Thursday, June 15, 2017
Sunday, January 29, 2017
Just In Time For African American History Month
Two days away from February, and I have already started celebrating Black History Month!
Black History Month, also known as African-American History Month in America, is an annual observance in the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom for remembrance of important people and events in the history of the African diaspora. It is celebrated in the United States and Canada in February, and the United Kingdom in October. (Wikipedia)
Today, I went to the thrift store and to Walmart, and I had several lucky finds. Incidentally, the Barbie dolls I found at both stores were African American. At Walmart, I found two of the newer/newish Fashionista dolls on clearance for 2 dollars each, as well as the Nikki Light-Up Heart Hands for 4 dollars. I was super excited at the price, because I have never found Barbie on clearance for that price. I often see others find great clearance prices on dolls and doll accessories, and it kind of bummed me out because I never find them myself. Well, I can't say that anymore :) Anyway, here are the Walmart finds:
Here are the stock photos for them: (Sorry for the poor quality of my photos, I was rushing this time!) The first one is not exactly what I have. Mine has all black hair (or possibly very dark brown) where the stock photo has lighter hair.
The Fashionista girls I got are darker in person than in the stock photos, which I really like, because I really like the darker skinned African American dolls.
The thrift store find was a newish Fashionista also, with the flat feet. I LOVE the shoes, you can't see in the photo, but they're made of this lovely opalescent/iridescent plastic. I must apologize to her for not brushing her hair for the photo.
She didn't have her necklace or purse, but that is fine. I already had the necklace she came with, and I have tons of purses. The doll's skin color in the stock photo is lighter than mine, as well as the shirt being pink where mine is blue.
She has the Goddess face mold. All of these new girls will look great on new articulated bodies when I find some.
Also at Walmart, I found an Ever After High Apple White for 2 dollars. She is the new kind that has a molded on shirt instead of fabric, and doesn't have poseable arms, but she has accessories (shoes, tiara, skirt, and necklace) that I can take off and use for my other EAH/MH dolls. Mine is in the group photo above, but here's the stock photo. The stock photo has a lighter top color, mine is really gold, as well as tan shoes where mine are red. I don't know that she came with a stand, I don't think so because this is from the new, cheaper line.
I have recently bought a couple of the curvy AA Fashionista girls, and I especially LOVE the one with blonde highlights (again, the photos show lighter skin where in person it is darker). First the stock photo, then mine:
I put a clear rubber band in her hair to help keep it in place. She has cornrows on the other side of her head. I absolutely love this girl!
I bought the other curvy AA/mixed race one for her outfit, and originally planned to donate her to the thrift store, but she grew on me so I kept her as well. In these photos of her, she is wearing a purple normal-sized Barbie dress that I thought might fit due to the cut of the dress. It did fit reasonably well. In the other photos, she is wearing part of the outfit from the Raven Symone doll from The Cheetah Girls dolls. I hoped it would fit, but the Cheetah Girls doll had a slightly smaller body, so it is very tight. I could separate the top though, as that would fit (AND look cute). I have the second outfit, but I don't have it handy to try on her. I tried it on my Rosie O'Donnell doll, and it was a tight fit, so it probably will be also on the curvy Fashionistas. Tight but workable.
Thanks to Atamaii.tv for their photo of the Cheetah Girls doll and outfits!
My last quick mentions are 2 sets of shoes; one from Walmart, which has sandals and white tennis shoe platforms for the flat footed ones, and the other from the thrift store, a set of boots from 2002.
You can find a better photo of the new shoe pack here, it is the second photo. This listing is from the wonderful Royalty Girl blog, which has tons of great photos and doll things.
That's all for now, I hope you enjoyed this! Have a great day and a great February!
