Elphadolls

The Sad Tale of the Second-hand #58

I have a couple of doll-related projects I'm working on now.

One: the dollhouse. I have the top two rooms pretty much set up. I'm working on decorating the lowest floor, which is a kitchen/eating space/restaurant.

The other thing I've been working on started when I bought a doll secondhand on impulse. I have had a Truly Me #58 on my wishlist for a while, after seeing a really beautiful Addy in a thrift shop, and then falling for #58's bouncy curls. So when I saw an opportunity to buy a used #58, I went for it.

Looking back, this purchase was not a good idea. This poor dolly had a couple of major issues. On the other hand, I have enjoyed working to repair her, although my first-time repair job has not had entirely great results.

Here's what she looked like when she first showed up.

So far so good.

Except that she had a huge hole in her side!

And her hair ... I don't know how long it was in that ponytail, but it did not want to come down.

First: the hole. It had been stitched together somewhat - not a pretty job, but thick and sturdy thread. The problem was that the fabric itself was fraying and stuffing was peeking out.

And the hole seemed to get a little bigger each time I handled her. It caught on everything.

My first thought was to patch it, but that was kind of drastic. Instead, I tried stitching. There was a lot of frayed material to cover, and the fabric was still fraying as I pushed my needle through. It was bad, guys. This was no longer a case of "well, a patch would be unsightly." We were far past that issue. This was Patch or Doll Hospital territory.

Back to my first plan: patching. First I used a little fusible bonding in the middle to hold the patch in place, and then I carefully stitched around the edges. I finished up with a large helping of FrayCheck.

This is the closest fabric match I could find. She won't be wearing bikinis anytime soon, but I think she is less likely to develop a case of the Giant Torso Hole.

Next: the hair.

I love #58's hair and I think a lot of people do judging by how many pictures I see of her. However, I don't know that there's anyway to get those gorgeous curls back after a certain point.

In my girl's case, some of her curls (mostly towards the crown of her head) seemed intact, but the greater part were stretched out and hopelessly tangled. Especially around the back of her neck, the curls were completely flattened out. Also, on the back of her head, it seemed there had been some hair loss with thin and almost bald patches.

I tried finger curling and then wetting the hair and curling it around a pencil. Nothing helped very much; her hair still wanted to go vertical.

I could not find any tutorials on restoring #58's hair, although there were plenty out there for other curly-haired AGs.

"I can't make it much worse," I thought.

I proceeded to make it worse.

This was not working. At this point I'd pretty much lost what was left of her curls. I decided to try other wigs.

Here she is in a Grace wig (specifically the one that used to be on Larkin).

Then I went researching wigs similar to 58's. One recommendation was the Kamilah wig by Global Dolls, which is no longer produced but is still available through some secondhand sellers. I purchased one in a 10-11 size.

A close enough color match.

It fits snugly on her head, so well I've had no need to glue it in place. The curls are very small and tight. It's a different look from most of the dolls I've seen. Less big and fluffy.

The original wig is currently in my room with some more curlers in it; as long as I have it, I am not totally willing to give up on it. So this will probably not be the end of Second-hand #58's transformation.

I tend to have a "character" for most of my dolls, and this girl is still unnamed. I had the name Guenevere in mind for a #58, but I may end up keeping that name for a new #58 with an intact wig. We'll see where this goes.

A doll for Elphaba

I don't have a proper camera at the moment and have had to borrow a family member's iPad when I want to take pictures, so that has put a damper on the blog. I will continue to try to post every now and then, though.

First: I found another producer of miniature books. This is Ariel Books' "Tiny Tomes." They have a variety of different subjects.

I ordered a little Life of St. Francis and I'm very pleased with it.

Yesterday I went by a doll show, which was a lot of fun. I snagged some American Girl sets I'd been wanting. One of my favorite finds, though, was a Happy Meal Madame Alexander.

Elphaba got a lookalike doll of her very own!

It's hard to tell from this photo, but this doll's skin is significantly lighter than Elphaba's.

I also got a Dorothy and a Tin Man.

I think Elphaba would have liked to take Little Dorothy's ruby slippers, but unfortunately they're molded on.

There was a lot of amazing stuff at the doll show. One lady had hand-knitted sweaters, coats, socks and mittens for 18" dolls. I couldn't resist those mittens! Here's Nanea trying a set on for the first time.

The Next Big Thing: Update

The dollhouse has been painted, and I am currently working on furnishing it! It has two rooms, a storage space on the bottom, and that upper area for a third room.

One of the things about this wardrobe is that it's a wooden frame with pressboard walls. This meant it was lighter, but it also meant everything had to be anchored into the frame. I'm just glad to have it all together and safely back out of the garage and into the playroom.

BEFORE AND AFTER:

Currently, I have a modern bedroom on the "roof" and the parlor on the upper floor. The bottom floor will be a kitchen, and beneath that is a small storage area.

It's hard to take pictures of this room because the humans' ceiling fan gets in the way.

Here's the parlor. It's currently looking very crowded because I decorated it for Christmas. (Doll furniture is deceptively large!) And here we have the reason it was so important to have those spacious ceilings: the Christmas tree.

I'm still working on both of these rooms and finding the exact arrangement that I want. Still, they're mostly done as far as finding furniture goes (the parlor even has a little too much at the moment). What will need more work is the kitchen.

The Next Big Thing

I’m not dead! Things have been pretty busy around here, but the Big Ongoing Project is that… the dolls are getting a house! First I procured a little bit of space in our playroom after a large reorganization effort. There was weeping and gnashing of teeth. I was not expecting to find a "house" so easily, but I found an old wardrobe at Hope Chest that my dad actually pointed out to me. It's not exactly what I wanted, but it was relatively inexpensive, and it had doors - one of the top things on my wishlist. Doors = no cat wandering in and chewing the dolls' fingers off.

As you can see, with the dimensions of this thing, it was either going to be 2 huge floors/rooms or 3 cramped floors. I opted for two huge rooms and I'm going to squeeze in an extra room on the top of the wardrobe. It's been a slow process so far, but at this point we've got almost all the raw material we need. I hope to have more photos soon as we get closer to a finished product.

Some Belated Back-to-school Pictures

Wal-Mart's got some great new sets out now! I finally managed to snag a few, and the science and school sets lent themselves to a school setting - something I've been continually collecting stuff for. So Karol and Nanea are off to school!

Aloha, Nanea

So as you may have noticed, I recently brought Nanea home.

When I first saw pictures of Nanea I wasn’t a fan. I thought she looked too much like a Wellie Wisher. However, I actually do like the Wellie Wisher molds. Once I saw pictures of her in different lighting, she started to grow on me.

I have been keeping up with people’s discussions of current AG doll quality and I have to say, they are right. Nanea’s vinyl is soft and squishy. Not like rubber, but when I squeeze it there’s a noticeable give. By comparison, my older AGs have vinyl that’s firm as a rock.

The whites of her eyes are also very bright and sharp. Her eyes are a little sunken and if I turn her to the side I can see through the socket to the white pegs of the eyes.

But she is a very pretty doll. I bought a couple of her sets - the swimsuit and the birthday set - and her little Brownie camera is probably in my top 10 doll purchases all year. (I was so sad when I realized I had missed Molly's travel set which included a camera - but now I have one!)