Worried? Tell It to the Doll

When we visited Guatemala during our recent cruise through the Panama Canal, we saw spectacular volcanoes, historic churches and tiny dolls that can take your worries away.

Called muñequitas quitapenas -- worry dolls -- these colorful, handmade dolls originated in Guatemala, and legend has it if you have a problem, you tell it to the doll, place it under your pillow and in the morning, a solution will present itself.

The belief stems from a Mayan princess named Ixmucane, who received "a special gift from the sun god that allowed her to solve any problem a human could worry about."

While we haven't put our dolls to the test yet, we do keep them on our bedside at the ready. Those Mayans were pretty smart cookies.