Black History Month, also known as African-American History Month in America, is an annual observance in the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom for remembrance of important people and events in the history of the African diaspora. It is celebrated in the United States and Canada in February, and the United Kingdom in October. (Wikipedia)
Today, I went to the thrift store and to Walmart, and I had several lucky finds. Incidentally, the Barbie dolls I found at both stores were African American. At Walmart, I found two of the newer/newish Fashionista dolls on clearance for 2 dollars each, as well as the Nikki Light-Up Heart Hands for 4 dollars. I was super excited at the price, because I have never found Barbie on clearance for that price. I often see others find great clearance prices on dolls and doll accessories, and it kind of bummed me out because I never find them myself. Well, I can't say that anymore :) Anyway, here are the Walmart finds:
Here are the stock photos for them: (Sorry for the poor quality of my photos, I was rushing this time!) The first one is not exactly what I have. Mine has all black hair (or possibly very dark brown) where the stock photo has lighter hair.
The Fashionista girls I got are darker in person than in the stock photos, which I really like, because I really like the darker skinned African American dolls.
The thrift store find was a newish Fashionista also, with the flat feet. I LOVE the shoes, you can't see in the photo, but they're made of this lovely opalescent/iridescent plastic. I must apologize to her for not brushing her hair for the photo.
She didn't have her necklace or purse, but that is fine. I already had the necklace she came with, and I have tons of purses. The doll's skin color in the stock photo is lighter than mine, as well as the shirt being pink where mine is blue.
She has the Goddess face mold. All of these new girls will look great on new articulated bodies when I find some.
Also at Walmart, I found an Ever After High Apple White for 2 dollars. She is the new kind that has a molded on shirt instead of fabric, and doesn't have poseable arms, but she has accessories (shoes, tiara, skirt, and necklace) that I can take off and use for my other EAH/MH dolls. Mine is in the group photo above, but here's the stock photo. The stock photo has a lighter top color, mine is really gold, as well as tan shoes where mine are red. I don't know that she came with a stand, I don't think so because this is from the new, cheaper line.
I have recently bought a couple of the curvy AA Fashionista girls, and I especially LOVE the one with blonde highlights (again, the photos show lighter skin where in person it is darker). First the stock photo, then mine:
I put a clear rubber band in her hair to help keep it in place. She has cornrows on the other side of her head. I absolutely love this girl!
I bought the other curvy AA/mixed race one for her outfit, and originally planned to donate her to the thrift store, but she grew on me so I kept her as well. In these photos of her, she is wearing a purple normal-sized Barbie dress that I thought might fit due to the cut of the dress. It did fit reasonably well. In the other photos, she is wearing part of the outfit from the Raven Symone doll from The Cheetah Girls dolls. I hoped it would fit, but the Cheetah Girls doll had a slightly smaller body, so it is very tight. I could separate the top though, as that would fit (AND look cute). I have the second outfit, but I don't have it handy to try on her. I tried it on my Rosie O'Donnell doll, and it was a tight fit, so it probably will be also on the curvy Fashionistas. Tight but workable.
Thanks to Atamaii.tv for their photo of the Cheetah Girls doll and outfits!
My last quick mentions are 2 sets of shoes; one from Walmart, which has sandals and white tennis shoe platforms for the flat footed ones, and the other from the thrift store, a set of boots from 2002.
You can find a better photo of the new shoe pack here, it is the second photo. This listing is from the wonderful Royalty Girl blog, which has tons of great photos and doll things.
That's all for now, I hope you enjoyed this! Have a great day and a great February!
Saturday, March 19, 2016
The Barbie Look® Barbie® Doll – Sweet Tea (Part Two)
My Sweet Tea review, part two.
Sweet Tea arrived well-packed and wrapped in tissue, which is always a nice touch.
But when I opened it up, I found that my Sweet Tea had a wonky right eye, set in too far. It doesn't come out as badly in the photos, but her left eye looks straight ahead while her right eye looks to the left.
This, in conjunction with what looks to me like a warped head, looks terrible to me. Sweet Tea is my first doll with the Karl facemold, so I am not sure if the face structure is supposed to be the way it is, but it looks funny. The face/eye problem doesn't come off as badly in the photos as it does in person, and even to me it sounds like I am finding fault where there is none, but in person she doesn't look good. I did show her to a friend before deciding to post about this, and my friend saw it as well.
