Mother: Claudia (64)

Daughter: Vicky (27)

Chicago, IL

“Valley Of The Dolls”

NOTE: Vicky is pregnant and is due within the next two weeks.

Claudia calls Vicky her “miracle baby.” After several miscarriages, she welcomed her first and only daughter, Vicky, into the world. Since then, they have been attached at the hip. Claudia and Vicky live together in a beautiful home in the suburbs of Chicago. Every morning, Claudia makes Vicky coffee and then sees her off to work. They talk at least five times a day and keep tabs on each other’s whereabouts using the Find My Friends app. Claudia is a “hoot and a half,” walking around in a moo moo and drinking boxed wine. Vicky’s personality is just as colorful.

They share everything – clothes, makeup, shoes, razors, a bed and even DOLLS! Claudia and Vicky have over 1,000 dolls. They play with them, bathe them, sleep with them, and even make new clothes for them. They have taken over almost every room of the house. Claudia says she can identify which dolls are hers based on their scent alone!

Claudia and Vicky seem to have an unbreakable bond, but their lives are about to change in a big way. One of her favorite things to do is cuddle with Vicky and watch re-runs of Murder She Wrote. She’s not looking forward to sharing Vicky with her soon-to-be husband, Jerry.

Vicky and Jerry have a very unusual relationship. Jerry is a divorced 57-year-old father of two. Vicky is a 27-year-old who was a virgin until she met Jerry. She hasn’t been away from her mom for more than two weeks. They are 31 years apart, making Jerry old enough to be Vicky’s dad (who also happens to be named Jerry). Vicky met Jerry when she was 19 and they quickly developed feelings for each other. Because of their significant age gap, they kept their relationship a secret from their friends and family for two years. When they finally came clean, Claudia told Vicky that she was not fond of her dating Jerry. She was concerned - and still is - about the age difference between them. Vicky and Jerry have been together for seven years. So, Claudia has come to accept their relationship and wishes her daughter nothing but the best.

Claudia and Vicky celebrated the “wedding of the century!” on October 26th 2019. The couple tied the know at the infamous Drake Hotel in Chicago. The wedding had 250 people and the family spent upwards of $250,000. They had a 12-piece band, ice sculptures, and a vintage Rolls Royce! Vicky’s father was very sick at the time and they family thought that they were going to lose Jerry Sr. It was an incredibly stressful and emotional time. However, the wedding was a fairytale and everyone is pleased to report that Jerry Sr. is happy and healthy at home with his wife Claudia.

Most people look forward to the honeymoon stage after the stress of planning a dream wedding. And while that was the original plan for Vicky and her husband, Jerry, they were shocked to find out, three months after tying the knot, that Vicky was pregnant. They had just started to relax after the chaotic year and life was finally getting back to normal. The wedding was over, and Vicky and her Mom had helped guide the family patriarch, Claudia’s Jerry, back to health. After 20 “pee sticks,” (Vicky saved some of the used ones), the family stress is back, but is now centered on the bun in Vicky’s oven. At first, Claudia was nervous about the baby coming so quickly after the wedding. However, she came around and this mother-daughter duo is just trying to have fun together before they become a party of 3. With all the new uncertainty, one thing is very clear: the title of Grandma isn’t very fitting – Claudia is way too feisty for that.

But even though a big change is on the horizon, some things are exactly the same. Vicky and Claudia live in separates houses, but not really. Vicky lives in one house with her husband Jerry and Claudia lives in the other house with her husband Jerry. The homes are 10 feet away from one another and Vicky still has her bedroom at her parents’ house, which contains their doll collection. Claudia thought maybe she could change the room into something more practical. She is ready to convert her daughter’s bedroom into something more useful! Truthfully, Vicky wants her childhood bedroom just in case she needs a break from her husband. She doesn’t want anything changed! Plus, Jerry won’t let Vicky sleep with more than 5 “dollies” in the bed, so she has to keep the rest at her mom’s house. Claudia’s Jerry on the other hand, lets her sleep with 20 in the bed. Recently, there was a casualty with Claudia’s prized doll, Peaches. One of her husband’s caretakers accidentally put Peaches into the wash and the doll “passed away.” Claudia is still completely heartbroken, but she managed to pick Peaches’ stuffing out of the dryer. She needed to hang on to the memories and the love. Vicky tried to replace her Mom’s favorite doll, but Peaches can’t be replaced.

Vicky’s other neighbor is her best friend of 10 years, Chessa. Chessa, 31, lives three doors down and is Vicky and Claudia’s hairstylist. She says they either come together to appointments, or schedule them so that one goes right after the other. They gossip about each other to Chessa, but she knows better than to take sides. Chessa thinks Vicky and Claudia’s relationship is “crazy and kooky,” but she adores them. Like Claudia, she is wary of Vicky’s relationship with Jerry. She jokes with Vicky that she’s going to have to “change Jerry’s diapers someday.”

Vicky can go into labor at any moment so the family is on pins and needles anticipating the birth of “Frannie,” who will be named after Claudia’s Mother. It took a minute to come up with a name. Vicky was set on Winifred after her favorite movie, Hocus Pocus, but Jerry put the kibosh on that. And they couldn’t use the names Holly, Muffin or Pinky because those belong to the dolls Vicky is closest with. Despite the stress, Vicky is excited for the next chapter and to add the 3rd member to their dolly duo. Someone who can join Vicky and Claudia at their tea parties and adventures. But, really, the big goal is to have someone to pass down their dolls to. They must keep the lineage alive. Being the worrier that she is, Vicky does fear that she won’t be as good of a mother as Claudia was to her. Claudia, on the other hand, is worried that this baby will make things tough for Vicky and, in turn, pull them further apart than they’ve ever been. But at the same time, she is also excited to teach her daughter the motherhood tricks she learned when Vicky was a colicky baby.