My Doll Collection...My Dollection!

Monday, September 25, 2017

Unicorn Hair Custom

Here is a custom I did for myself.  This doll had a bad haircut.  I rerooted her with a variegated yarn from the dollar store. 





I put the head on a MTM body, her other body was very stiff.  I tried to keep the earrings, but they were so gunked with glue on the inside of her head I had to cut them out.  This yarn isn't as soft as some of the other stuff I get from Michael's, but I still like it.

Thanks for looking!

Friday, September 22, 2017

My First (and only so far) Paid Doll Cleaning

I was asked a few weeks ago to clean a few dolls for a lady, who was planning to sell them on eBay.
She had three dolls to clean.  I originally asked for $50 to clean all three of them and fix the hair.  She asked what she could get done for $20.

I caved, and accepted the $20.  I just couldn't leave them all dirty like that.

The befores:
Tressy

Tressy

Live Action Barbie

Live Action Barbie

Ballerina Barbie

Ballerina Barbie


The afters:

Live Action Barbie

Live Action Barbie

Ballerina Barbie

Ballerina Barbie

Tressy

Tressy

Ballerina Barbie could have used some extra TLC on her frizzy hair, but I wasn't prepared to do that for $20.

What do you think?

I think they turned out great.  The seller was pleased as well.  I asked her to leave me feedback on my FB page...she never did.

Thanks for stopping by!

Wednesday, September 20, 2017

A Recent Kijiji Haul

I bought this lot, early this week, off a lady who posted on Kijiji.


I originally was just going to buy the vintage Barbie clothing, for $20 CAD.  She then offered the whole lot of it to me for $40 CAD.  The price sticker on the Kelly play set is $45 alone.  I think I got a good deal.

I wasn't going to keep the City Shine Barbies, but when I saw the one with the Steffi face mold, I fell in love with her, and I'm going to keep her.  The other one I'm going to sell.

I've been struggling lately with clutter, and am really trying to weed out the dolls I don't totally love.
It's definitely a struggle, but I'm slowly establishing a pile of dolls I need to purge.

Would anyone be interested in seeing what I'm going to purge?  I could offer them up here, if so.

Thanks for stopping by!

Getting back into it

I've take some time away from the blog as I was trying out some new things, and life just got in the way.

I've decided I missed it and am going to start posting again.

I've still been thrifting, and found some amazing things!  I've also been dabbling more in to customizing my dollies, rerooting and such.

Now I'm going to catch up on my reading list.

Friday, February 10, 2017

Keypers Makeover

Here are the results of my Keypers makeovers:


I think they came out pretty well!

Thanks for looking!

Wednesday, February 8, 2017

Ponies and Keypers

In the same haul I found the She-ra figures, I also found some G1 MLPs and a couple Keypers. 25 cents each!

They were pretty grimy and needed some hair TLC, and spent the afternoon giving them each a spa day.

Will post updates when the hair dries!

Thanks for stopping by!

Tuesday, February 7, 2017

OMG you Guuuuys!! She-Ra!

I was out thrifting today, and found a little plastic bag with some figures in it, for $1.50 (and was 50% off that!!).  I knew right away what they were and tossed the bag in my basket.

I had She-Ra as a child, also Catra and her horse, and Frosta.  Sadly, all that remains to this day is the horse, Storm.

So I was really excited to find these.  Even if they are missing accessories.  I was about to Google the characters and dolls (since there are two different She-Ras), but then remembered there is a whole section about She-Ra in my Mattel fashion dolls guide!!




First up is She-Ra:


Then Angella:


Then Glimmer:

Her curly hair is in pretty amazing shape

Storm, from my own shelf:

I believe it's actually called "Silver Storm"based on the accessories, missing the bridle piece 
Here are the two She-Ras.  The one on the right has more articulation of the head, and both arms move simultaneously.  I figured out she is "Starburst She-Ra".




The odd duck out was this doll with green hair:


She does not have any markings on her for year or company, or even country.  Her hair is an amazing color of green, the photos do not do it justice.  Sadly, she's had a bad hack job haircut, and one of her eyes is smudged.  Her elastic hips are also very loose.


Anyone recognize her??  Please let me know if you do!!

Here is the reference book I used:


Thanks for stopping by!

Monday, February 6, 2017

Vintage Barbie

A while ago, I thrifted a vintage (70s) Barbie.  She has the lovely Steffie face mold.  I figured right away that the body her head was one, while it's a legit vintage Barbie body, wasn't her original one.  I have acquired a few of these dolls, and the body just didn't seem right.  It was heavier than the other dolls', and the skin tone was off (which could be discoloration from age, but still, it wasn't right).

She also had black stains on her face, on her forhead, nose and chin.  I thought this was the perfect time to try the benzoyl peroxide zit cream (I found some at Dollar Tree) in sunlight method.

