They arrive in the mail, in good but gently used condition, the Lennon Sisters vintage paper dolls I won on eBay.

“It’s never too late to have a happy childhood,” the saying goes. I had a happy childhood, so why not repeat it in midlife? Well, OK, just the doll part.

Apparently we baby boomers like to hold on to our childhood toys for nostalgia. And if our mothers threw them away, we can buy them back.

My mother kept most of my childhood dolls and toys, but not my old paper dolls. Or maybe I thew them out when I was too old to play with them.

I recall hours sitting on the living room rug playing with those paper dolls in the ’50s. Besides the Lennon Sisters, I think I had Gisele MacKenzie, Marge and Gower Champion and maybe Rock Hudson. Sometimes I’d cut Betsy McCall dolls out of the magazine. We bought some of them at a store, long closed now, in Knightville.

Luckily, my mother saved my dolls. However, she would frequently suggest I give them away to get them out of the attic, for she was worried that they would melt up there. Finally, when I was in my 30s, I took her suggestion and went up into the attic and started cleaning out. Unfortunately, I hadn’t heeded her advice about the heat, and, disastrously, my Peggy and Betsy Wetsy both lost their faces. I didn’t give the rest away but wrapped them better.

About 10 years ago, I decided to go through my dolls and their accessories again. I downsized some and took the best ones to display in my apartment. I consigned and sold the pink Wolverine stove and refrigerator and some dollhouse furniture. My rubber doll Marianne was brown with age, so she didn’t stay.

But what I kept I fondly still display. My mother had made clothes, still in great condition, for all my dolls. But if I find a vintage outfit for one of my Vogue dolls or my Uneeda Bob on eBay or at an antiques mall, I buy it. It’s a great feeling for a sentimental lady.

Last summer at a yard sale I found a Raggedy Ann to replace the one my Auntie Meff had given me. She is snuggled right next to Mary Jane, a cloth doll, my first doll ever.

I’m not the only middle-aged person who is nostalgic about childhood toys. My Rumford cousins, Bobby and Kathy, almost had a custody battle over Zippy the Chimp, a favorite stuffed animal.

A friend who recently lost his mother has been going through her belongings. So far, no parting with his childhood toys, among which are the cowboy rubber squeaky doll, the Tonka trucks, the Gilbert erector sets, the Busy Beaver toolbox. And there’s the Howdy Doody lamp.

As for me, this winter I hope to find some time to cut out some of the outfits for my newly acquired Lennon Sisters paper dolls. I can be a kid all over again.

– Special to the Telegram