The Perfect New Year's Eve

Her sisters are talking about going to a New Year's Eve party, but Heather can't stand noisy crowds. She has her New Year's Eve all planned out: she will read magazines, drink soda, and eat candy until midnight. Perfect!

Winter Fun with Citrine

Citrine is an outdoorsy girl, and winter is her favorite time of year. When she heard that there was a snowman-building contest being held nearby, she hurried to participate--she considers herself an expert at at every winter activity. Using Sonny Angel as a model, she build the winning snowman! We're hoping the bear won't be too disgruntled.

Ice Rune

I totally love my new girl, Ice Rune, whom I've named Citrine. Her coloring is gorgeous, and I really like her stock outfit. She is posing here with a snowman Sonny Angel given to me by my daughter for Christmas.

Beryl Meets Hope

The new girl, Beryl (Enchanted Petal, on the left), is being introduced to all the girls at Blythe Happy. Hope (Simply Peppermint) is very excited to meet her.

"Hi, I'm Hope, nice to meet you! We green-haired girls need to stick together! I hope you don't mind that I'm borrowing your extra dress, it looks great on me...is this all you have, two dresses?  Oh well, Leslie will make you some more. Your hat is so funny! What do you call it, a babushka?? (Raucous laughter.) Oh, I'm just kidding, I like your style, Beryl--you look like you just stepped out of a fairy tale!"

(Beryl does not seem to be amused.)

Thank You Santa!!!

Wow, Santa was very generous to me this year! I received these three gorgeous dollies!!!

The first girl out of the box is the lovely, green-haired Enchanted Petal. Her name is Beryl. Candy and Wendy thought the best way to welcome their new sister was to overwhelm her with gifts!

Don't worry, the other two will be released from their boxes soon!

Peace

Elody (Prima Dolly Melon) and Ellie (Ichigo Heaven) have a Christmas wish: Peace.

My Christmas Wish

I hope and pray that we all receive the gifts of joy, love, and peace this Christmas.

Christmas Eve

Hanging her stocking

by the chimney with care,

Ivy is hoping

Santa soon will be there!

Christmas Dolly

Faith (Pow Wow Poncho) and Claire (I Love You It's True) 

"Merry" Christmas

This is Merry, my Prima Dolly Marigold, setting up the Christmas manger scene.

Christmas Sisters

Charlotte (Precocious Candy Mushroom) and Brock (Chantilly Lace custom), waiting for Santa on the mantel.

Ready for Christmas

Eve, my Milky Way Sugar

Christmas Overload

Let's Build a Snowman!

When Grace and Bonnie awoke, they saw it had snowed in the night! They quickly dressed in warm clothes, and ran out to build a snowman.

Christmas Tree Angel

Here's the angel on the top of our Christmas tree this year. 

She's the best angel I've ever had!

Her wings are an ornament I found for a mere $6 at the local 

World Market store.  

Wings plus doll plus tree equals CHRISTMAS ANGEL!!

Happy Thanksgiving

Be thankful for the little things (and the big things too!)

Twins!

I was first drawn to Candy Carnival because of her pretty blue hair, so I bought one, about a year ago, NRFB, on Ebay. When she arrived, I was disappointed in the quality of that pretty hair--it was super duper frizzy on the ends, to the point that it always looked matted. Still, I loved her, but felt sorry for her, standing on the back of my doll shelf, never quite fulfilling her potential. 

Recently I saw another Candy Carnival on eBay; she was being sold nude, and not many people seemed to be interested in her...so I bid, and won, and got her for the least amount I've paid for any doll so far. Yay! But she too had the frizzy hair problem, so I decided to be brave and try to smooth it out with hot water. I boiled water in a large cup in the microwave, then took it out and let it cool just for a minute, then I dunked her hair in and swished it around a bit. Then I rinsed it in cold water. When her hair dried, it was amazing! Soft and smooth, with a little curl but no more frizz. I quickly repeated the process on her twin sister, and now I have two really beautiful girls. I made them matching outfits to celebrate their twindom.

Here they are, before their hair treatments. 

Here are Daphne and Waverly, after their hair treatments. Now their hair is easy to brush, and it actually seems to be a slightly different shade of blue! I'm very happy with them now.

Halloween Greetings

"I don't remember wearing that silly outfit, but apparently I did, because this card is proof!"

Halloween greetings from Brock and all the girls here at Blythe Happy!

New Girl in the House

I wish I could buy every Blythe doll ever made...but since I'm not a millionaire, I have to pick and choose, which makes each of my dolls really special to me.

 I am particularly drawn to the fantasy-haired girls, with pink and green at the top of my list. Here's my newest arrival: she is a 2007 release called Prima Dolly Melon. I managed to find her in "used" condition, so she was affordable, but she didn't come with her stock outfit (which I don't mind because I rarely use the stock clothes.) I love her soft coloring.

Naming a new doll has gotten harder with each one, because I've used all my favorite names already! My first thought for her was to incorporate her given name and call her Melany; but I don't love that name, so I thought of Melody. That's a little too musical for her, so I took off the "M", and now she is...

Elody!

She has moved right in and has taken quite a liking to our My Little Pony collection.

Welcome, Elody! We are so glad you are here!

The Surprising Origin of my Heart Pockets

I've started making these Heart Pocket dresses to sell in my Etsy store. Aren't they cute? 

I love to choose fabrics that coordinate well for the dress, and then come up with the perfect pocket design. You might be surprised to hear that these pockets started out as....

...scissor fobs!

I've always loved hearts, and a few years ago I challenged myself to make one heart every day for a year. I kept a blog about it here: 365 Sewn Hearts . It proved to be more and more difficult to come up with different hearts to make, until the middle of the year when I hit upon the idea of sewing scissor fobs out of felt. They were so much fun, I kept on making one every day for two months! 