Husband:  Why is there a doll head on the window sill?
Me:  I'm trying to get rid of black marks on her face.
H:  How?
M:  With peroxide cream and sunlight.
H:  How does the sunlight help?
M:  I don't know.  That's what the internet told me to do.

*A few hours later*

Husband:  So, as far as the sunlight goes, the UV from the sun doesn't actually help the peroxide to work, it's the heat apparently.  I have a heat lamp you can use, since there's not a lot of heat coming through that window.
Me:  Wow.  You've done a lot more research than I did.

Anyhoo...under the heat lamp she went!  It worked like a charm!

If only zit cream worked this well on humans.

She also didn't have much of her original hair, so next step was the reroot.  I used Golden Sun that I had in my stash from DollyHair.com.  It was during rerooting, I discovered cracks in the vinyl of her face, one at the back of her head, and a few fine ones at the bottom of her chin.  I glued them with plastic adhesive.

When I finished her hair and tried to put her back on the body she came on (the one I suspected to be wrong).  All the splits cracked open again.  I realized why.  The neck post was too large for her tiny neck hole, and the force of trying to get the head on caused the cracks.

Great.  Now she needed a new body.  I scoured through my donor body dolls (Made to Moves, older articulated Fashionistas, and Liv), but couldn't find the right skin tone match.  I finally found a match, but the doll wasn't in my donor pile.  It was a Raquel (I think?) Fashionista, but I wasn't ready to behead her.  She's just too pretty.

I went to Walmart in search of a body.  I finally found a budget Barbie doll (basic articulation) with the right skin tone, for around $10.  Success!

Left to right:  New body, Raquel Fashionista, old body
This doll was such a pleasure to unbox.  There were only about 3 plastic ties to clip, and NONE IN HER HEAD!!!  I hate those stupid plastic ties they put in the head.


Off came her head...NO PRONGS!!  Yay!!!  Just mounds of glue stuck to the post.  Ugh.


The neck post was still a bit wide for the head, so I got out my Dremel tool and ground it down.


I didn't want to re-glue the cracks in her face until I was done fitting her head on the neck, to lessen the chances of them splitting open again.



This crack was the only one I could really capture in a photo, it's also the biggest.


I just love her.  Her face paint doesn't even need to be touched up!

Thanks for stopping by!

Sunday, February 5, 2017

Ever After High turned Shoppie

I had an idea for a repaint the other day, and went ahead with it.  I've not done too many repaints, so it was practice for me, also.

I have an EAH Apple White (I think?) doll, and her hair kind of reminds me of a Shopkins Shoppies doll (like Rainbow Kate meets Popette).

Rainbow Kate, image from Google image search

Poppette, image from Google image search


I started with soft pastels (my first attempt at blushing), and then watercolor pencils to outline where I wanted things.  I used Krylon Matte Spray (I can't get MSC in my area, and I haven't bothered to order any yet, shipping is expensive).


 Then I moved on to acrylic paints.


 The finished product.



I'm not entirely happy, but I sealed it all anyway.  It was good practice.  One of her eyes ended up bigger than the other, and I think I should have started her mouth lower down or maybe wider, to try and hide the factory molding better.  I also think I should have made her eyes more round.

I also don't have an outfit for her.

Thanks for looking.

Saturday, February 4, 2017

Vintage Davtex Reroot/Partial Repaint

A while ago, I bought a bag of what appeared to be vintage Barbies.  As it turned out, they weren't Barbies, but Farbies (aka clones).  I didn't find this one overly attractive (her head was a weird shape, I thought).  I finally got around to do something about it this past couple weeks.

First thing I did was reroot her.  Her original hair had a nasty texture.  I couldn't tell if it had been a bubble cut, or if it had been, just cut.



I decided on an auburn color from my stash of hair from Dollyhair.com.  After I finished, something still didn't look right.  I had forgotten to take a photo of the part before I cut all her hair out, and I couldn't find the part line after I got all the hair in.  Boo.  Then I realized if she HAD originally been a bubble, I have no idea how to style that, nor do I like it.  The I saw the little line on her forehead, as if that's where it would have been rooted if she'd been a swirl ponytail doll...


Ta da!!  Much better!  I realized after I did this part, that it was the super high forehead that wasn't doing her any favors.

I clipped up her hair to see what she would look like with a ponytail!  I thought pretty good!


I also touched up her eye and lip paint, and gave her some clothes.





She is wearing one of the new "one size fits all" Barbie fashions, and dollar store shoes.  She was hard to find shoes that fit half decent!  Her feet are smaller than most of the Barbie shoes I have.

The stand I made out of one of those balloon sticks, a jar lid, some felt, some wire, and some ribbon.

I'm trying to sell her locally, as I don't collect clones, but she's kinda starting to grow on me...maybe I'll call her Audrey for now.

Thanks for looking!!