I was glad to find that she didn't have glue in her head, which is a big Barbie pet peeve of mine. However, I did continue to be disappointed with her. The eye decal was misplaced, as noted above, as well as several fingernails, and the right hand (perhaps the left, I did not check) had some flashing (excess plastic from the molding process).
Now, I'm really not one to be picky, and I really wouldn't have cared about the hand problems, because I don't mind a bit of fine-tuning - flashing can be sanded off, and nails can be repainted. But in this case, it was just one of several problems, the next on my list being the shoes.
I really liked the style, and liked that one end of the ankle strap was not connected to the shoe, so you didn't have to worry about it breaking when you take it off and put it on, which has happened with most of my Barbie shoes with ankle straps. However, these shoes are made of a very soft plastic, so the straps don't stay. The strap on the left shoe of this one was placed incorrectly during packaging, and remains as it is in the picture, up and away from the ankle.
The exceedingly soft material of the shoe make them extremely difficult to stay on. They slide off easier than butter on a hot knife. This style of shoe has been used before without a strap, and they stayed on well enough for me with the previous harder material. Being the ModelMuse foot with left and right molding, the shoes stuck on well, and are perhaps my favorite style for use on Barbie. So it was disappointing when I discovered the shoes just flew off.
My other complaint is the body. I am a huge fan of the articulated bodies, both MM and Fashionista, and buy them up whenever I can to rebody dolls that are not on articulated bodies. My Tarina Tarantino Barbie is now on an articulated MM body (donated by the Elvis Barbie) and I love it. However, Sweet Tea's body is not the same. It doesn't have the chest pivot, and it feels incredibly cheap. It is terribly light, all parts are hollow, and just doesn't look as good in person as previous articulated MM bodies. I don't mind the hollow leg feature, because it does use less plastic, which is good, and you can't tell by looking. But this body just felt very light and just... cheap.
The same goes for the fabric used. The fabric is the same quality that is used on playline, which isn't in itself a bad thing, but it feels quite cheap. The skirt is lined with a mesh inside, which is a nice touch. There isn't velcro on the shirt or the skirt, but buttons, which is another great thing - I returned a second-wave Look Barbie for having velcro (I'm more than happy to pay the extra dollar for buttons, Mattel). The purse was sewn to the skirt in a way that you would have to cut the string if you both don't want it to put a run in the skirt or have the purse separate. It would be very easy to mistake this and ruin the skirt while unpackaging the doll, which luckily I didn't end up doing. This isn't the same kind of sewing as some previous securings, where it is sewn but not tied off and you can just pull the string out, you actually have to cut the string, which endangers the skirt being cut as well as getting the run that I mentioned by pulling the purse away from the skirt to get to the string in between.
I don't think I've ever published a post that has been so critical, and I tend to forgive where others condemn, but I was just very disappointed with Sweet Tea. I returned her for an exchange, and I hope I don't receive another one that I am not happy with.
Here are the other photos I took of her. Everything else seems in order. I like the accessories and will look for an additional set on ebay so that I can have two matching cups and plates. The scone on the plate is attached, not separate, so perhaps with some DIYing you can remove it from the plate, unless it is hollow and there is no bottom to the plate. I do not know because I didn't get that far in deboxing before deciding to return her. The menu is like other paper with print in the other Look releases, with nonsensical words of random letters instead of actual words. I don't care about it not having actual words.
I dislike having to post a critical review, instead I would have not mentioned her. However I've posted the Part One entry already, so I had to follow up with it. My bottom line is that this doll was not worth the 30 dollars they are asking, considering past quality and the problems highlighted here (I'm sure I'm forgetting something else). So if you're a stickler for quality or perfection, this is likely not your best pick. But if you're a stickler for quality and perfection, you probably know not to look to Barbie much anymore, since they continue to produce lower quality dolls.
Sweet Tea arrived well-packed and wrapped in tissue, which is always a nice touch.
But when I opened it up, I found that my Sweet Tea had a wonky right eye, set in too far. It doesn't come out as badly in the photos, but her left eye looks straight ahead while her right eye looks to the left.
