Attention grannies, moms, aunts and fairy godmothers. If there is an American Girls fan in your family, this is an experience you don’t want to miss!
The New York City American Girls Place – which offers Broadway-style shows, gourmet dining, and even a hair salon for dolls – is located at 609 Fifth Avenue (at 49th Street) in Manhattan.
This is a day trip you have to plan way in advance.
There is a two-month wait, at least, for café reservations -- call toll-free 1-877-247-5223. Online reservations are not accepted, but you should check out their website anyway.
For the uninitiated, The American Girls Collection is a brand of dolls where each character represents a particular period and region of U.S. history. They come with period costumes and a variety of interesting accessories. You can even buy matching outfits for doll and child.
The best part is the books. Each doll in the set has her story told through several volumes of fiction, with craft books, cookbooks and all sorts of companion volumes, that enable your girl to totally lose herself in another time and place.
Written for seven-to-twelve-year-olds, the books cover topics such as child labor, child abuse, poverty, racism, slavery, animal abuse, and war, among other topics, with a gentle, yet enlightening, tone.
I know I am getting old because the latest “historic” doll, Julie, is from the 1970s. That must seem as long ago to today’s girls as the Civil War did to me!