I gave away a lot of the scissor fobs, but most of them just sat in a mason jar on a shelf until recently, when I decided to try using them as pockets on Blythe dresses. I was thrilled with how well they worked, so I plan to continue making these for the foreseeable future. 

 Here's how I started the bee dress: I had these perfect fabrics to match the bee fob, so I simply cut the fob apart to remove the back of the heart, then ironed it flat. I made the dress as usual, and added the pocket using hand embroidery. Cute!

I'm still using a lot of the scissor fobs for the pockets, but I'm also making new designs, or re-making some that I gave away. For these two identical dresses, I started by choosing the fabrics, then made new flower pockets to match them.

You can see all my newest creations in my shop: Blythe Happy

My Fun New Camera

I've had my eye on the Fujifilm Instax mini 8 camera for a while. It is a polaroid-type camera that takes small photos the size of a credit card. I first saw it on the blog My Blythe and Me, and I wanted it!  I saw it in two different stores for about $129, which was more than I wanted to pay for a "just for fun" camera. So, when I found it on Zulilly for half price, I jumped at that bargain! My daughter, Jenna, likes it too, and we've decided to share it.

My favorite subject to photograph is Blythe. Here you can see how the camera and a photgraph compare in size to my dolls.

My daughter's favorite subject is her white cat.  She loves that cat!

We have other cats in the house, and they have made it into a few of the pictures...

The film comes in packs of 10, and I splurged on a few packs with colored boarders. You never know what color will appear when the picture pops out of the camera!

 I haven't taken nearly as many pictures as Jenna has. There's been a bit of a learning curve for me, as I work on finding the right distance to stand from the dolls. If I get too close the pictures are blurry and overexposed. If I stand too far back, the dolls look too small in the picture.

I want to think up fun ways to use my Blythe photos. So far, I've thought of framing them to use on the walls in the doll house; or I could cut them up and use them when I make Artist Trading Cards. Do you have any other suggestions?

Happy Independence Day, America!

New Shoes

There is one thing I don't know how to make for my dolls--SHOES. I love little dolly shoes, and with close to 30 Blythes in my collection, I need to have a collection of shoes that will go with all their different outfits as well.

Recently I purchased these shoes from actongtong on eBay. The seller is located in Hong Kong, so before I made the purchase I inquired if he would offer combined shipping if I bought several pairs of shoes. He quickly replied that yes, he would, so I purchased 7 pairs. I was happy with how fast they arrived (they only took 11 days to reach me in the U.S.), and I was very happy to see that the seller included a free pair of shoes!

Profiles

I love Blythe profiles! These girls look so thoughtful when seen from the side. Here are two pictures I've taken recently...

...this is Charity (Mod Molly) with the morning sun coming in the window behind her:

...and here are London (Prima Dolly London) and Patience (Veronica Lace); they seem to be looking at something interesting.

An ATC for Daphne

On Plastic Paradise we have a monthly ATC (Artist's Trading Card) challenge. This month the theme was "friendship". I have had the idea in my head for weeks, and I finally pulled out paper and glue yesterday to make the card. I am working towards the goal of having a card for each of my dolls, so I chose Daphne (a Candy Carnival Blythe) to be the featured doll this time. She doesn't get much camera time, even though she's one of my very favorite dolls--I need to do something about that!

The card is 2 1/2 x 3 1/2 inches, the same size as a standard playing card.

Daphne thinks it is awesome!!

Custom White Dresses

I had a large custom order from an Etsy customer this week: nine white dresses with hand-embroidered names.

I used several different white-on-white cottons for the dresses, as well as several different lace trims for the hems, to give them some subtle variety.

I was surprised to discover that I had a favorite among these dresses--it's this one, "Olivia". The light blue paired with the white really speaks to me, and I think the embroidery came out especially well.

Waiting

Wendy, Bree and Hope are waiting impatiently for the Easter Bunny to arrive.

Birthday Dolls

Finally, all of my birthday dolls have arrived. I know I'm spoiled! I've already posted about Charlotte de Fleur (whom I am calling Fleur--never mind that her dress says "Ellie"!); I also adopted Prima Dolly London from a collector in England, and I found the middie Puchippu Chappu Pepa on Amazon for a good price. London and Pepa don't have names yet, but I'm working on that.

Obviously, I love the fantasy-haired girls. London has had a slight haircut (from her previous owner) which I think looks great. I love the contrast in style between London and Fleur! Pepa just arrived two days ago, and I haven't de-boxed her yet because she looks so cute just as she is...but it won't be long before she's out of there.

Charlotte des Fleurs

I just received my Charlotte des Fleurs yesterday, from CC Toys. It's amazing that the trip from Japan just took her a week, whereas the (used) Prima Dolly London I'm waiting for from Canada hasn't yet arrived, and it's been almost a month!

Her temporary name is Fleur (since I already have a Charlotte); I will see if anything better strikes me in the next week or so, and if not, I guess she will remain a Fleur forever.  Um...her hair. It's big. Very big. She will take up the space of three girls in my dollhouse! I'm thinking I might have to treat her differently than the others, just because of that big hair. She will probably get her own special display, and I won't be able to play with her very much because I think the hair could easily become a tangled mess.

I love her pink hair clip and, her shoes are amazing! The stand she came with is a pale translucent pink which is also very pretty. I'm not too excited about her dress--it's too short for my taste, and when I tugged on the front to try to pull it down a little, it started to rip. Pooh. I will make her a pretty pink dress and that will solve the problem. I'm not very happy with her thigh-high socks either, they aren't very stretchy which makes them hard to put on, so I didn't bother. But overall, I love her!

Happy St. Patrick's Day