"I've had a maternal instinct from a very young age and I really wanted to replace some childhood dolls that I had lost over the years. I went online and started searching for baby dolls and came across these reborn dolls that looked real.
Although
she said it was a "surreal experience" unpacking a box with a
realistic looking baby inside, she was instantly hooked.
Two months later, she bought another doll, she now has five, who she has
named Scarlette Winter, Emberleigh Elise, Harlow Annalise, Linleigh
Michelle and Ava.
The dolls come as plain body parts and Leah paints their faces. She said:
"I get to use the girls' names I would have had for my own daughters, and buy all the sweet clothes and bows for their hair. They fill in that missing part in my heart. I would love to have daughters, but I didn't - so now I have reborns.
"It's a very fulfilling thing because I can dress them in the way that I want. They are the daughters I never had."
Leah
buys her doll daughters adorable tutus and dresses and also gathers
hand-me-down garments from other reborn mums, who she meets on
Instagram. She now paints dolls to sell to other women for £556 ($800).
She spends up to two-and-a-half weeks painting the skin and threading
each individual mohair hair onto the babies' small heads.
"I really enjoy being able to give somebody else that joy of opening up that box with a baby inside," she said.
"It has a lot of meaning for them for whatever reason. They find it very comforting to have that outlet. I don't find my babies comforting, but I do think they are fun.
"I just made a baby with Down's Syndrome, which I thought was adorable. The woman who ordered the doll said she had a miscarriage where she believed the baby had the conditionHowever, though the reborn community is a tight-knit one, not everyone is a fan of Leah's hobby - and even her family are divided. While two of her boys adore the dolls and even take part in dressing them and holding them, her other two find them unnerving.
She said:
"My husband thinks they're a great hobby for me because he knows I love painting them and creating them for customers, and he knows it's a bit of me time. But he won't pick them up – he associates dolls with girls and he's a bit of a guy’s guy. I do get a lot of people who tell me that I'm crazy and that they're not real children. They don't understand that it's just role-play.
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