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Creating more realistic child dolls is an increasingly growing trend among collectors and hobbyists. The challenge involves making the dolls resemble real human children to the greatest degree possible. The term given to this practice is creating reborn dolls. This new market is exciting for long time crafters who have grown tired of the more typical and far less realistic dolls that have been on the market for years and years.

In recent years the reborn dolls market has really taken off because of the expanding use of techniques that make the dolls more life-like. The popularity of the berenguer and preemie dolls that have been around for a long time seems to be driving the reborn doll craze. The berenguer and preemie dolls are very realistic in size and appearance.

Many times, reborn dolls are made using a specific procedure that works to remove the doll of its artificial appearance and trappings to create a more natural looking and feeling model. This procedure most often begins with taking apart the doll and removing the paint that was put on at the production facility. This removing of the paint leaves a plastic shell that you can modify as necessary.

Reborn dolls then have a purple color added to the inside of the plastic parts to add color tones underneath the plastic, which will add to the realistic skin color of the doll. From there, the outside is painted up with different skin toned paints and colors to add a real skin color, and then other tones and techniques are implemented to create skin lines, blemishes, and other skin-topping effects that make the doll look more lifelike.

Using real human hair or soft, humanlike mohawk faux fair, hair and eyelashes are added to the doll, causing the reborn dolls to have human-like characteristics. This process can take dozens of hours, since it is often done by hand and by strand. After application of the hair or hair-like features, the doll is reassembled with a softer filling and underbelly. Other additions may also be added, such as a breathing or heartbeat sound to create a realistic sense of the dolls being alive.

For those who want to make their own without as much work involved, there are reborn doll kits that allow the purchaser to make their own reborn without as much work. Most people who want one, however, shell out the money (often upwards of a few hundred dollars) to purchase one. These dolls have also become popular gifts for newborn mothers, often replicating the condition of their children after birth as a memento.