It's taking a lot of strength. Ebay bundles are a big weakness man.
But I needed to get out the house yesterday so I hit the charity shops.
I like to do the big circuit when I have the energy and the time, which means walking down to the high street, hitting out 5 or 6 shops, then getting on a bus to the next suburb over and doing the same.
Then one final bus to the last suburb to hit the 8 posher charity shops and home again in a nice big circle.
So our local charity shops are pretty random. We have two that sell toys, one that sells antiques and has a lovely lady who enjoys talking to anyone who'll listen about her latest finds (lol), one that sells furniture, electronics and bric a brac and the last two mostly just sell clothes and books.
So usually I skip most of them and just hit the toy ones.
Unfortunately our local children's charity has recently gotten a new manager and put all their prices up for dolls. This means that they're asking £3+ for ratty nude barbies and it pisses me off.
So I don't tend to buy much unless it's a particularly special doll.
The YMCA doesn't get dolls that often but it's always worth a look anyway, just in case.
from there I headed to the Bridge, where 2 of the 5 charity shops have shut down in recent months. They have a fara, a fara kids that only sells kids stuff and toys and one other that sells mostly clothes.
I got a nice jacket in that one.
Fara Kids usually has some nice stuff as this is a pretty affluent area and they get a lot of donations. This time around they had a nude Boxy girl who I passed on and several dolls that appeared to have toothpaste on their faces. Er.... what?
wierd.
I didn't buy anything.
The last town I hit also has a fara kids which is one of my favourite charity shops in the area. It's not very big but it always has dolls AND it has a huge box of random doll clothes I love to rummage through. I love me a good rummage.
I picked up a couple of things there.
I redressed them for photos. Elena of Avalor came wearing a random dress which I liked the look of and is the primary reason I purchased her. It helps that I like her face. Disney bodies always have weak knees, it pisses me off. I wrapped elastic bands around her knee joints so she can STAND THE FUCK UP.
The frightmare was one I didn't already have. I dunno, I feel like they'd have done better at retail were they half the price (£7 or 8 instead of £15) and weren't Monster High tie ins. I feel like they kinda... didn't work when you compared them to Monster High.
But as wierd as heck mlp-like toys they're quite fun.
the Ddung clone was 50p and she has little pink shoes. Her dress was just a strip of shitty fabric so I put a bratz kidz thing on her.
I got a couple of bits of clothing too but at 50p each it's a little steep for me. It's worth it for vintage pieces or really unique bits but for just a generic barbie shirt or a standard dress? Yeah no.
And they didn't have much in my scales, most of it was baby doll sized. I think i've mined that box for all the barbie stuff hahah.
When I got home I was trying to find a body to shove the Ddung head on to see if it looked cute on a slightly bigger body but I instead found this girl and remembered that I had an articulated decendents body I was looking for a head for.
She's a littlest Pet Shop penguin head repainted to be an owl. I did her years ago and she makes me smile.
But because she had a bobble head she has a HUGE neck hole and I always found it difficult to get her onto a body. Her first body used a soda lid with a hole drilled in it but it was a bit unstable and ugly.
This time around I elected to hack up one of the Moxie clone dolls I got in that huge bundle of dolls and use it as a "neck hole donor" as suggested by some people on tumblr.
I glued it in place just for extra security.
The dress she's wearing is what Elena was wearing. It's super cute.
Yes, a brown body might have been better but at the same time, the difference between head and body I think works to make her feel more like an obvious hybrid. I feel like a matched body might be a touch creepy. I dunno.
Anyway, she can now actually POSE so it's a huge improvement over the Moxie Girl body she WAS on.
Growing up Skipper also came out of the airing cupboard. Her stains have mostly faded. She had a blue mark on her cheek which is pretty much gone now and a lot of blue er... "eyeshadow" across the middle of her face and up her forehead which is also mostly gone.
I elected to keep the stuff around her eyes because I didn't want to risk damaging her eye paint and it just looks like a continuation of her eyeshadow anyway.
She's a very little doll, especially alongside the similarly gimmicked growing up glam my scene.
I think Skipper's grown up mechanic works better though. She has a soft vinyl sleeve around her chest that pops out to grow boobs and she gets only slightly taller and it's more proportionate when clothed than Kennedy's frankly ludicrous giraffe torso there.
I mean wtf Mattel?
In my Ebay travels I also stumbled across this girl. (ebay photo)
Actually I first stumbled upon her twin, another Doll Chateau Bella who had perminant marker writing all over her for no clear reason.
I was watching that one to see how much she ended up selling for without her certificate and covered in sharpie, I was curious.
Then this girl popped up on my feed as a BIN for £90.
She seemed to have all the correct markings but I ended up emailing the seller to confirm. She confirmed where she'd bought the doll from (A well known dealer) and located the certificate for me.
So I felt comfortable in believing she was legit and purchasing her. She's been on my wishlist for a while.
I've never handled a msd Doll Chateau before, all of mine are small 1/6 scale ones and Bella is 1/4. I wasn't sure how well she'd stand or pose because the tiny ones are pretty shit at standing up due to their very very narrow elastic channels.
As it turns out, Bella stands beautifully and posed pretty well.
She's in white resin which has mellowed to a soft cream colour.
Her faceup was a little blotchy so I wiped her, I had an idea for her I wanted to try out anyway.
I always like to put my own stamp on my dolls, they don't tend to keep their original faceups heh.
I wanted to do something outside my comfort zone with some colourful eyeshadow and such.
And then my surprise bag of eyes from Lemonjellyeyes came in and these pale green ones just felt so perfect.
She looks moody and unearthly and i'm fairly pleased. Of course I do feel like my work could do with being a little crisper but hey, practice makes perfect right?
And to give an idea of what a bargain she was at under £100, a brand new DC Bella would set you back about $299 usd, which is currently about £230.
So i got her for less than half price.
And yes, she has her certificate and her head plate.
Score!
And she makes me even more sure I really do want a DC Hugh as well. I'll probably order one in the next year ahem.
I'm also waiting on some more heads because i'm weak... but also because I missed the last "last chance" to get them and regretted it. At the time I was all "no random heads, only full dolls!" but of course, the reality is that sometimes you only have a small window to get a head you really want and bodies can wait.
in this case it's Doll In Mind, a company that shut down last year? I think?
they opened up one final group order which i've jumped onto because honestly their heads are damn unique and interesting.
From their website, there's Larina.
Annabeth
and hopefully if we get enough orders, the extremely grumpy looking Gayane
i'm hoping we get them, they're msd scale and I think they'll be a lot of fun to paint and come up with characters for. Their heads have so much personality and I adore that.
I'm not big into conventionally "pretty" heads, I vastly prefer characterful faces.
This year I believe will be one of mostly finding bodies for all these heads. Heh.
2020, the year of bodies.
*snicker*
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