Not Fashion Doll Related...

Look what I made :)

I bought the wicker basket for $6 (I had a similar one as a child, that my grandma had done for me), and spruced it up with some decorations and made some bedding for it!  Now I'm trying to sell it.

I added lace, rosettes, and ribbon to the outside.

I didn't make the teddy, included to show the size of doll the bed can accomodate.

I've never made a mattress before, let alone with tufting.

The little pillow and pillowcase!

Thanks for looking!

Doll Storage

I watched a My Froggy Stuff video on YouTube the other day about doll storage, and she had recommended using magazine files to store dolls upright (I don't have very many stands, and most of my dolls were in drawers).

Mine aren't as pretty as hers...because, well, I'm a bit cheap these days!  Here's the start of it:

Here's the link to her video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RzIS9rOnx8k

How do you store your dolls?

Thanks for looking!

Crocheted dress

Yay! A pattern that worked for me! It's basically just a crocheted tube so the mid section is a bit baggy...she could use a belt! Overall I'm happy with it!

Thanks for looking!

This. Doll's. Hair. Ugh.

Here is lovely Princess Tori from Barbie Princess and the Popstar.  She was in desperate need of hair doing.  I'm not sure what fibres her pink hair is made of, but as soon as brushed it the curl totally brushed out!  I've never had that happen before with brushing.  I washed her hair as I normally do my dolls, but the curl never really came back  >:(  The blond side still held the curl.

I tried to just twist the curl back in while the hair was wet, as per the photo below, but I still wasn't satisfied.

The top of her head turns, so she can either be a blond princess, or a pink haired popstar.  Hairs get caught under the part that turns, however, and little pieces of hair break off :(

I didn't want to try a boil perm, since I've never done it before, and it's not my doll.  So I wet her hair some more and wrapped it in sections around pipe cleaner.

Here she is with some friends (I also fixed their hair, for a friend's daughter); waiting for the curls to dry.  On a side note; the AA doll had a hair plug coming out of her ear!

I mixed up some sugar water hairspray (1 cup of water to 4 tsps sugar) and sprayed it with that.

Here is where I got the recipe (sans the essential oil):  http://wholenewmom.com/recipes/homemade-alcohol-free-hairspray-that-works/

Here is the end result!  It's not too bad, and certainly looks better than it did before all of this :)

Thanks for looking!

Upcycling/Freecycling!

Here are some of the ladies I gave makeovers to, to pass along to other children :)

Barbie, a Tong doll, and Maxie (I cut the frizzled ends off her hair)

 The Tong doll's hair is a serious mess...but I wasn't going to spend the time on rerooting a doll that's being given away (the fundamentals of freecycle are you get for free...you give for free).

Skipper (in a Lady Lovelylocks dress; it actually fit her quite nicely.  I treated the fraying ends of the inner skirt with Fray Stop) and 2 Barbies (one is a Pretty in Pink outfit; I couldn't identify the other)

The ones I am keeping are a Barbie Beat Midge, a Skipper, an Earring Magic Barbie, a Costume ball Barbie (without the dress, but I just loved her face), and a Lights and Lace dress.

I can't get this photo to NOT post sideways...grrrr...

I'm also keeping the one that needs the face up, as a project doll.

Thanks for looking!

Evening activities

Spent my evening washing doll clothes and hair washing/restyling . Got a lot of dolls from a freecycler, hoping to find some cool vintage dolls.

In the mix were a couple Skippers, a Maxie doll (who needed a hair cut ), a cute little baby, a Tong doll with rooted eyelashes (in serious need of both hair and lash rerooting) and some 80s Barbies. The native american? Doll needs a face up. One of the Skipper dolls was in a dress from one of the Lady Lovelylocks dolls.

 I don't intend to keep them all...I like giving dolls makeovers and new life for other children ☺

More Barbie Additions

Got these two lovely ladies for a buck each!  NRFB either.  They look like they are not Canadian or American...there are multiple languages on the boxes (French, Dutch, Portuguese, etc...).

Does anyone know anything about them?

Her box says Horse Lovin' Barbie...found her going for around $50 USD on eBay

Haven't found anything on her yet...front of her box just says "Shoes"...back has a "Fashion Avenue (TM)" reference.

Update:  I found out the second Barbie is "Shoes Galore" Barbie!

Thanks for looking!

I've been working on crocheting my own Barbie clothes; so far none of the patterns I've tried so far work out 100% the first try.  I'm too lazy to gauge things...that's probably why!  I'm not good at making my own or tweaking patterns...so I guess I should start checking my gauges.

I've also got another project ahead of me...involves the Dremel tool...I hope it works.

Have a great day :)