ORLANDO, Fla. — Winter Haven, Fla., resident Deb Hoffmann received a Winnie the Pooh stuffed animal from her parents when she was 2 years old. It went everywhere with her.

Now, the 56-year-old has the largest collection of Pooh and Friends memorabilia in the world, a Guinness World Record she’s held since 2008. Her more than 20,000 Winnie the Pooh items are divided between her Florida and Waukesha, Wis., residences.

“I think collecting is like in my DNA, so I think I was doomed from the beginning,” said the website designer for TechAnalysts, a company Hoffmann owns with her husband, Gary.

She came across a Winnie the Pooh phone in a store she frequented. An item she passed up on multiple occasions, it sold six months later. Hoffmann was consumed with finding it and placed ads in newspapers across the country.

Someone responded, and Hoffmann got the phone — but it was missing the butterfly. So a new hunt began. As she searched, Hoffmann discovered Hallmark released a set of six Winnie the Pooh ornaments. She acquired all of them. “I kind of like got sucked in, and before I knew it, I’m like, ‘Oh, look at that. There’s a Pooh. I better get it right away!’” she recalled. “I ended up having a bunch of them and more than I even realized.”