This, in conjunction with what looks to me like a warped head, looks terrible to me. Sweet Tea is my first doll with the Karl facemold, so I am not sure if the face structure is supposed to be the way it is, but it looks funny. The face/eye problem doesn't come off as badly in the photos as it does in person, and even to me it sounds like I am finding fault where there is none, but in person she doesn't look good. I did show her to a friend before deciding to post about this, and my friend saw it as well.
I was glad to find that she didn't have glue in her head, which is a big Barbie pet peeve of mine. However, I did continue to be disappointed with her. The eye decal was misplaced, as noted above, as well as several fingernails, and the right hand (perhaps the left, I did not check) had some flashing (excess plastic from the molding process).
Now, I'm really not one to be picky, and I really wouldn't have cared about the hand problems, because I don't mind a bit of fine-tuning - flashing can be sanded off, and nails can be repainted. But in this case, it was just one of several problems, the next on my list being the shoes.
I really liked the style, and liked that one end of the ankle strap was not connected to the shoe, so you didn't have to worry about it breaking when you take it off and put it on, which has happened with most of my Barbie shoes with ankle straps. However, these shoes are made of a very soft plastic, so the straps don't stay. The strap on the left shoe of this one was placed incorrectly during packaging, and remains as it is in the picture, up and away from the ankle.
The exceedingly soft material of the shoe make them extremely difficult to stay on. They slide off easier than butter on a hot knife. This style of shoe has been used before without a strap, and they stayed on well enough for me with the previous harder material. Being the ModelMuse foot with left and right molding, the shoes stuck on well, and are perhaps my favorite style for use on Barbie. So it was disappointing when I discovered the shoes just flew off.
My other complaint is the body. I am a huge fan of the articulated bodies, both MM and Fashionista, and buy them up whenever I can to rebody dolls that are not on articulated bodies. My Tarina Tarantino Barbie is now on an articulated MM body (donated by the Elvis Barbie) and I love it. However, Sweet Tea's body is not the same. It doesn't have the chest pivot, and it feels incredibly cheap. It is terribly light, all parts are hollow, and just doesn't look as good in person as previous articulated MM bodies. I don't mind the hollow leg feature, because it does use less plastic, which is good, and you can't tell by looking. But this body just felt very light and just... cheap.
The same goes for the fabric used. The fabric is the same quality that is used on playline, which isn't in itself a bad thing, but it feels quite cheap. The skirt is lined with a mesh inside, which is a nice touch. There isn't velcro on the shirt or the skirt, but buttons, which is another great thing - I returned a second-wave Look Barbie for having velcro (I'm more than happy to pay the extra dollar for buttons, Mattel). The purse was sewn to the skirt in a way that you would have to cut the string if you both don't want it to put a run in the skirt or have the purse separate. It would be very easy to mistake this and ruin the skirt while unpackaging the doll, which luckily I didn't end up doing. This isn't the same kind of sewing as some previous securings, where it is sewn but not tied off and you can just pull the string out, you actually have to cut the string, which endangers the skirt being cut as well as getting the run that I mentioned by pulling the purse away from the skirt to get to the string in between.
I don't think I've ever published a post that has been so critical, and I tend to forgive where others condemn, but I was just very disappointed with Sweet Tea. I returned her for an exchange, and I hope I don't receive another one that I am not happy with.
Here are the other photos I took of her. Everything else seems in order. I like the accessories and will look for an additional set on ebay so that I can have two matching cups and plates. The scone on the plate is attached, not separate, so perhaps with some DIYing you can remove it from the plate, unless it is hollow and there is no bottom to the plate. I do not know because I didn't get that far in deboxing before deciding to return her. The menu is like other paper with print in the other Look releases, with nonsensical words of random letters instead of actual words. I don't care about it not having actual words.
I dislike having to post a critical review, instead I would have not mentioned her. However I've posted the Part One entry already, so I had to follow up with it. My bottom line is that this doll was not worth the 30 dollars they are asking, considering past quality and the problems highlighted here (I'm sure I'm forgetting something else). So if you're a stickler for quality or perfection, this is likely not your best pick. But if you're a stickler for quality and perfection, you probably know not to look to Barbie much anymore, since they continue to produce lower quality dolls.
