most of the time.
You know, your jobs and whatever.
But at the end of the day, especially after I've had like a really stressful work day,
there's something about holding a newborn baby and rocking them and if you can take even just a
couple of moments to enjoy a baby then it's wonderful.
This baby is Coco.
She came all the way from the UK.
His name is Jakari.
He's my only ethnic baby.
I plan to adopt more ...
This baby ... she is my favourite baby.
I know I say that about all my babies but this baby really is my favourite baby.
I have this big guy right here.
This is how I would dress my real baby all the time.
Like, if I had a son this is how I would dress him.
When I feel lonely, I look at him a lot.
If I, you know, just need comfort or something, I just go over to my crib and I pick him up
and I just give him a hug and I'm just like, OK, OK get through the day, let's go.
It doesn't replace a child and never will but it does help me
especially like on my sad days where I'm just like, dang like why am I not a mum today?
You know?
And so then, you know, it's like I said, I just pick him up and
I'm like, it's OK you're gonna get through this, you're OK.
So this is what I like to call my happy place which is my nursery.
So, come on in.
I have set up like what a traditional nursery would be for me,
if I were to have a living baby come home
and so I have my changing table area here.
This is like a little bassinet area here.
We have the little DockATot which I use for posing, for taking pictures …
They tend to remind me of my daughters when they were newborns.
And there's a lot of familiar characteristics of this particular baby.
I think that it's just a natural instinct, it's that motherly instinct
that most people have even men have it
where when you're holding a baby, there's just something instinctual that just kind of comes out in you
and you want to nurture them, you want to hold them in a certain way and
you start to sway and you move when you're holding a baby it's just so natural instinct
and I just think it's really beautiful.
Hey guys, what's up? So look at who it is.
It's Annie!
So, she was born overnight guys.
I literally worked my booty off for this one.
We have Jackie here, my lovely assistant.
I'm not just your assistant.
Oh, yeah, you're my wife.
Well, my wife started first.
She said she could make them and I really was like, there's no way you can make these.
I didn't know she had her artistic skills.
So I watched her for about a month and then I was like, well I think I can make them.
She has a nice sleeping expression.
Look at how big her feet are, she has nice big feet.
So I have customers all over the world.
I've shipped a lot to the UK, I've shipped to Canada, Australia, Germany …
I shipped to a new one recently – New Zealand.
All I do is I try to achieve the most realism I can.
They lay there, they don't do much, you can cuddle them and hold them and so I think that's why
I enjoy it.
It does and it doesn't make me want to have babies.
At all.
Because you know what I like about the reborns?
I can buy it a new outfit and it stays new for forever
and then it doesn't turn into a teenager that wants an iPhone 11, you know, or something like that.
That's how you make a baby.
I always dress my babies before I take them out.
I like them to look nice.
I like them to look stylish.
It's a she? – Boy.
It's a boy? – His name is Joseph.
Hi Joseph.
He's so handsome!
Thank you.
Mira sus labios, que lindos. (Look at his lips, so beautiful)
They are expensive, verdad?
Yeah, they are expensive.
He's so handsome. – Thank you.
My baby was like that when she was born.
Beautiful like him.
Growing up I always wanted to be a mum.
I knew in my heart I was meant to be a mum.
I babied my brothers and sister, I babied my cousin …
They would say, 'Oh Lucenda is going to be a mum any day now,
and she's gonna have like five kids or more,' and I always thought so too.
Do you have anything like, newborn?
Yeah, we do, for a boy? – Yeah.
We have this kind of stuff right here.
They're really convenient because they're like, you know, really comfortable.
Yeah …
Oh that one's cute!
And this one.
You have the cutest sleepers.
Yeah, those are comfortable.
I just remembered just one day just
feeling super sick, my lower abdomen was hurting so bad and I asked my husband to
take me to the hospital.
They found out that I had stage four endometriosis.
I remember waking up in the hospital room by myself and the doctor coming in and
telling me like, I'm really sorry but I don't think you're ever gonna have kids
and maybe like two minutes later my husband came into the room and as soon
as I saw him, I was like, I'm never gonna be a mum, I'm never gonna have kids that
look like you … because that's what I've always wanted, I wanted my kids to
look just like my husband and now it's never gonna happen but you know it's OK,
it's life and, you know, we can always adopt later on in the future,
if we choose to, if not then, hey it's our life.
People that are unaware of the hobby assume that there's something mentally wrong
by collecting a huggable work of art that there's some tragedy in our lives,
that we're now finding dolls to replace that with which is maybe 1%
of the community might have experienced that but for the majority of
us it really is about the artwork, it's about seeing realism.
My goal was always to set out to find the most ultra-realistic lifelike looking baby doll
that could ultimately fool somebody.
We all need to realise that the child inside of us still lives and it keeps us younger longer
if we embrace that child.
I could say collecting toy cars is creepy for a 50-year-old man but they do it.
I don't judge people, they're having fun.
She's a little swaddled burrito.
Safe, ready to be put to bed.
Then she can look up at her little mobile.
Could he pass to be yours?
I don't know.
No, I don't think so.
He got brown hair. – I've got brown hair.
Is it really helping me or am I going crazy?
I took a step back and I said, OK Lucenda do you really need these reborns?
Or do you really want them?
And I came to the conclusion that I needed them and I wanted them.
I needed them because they helped me because to go to a store and to walk by a baby section is painful.
I had no reason to be there but now I do.
Now I can go into a baby section and be like, oh that'll look cute on my doll
or, oh that'll look cute on, you know, Joseph that's when I realised
not everybody's going to understand this hobby and that's OK but as long as I do,
that's all that matters.