A Mom Unboxed All of Her Collector Barbie Dolls With Her Daughter
Dolls are meant for play!
Barbie-mania is in full swing, and I am totally here for it. The new Barbie movie is absolutely crushing it at the box office as this summer’s biggest hit (Sorry, Oppenheimer!), and every single person who loved, cherished, and played with their Barbie dolls as a young kid is feeling wistful and nostalgic for those simpler times.
My daughter turns four tomorrow (Prime Barbie playing age!), and thankfully, my mom kept every single Barbie doll that I had growing up, including their clothes, accessories, and cars. Now, I watch my daughter play in her bedroom with my old Barbie dolls, making up news worlds and friendships and stories in her own way. Needless to say, I’m emotional.
As a kid, my mom wasn’t strict when it came to how I played with my dolls. I could take them out of the box, no worries about them depreciating in value or anything, and just play. However, there are several stories from older moms who remember being told that they could never take their collector Barbie dolls out of their box. They were to be looked at (carefully) and never, ever touched.
One mom is going viral on TikTok for breaking one of those old generational curses and allowing her daughter free-range of her Barbie collection. Yes, even the fancy collector ones.
In this heartwarming video, @brittanygrabel, a mom and Barbie collector, shares all her collectible dolls with her daughter.
“My daughter and I opened all my ‘collector’ Barbies. I won’t raise her to miss out on living today,” she wrote in text overlay on the now-viral video that has almost 1 million views on TikTok.
In the video, Brittany and her daughter sit on the floor of what appears to be a playroom, tearing into box after box of collector Barbie dolls. Brittany explained that, as a little girl, she always wanted to play with them but refrained, hoping to keep the dolls in perfect condition and one day strike it rich.
“I remember wanting to play with these as they say on a shelf collecting dust in hopes I could sell them and become a millionaire,” she wrote. “I loved Barbies when I was her age and had quite a set up. I still have most of them and all her furniture.”
“I have been blessed to be able to pass them all down to her.”
Thousands of TikTok users commented on the video, applauding Brittany for letting her daughter play with the dolls in the way they were meant to be played with.
One person wrote, “But what if this moment was what they were worth saving for? 🥺”
Brittany replied, “In this moment I became that millionaire! 🥰”
And now we’re all sobbing!
Another user wrote, “This has me crying. Getting to exist in the moment with this joy instead of putting it off”
“Exactly! Life is too short,” the OP replied.
Even the official Barbie TikTok account got in on the viral moment and commented, “Love this Barbie bond 🥰”
As the caption on the viral clip reads, "The real world isn't what I thought it was," a nod to the film. It’s seems clear that at one point in Brittany’s life, she thought having perfect collectible dolls in mint condition was going to be her ticket to happiness, but in reality, sharing them with her daughter turned out to be the prize.
Some TikTok users commented on the video, noting that Brittany had essentially flushed all that money down the toilet. She had a perfect clap back for those kinds of comments in a follow-up video.
In reply to one comment that said Brittany had just thrown away her kid’s “entire college education,” she posted screenshots of what the collector Barbie dolls — that she had been keeping in their boxes for literally decades — actually were selling for now.
There was not one Barbie selling for over $200.
“Wouldn’t even cover the cost of books… ,” she wrote in the caption.
All the more reason to let the kids play!