Thursday, March 10, 2016
The Barbie Look® Barbie® Doll – Sweet Tea (Part One)
Last night, I caught up on my Barbie-ing and renewed my Barbie Fan Club membership. My first year of Barbie Fan Club membership was last year, and I decided to go ahead and renew for 2016. BFC is open to renew in January of each year, but I put it off until now because I haven't been in a Barbie-ordering mood, though I have continued on with my thrift store Barbie searches :)
Yesterday was Barbie's birthday, and to celebrate, the Barbie Collector website had a 20% off promotion. Immediately after my purchase of this year's fan club membership, my $20 first quarterly credit was available, and I decided to use it in conjunction with the birthday discount. With the discount and the quarterly credit, I paid $9.91, including shipping. The total for Sweet Tea herself was $3.96 (originally $29.99), so it really does pay to get the membership.
I chose the Sweet Tea Barbie Look doll with the intention of using her articulated ModelMuse body with another head I've wanted to rebody. The body color of the doll's head I have is quite light, and not typically released as playline, with the lightest color being that which is used with the Raquelle doll. Articulated bodies (which I prefer) with the matching skin tone are harder to find outside of modelmuse bodies, and Sweet Tea comes with the articulated ModelMuse body in the color I am looking for, I THINK. This entry has been split into two parts because I haven't received the doll yet, and the second part will be posted after she arrives.
While I originally purchased Sweet Tea with the intention to just use her body, her face is quite sweet (aptly named) and I may have trouble not leaving her as is. Of course, if she is not the exact color I am hoping she is, I won't have to use her for the other doll head and will be able to leave her as is. And, of course, I can always get a second one!
Here is Sweet Tea -
With the first release of The Barbie Look line, Mattel created the Tea Party outfit, and I think that the Tea Party outfit is perfect for Sweet Tea as a secondary look. It has the same color scheme and will look great on Sweet Tea.
I was able to buy 2 sets of the Tea Party outfit because I found them at a great price. The accessories for Tea Party and Sweet Tea look like they will work well together.
Yesterday was Barbie's birthday, and to celebrate, the Barbie Collector website had a 20% off promotion. Immediately after my purchase of this year's fan club membership, my $20 first quarterly credit was available, and I decided to use it in conjunction with the birthday discount. With the discount and the quarterly credit, I paid $9.91, including shipping. The total for Sweet Tea herself was $3.96 (originally $29.99), so it really does pay to get the membership.
I chose the Sweet Tea Barbie Look doll with the intention of using her articulated ModelMuse body with another head I've wanted to rebody. The body color of the doll's head I have is quite light, and not typically released as playline, with the lightest color being that which is used with the Raquelle doll. Articulated bodies (which I prefer) with the matching skin tone are harder to find outside of modelmuse bodies, and Sweet Tea comes with the articulated ModelMuse body in the color I am looking for, I THINK. This entry has been split into two parts because I haven't received the doll yet, and the second part will be posted after she arrives.
While I originally purchased Sweet Tea with the intention to just use her body, her face is quite sweet (aptly named) and I may have trouble not leaving her as is. Of course, if she is not the exact color I am hoping she is, I won't have to use her for the other doll head and will be able to leave her as is. And, of course, I can always get a second one!
Here is Sweet Tea -
With the first release of The Barbie Look line, Mattel created the Tea Party outfit, and I think that the Tea Party outfit is perfect for Sweet Tea as a secondary look. It has the same color scheme and will look great on Sweet Tea.
I was able to buy 2 sets of the Tea Party outfit because I found them at a great price. The accessories for Tea Party and Sweet Tea look like they will work well together.
Friday, June 26, 2015
Allan 2.0
I saw just now that my vintage Allan matches Basics Ken skintone, and came up with Allan 2.0, or 'Allan all growed up' lol (Hey, Ken got to!). I am thinking about actually doing this, since Allan's body has broken feet. Hmmm...
(His head's a bit too big because I was holding it over Ken's head, so it was closer to the camera and is not quite in ratio.)
(His head's a bit too big because I was holding it over Ken's head, so it was closer to the camera and is not quite in ratio.)
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