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Mrs. Blegen had been teased about her thrifty habit of never throwing anything away, but once more this practice proved helpful, since she found just the right type of wire for shaping the body. She had numerous bits of yarn for the padding of the arms and legs, and material for the shirt and cap. Preparations for supper were forgotten as she twisted the wire and yarn into shape and dressed the doll. By the time her family reached home, Mrs. Blegen had not one but a pair like the Swedish yarn doll, hanging from strings in the kitchen doorway. She wondered if her husband and children would think her quite childish, forgetting to cook while she made a pair of dolls. But to her relief they were delighted with the cunning dolls and spun them around and around as she hurriedly prepared the supper.

A few days later a friend of Mrs. Blegen's had a party. She took the pair of dolls to the hostess as a "little gift. Everyone at the party admired them and demanded a pair. Mrs. Blegen realized she could not afford the yarn and wire for so many dolls and had to charge fifty cents a pair to cover the cost of materials. Even then friends urged her to raise her price, declaring the dolls were worth far more than that. But Mrs. Blegen felt the small dolls were still very crude, although she had made many improvements over her original pair. She knew that some day she would construct an even better doll that would be worth more.

TODAY, MRS. BLEGEN is making a doll that is far more lifelike than those she first made using just yarn and wire. They require a greater amount of time to make, about five hours for each one, and many different types of material are used in their creation. Therefore, she feels justified in charging more for the dolls she is now producing. She charges $2 for each doll or $3.50 a pair. Friends continue to urge her to raise her price. "But I enjoy making my little people, and I like to meet the folks who can pay the price I have set," insists Mrs. Blegen.

In her effort to improve the dolls and make them look more and more like little people, she has found that pipe cleaners shaped into thin arms and legs, a thin body and round head make an ideal skeleton. The legs, arms and body are padded into shape with cotton and wound with thread to keep the padding in place. From this she builds up the hands and feet, made of a mixture of library paste and tissue paper. The mixture is shaped into tiny fingers and dainty feet and is almost as hard as china when it dries. It takes paint nicely. She has a measure she uses for each doll, keeping all the figures about the same size so that she can knit pants or crochet tiny hats at odd moments and know they will fit any figure she has. The small crocheted hats that a great many of her little men wear are saturated with library paste, then shaped and blocked on the round handle of a tool, which she has found is the size of her miniatures' heads. She lacquers the hats after they are dry.

The costumes of the dolls are absolutely authentic. Although Mrs. Blegen, who is Norwegian, dresses the majority of her dolls in Scandinavian clothes, she also styles Dutch couples, Irish couples and Scottish and German couples. Most of the time she makes and sells the dolls in pairs, but she does produce single characters such as her captivating elf, the Scandinavian Tomten, who must have a bowl of hot mush left for him on Christmas eve or he will do all kinds of mischief to the household throughout the coming year. She also makes many scenes, some with as many characters as twelve. Her native wedding scene includes twelve figures, in addition to the sturdy furniture in the background. These scenes sell for $50. Traditions of the different costumes are never violated. She dresses the Norwegian married women in white headdress and the single girls wear only the colored ones. Diagonal striped aprons distinguish the Swedish women from the Norwegian women, who wear only the plain white. The Norwegian bride does not wear a wedding veil, but a heavily jeweled and beaded crown adorns her head.

MRS. BLEGEN has sold her dolls to people all over the United States and some have been sent to Manila, New Guinea, and other countries outside the United States. When she received an order for a pair to be sent to a WAVE stationed in Manila, she had to use nothing but cotton material since a native bug there devours any other materials, such as wool and silk.

Mrs. Blegen finds she is unable to make up the dolls if she isn't "in the mood." The few times she has forced herself to produce a figure, she finds he is stiff and lacking in character. She does not have many tools, but the most necessary ones are a big darning needle, pliers for cutting wire, a tool handle for shaping and blocking hats, and an artist's small palette knife with a limber blade. Most important among her materials are library paste and tissue paper.

A problem that concerned Mrs. Blegen in the early stages of making her tiny manikins was the fact their faces lacked a profile. This was solved when she hit upon the idea of adding a speck of absorbent cotton to form a nose. The heads are made of cotton balls covered with unbleached muslin. Depressions for eyes and mouth are stitched in, the nose stuck on and all is covered with clear airplane dope or preferably a clear utility lacquer. She has found that unraveled silk stockings make the best material for hair. Some of her little people wear miniature spectacles made of wire. To make them look even more realistic, Mrs. Blegen found she could make the lens by spreading a thin coat of airplane dope over the frames.

One of the outstanding qualities of Mrs. Blegen's scenes, or even her individual dolls, is the detail. In her Thanksgiving scene she has one of her characters holding a miniature pumpkin and several ears of corn, while a man is holding a turkey which has just been killed, all reproduced by Mrs. Blegen.

IN ADDITION to the wedding scene and those illustrating holidays such as Christmas, Mrs. Blegen has dramatized Scandinavian jingles and songs with her little people. One favorite tells of a man and woman meeting and of the proposal of marriage by the gentleman. He asks, "Sigrid, do you want to get married? I'll be the husband if you'll be the wife, and I'll carry the water if you'll make the coffee." Mrs. Blegen's interpretation shows the man wearing a yoke and carrying two pails of water, while Sigrid holds a small coffeepot and coffee mill. Another popular scene includes three little people, Annie Knut, her old mother and her lazy brother, Thruls, who is resting against a wheelbarrow.

Mrs. Blegen usually has a backlog of seventy-five or more orders. She finds they come from people who have received a doll as a gift or from those who have seen the dolls in friends' homes. She has begun to sew a small name tape on the petticoat or jacket of the dolls when possible, since many believe the little figures are becoming collector's items. This also brings more orders.

One of Mrs. Blegen's most interesting customers is a woman in Los Angeles, who has furnished her house with Norwegian furniture and trinkets which she has brought back with her from her numerous trips abroad. The results are not only authentic but so attractive that the studio that filmed the movie, "I Remember Mama," made arrangements to use the house for the picture. Consequently, two scenes show a pair of Mrs. Blegen's dancing dolls. Those of you who have seen the picture will recall perhaps the scene where Dagny swings the dolls around as she talks to her father, and in another scene, where Katrine is planning to burn her manuscripts, there is a pair of the dolls swinging beside her desk.

The dancing dolls seem to be the most popular in demand. Mrs. Blegen has thin string tied to them, and when they hang down they can be spun around in such a way that in passing each other, they will lock arms and turn as though dancing.

THESE LITTLE people not only provide many hours of enjoyment and company for Mrs. Blegen since her husband has died and her ten children have all married and moved away from home, but they have given her independence and financial security. She prefers to live alone in her small three-room cottage with just her little people, although she would be welcome in any one of her children's homes.

Mrs. Blegen asserts that her dolls did their part during the war, since she used the money she received for them to buy war bonds.