i'm bad at resolutions - 10kg of dolls? Heck yeah 10kg of dolls!

There's a good reason i've never made new years resolutions, i'm terrible at keeping any sort of promise to myself.

The past month or so i've been getting increasingly stressed by the selling of stuff, the constant trips to the post office, making sure everything was right and proper before sending it out, the chaos of packaging up 12 things in one night, it was getting to me.
So I said to husband "okay, i think i'm gonna take a break from selling things for a bit once these auctions end"

so what'd I do?

I bought a 10kg box of monster high dolls.

*headdesk*




Okay so let's explain,

On facebook i'm in a fair few dolly groups, including a couple of Monster High ones. I don't tend to buy Monster High these days unless it's one I REALLY want or they're stupidly cheap in charity shops, but I spend a lot of my time IDing stuff for people and helping them out with putting collections back together.

I absolutely LOVE big bundles of random stuff that needs to be reunited, it's a bit like a puzzle or something and I dunno, it just appeals to me.

Anyway,

a new member joined with a big pile of random dolls they said they didn't have time to sort through nor the knowledge to know what was what anyway. They were her daughters and she just wanted rid of them now.
She wanted £50 and the image was uh... pretty vuage.

Because i'm clearly insane, I managed to work out what about 33 of these were just by staring at the picture for a while.
I... think I might have a problem <_< hahaha.

Anyway,

One thing I did get the seller to confirm was that the pink haired girl underneath Porter was indeed Ghoul Chat Rochelle as I believed it was.

Shipping was really fast, arrived the next day which surprised me. The box is HUGE.

seller said there were about 57 dolls in the bundle, and according to the box there's 10kg of weight in there.

Whoo hooo hooo, this is gonna be a bit of work but lots of fun right?

Let's delve in!

Oh, before we start, my guesses for dolls as I could see in the photo:

we got gooliope. Some inner monsters. Honey and a random venus. Up the top there's ghoul spirit spectra and batsy Claro. look like coffin bean abbey as well. Sirena, the drac that came with the bathtub, Gil from the two pack with Deuce. There's Porter and Coffin Bean toralei and Ghoul Spirit Slo Mo too. BYBY Moucedes, the clawd from the family 4 pack, Nightmare, probably ghoul spirit venus, DDG lagoona, Clawdia, there's a rochelle but no idea which as she's face down (prob ghoul chat), clawdeen from the family 4 pack as well. Casta, what looks like Deuce, freaky fusion ghoulia, cloelei's outfit at least, Kiyomi, Jane Boolittle, Catty's scaremester doll, possibly DDG spectra?, the howleen from the family 4 pack. art class skelita, Deuce from that two pack with gil, freaky fusion frankie with the blue hair, Viperine.

Lots of dolls. Let's see if I was right! 

So here's the box, it's actually too heavy for me to lift and the courier was struggling a little. It's a big box and it weighs at least 10kg according to the label (one says 10, the other says 30 so yeah.. go figure. I'm assuming 10) so it's really awkward to move about. Poor courier guy. It was pouring with rain too.

Inside we have some playset stuff and a big asda bag... ooooo mystereous.

Under the bag looks like this. Looksee! Ghouls Chat Catrine and Rochelle! YAY!

Inside the bag is... stands, brushes, accessories, loads of stuff.

This is all the dolls laid out.
There's a lot of them. The seller said she counted 57. I uh.. haven't counted.

Most of them are, I have to say, in pretty good nick. Aside from a little hair care needed, most are fine with clean faces, their hair in original styles and their original outfits on.

4 are dirty. Bloodgood has marks on her face that may come off with a magic eraser. Ghoulia has what looks like nail polish on her face, ghoul spirit frankie has some sort of smudge of greyish on her cheek that won't come off and Ghoul's Alive frankie's leg isn't just broken, it looks like it's BURNED.
wowza.

Everything else though looks AOK. I'll have to see which of the teensy accessories are present in the big bag.

The most obvious doll in the bundle is of course Gooliope. I forget sometimes how much I added to mine by painting her accessories and giving her a jacket lol.

Anyway, I tied her hair back because I think it looks better that way, it shows off her earrings more you know? plus her really neat ear sculpt.

She's in great condition, just needed a quick hair comb.

The mark on Bloodgood's face mostly came off with a little nail polish remover, there's a very faint blueness but you gotta really squint to see it. I don't think it's the stain though, I think it's Mattel's shitty QC as Nightmare has half her eye on her cheek too! Poor Nightmare! It looks like the decal peeled while it was still drying and they were all "eh, it'll do, shove it in the box anyway"

Typical Mattel bullshit that.

I mean seriously, wtf?

The fact the rest of the eye is just sitting there on her cheek says to me that's not play wear, that's factory fuckup.

These are the three damaged ones. Sadly Ghoulia's staining I couldn't remove without taking her factory paint with it. She has a grey smear across her cheek from the nail polish and some of her eye makeup went bye bye too. *sigh*
oh well, she's a weird looking doll anyway.

Pinkeye Frankie (AKA Ghoul Spirit) has a stubborn grey smear I couldnt' remove either.

and poor ghouls alive still works, much to my surprise... but uh...

Well.. you see her leg? It's not just snapped, it's CHARRED. How the hell does that even happen? Did someone try to melt it back together?

I just... what?

Bewildering.

still, plus side, none of these were rare or interesting dolls. HAH. and 3 out of 57 isn't bad.

Finnegan Wake even has his diary, there was a pile of diaries and paperwork in the bag but sadly a few of them seem to have got wet at some point so are ruined.
those that survived look fine, it looks as though either they were sat in water or had it spilled on them.

The paperwork on the top of the pile were all dry, the ones at the bottom dried together into one solid mass of card and paper.

Finn's is fine.

Also Pack of Trouble Clawd, who's hair is a bit of a mess but kinda difficult to do much with without a comb. 

I genuinely have no idea how this thing even works, but holy crap does this Frankie have way too much hair. It's so thickly rooted it cannot sit down, she perpetually looks like a hedge.

Pretty colour but yeah, waaaay too much hair.

There's little emoji things that slot into the base for no obvious reason. It's uh.. random.

I... really haven't a clue. Maybe i'll shove some batteries in and see what happens.

Porter and Kiyomi, yet not other Haunted dolls. Random. Kiyomi has her diary and brush too.
Neat.

Art Class Skelita who also has her paperwork diary thing but I didn't find it till after I took this photo. Doh.

I admit, I was kinda tempted to steal her headband for MY Art Class Skelita who is missing hers but I can't be bothered trying to clip it off. This one's hair is a bit tacky in places, a few of the dolls in this bundle have the dreaded Mattel glue hair situation going on. Skelita's isn't terrible but it's slightly tacky so i'd rather keep my display one who's hair is slightly better. I'm fussy hahah.

Dot Dead Gorgeous Lagoona and Spectra. Their cards are a bit water damaged.

both have compacts which omg, I totally didn't even remember they came with! I used to own a few DDG dolls and I dunno, I totally forgot they had compacts. Lol.

I love the old Icoffins, there's something so satisfying about sliding them open and closed.

Spectra's hair is lovely and she's totally complete! and not yellow like my other one. WHOO.
I THINK these are their stands.

DDG Lagoona's shoes always made me slightly uncomfortable. I always found there was something just.. vulval about them. I don't think the little pearl helps.. ahem.
I remember people getting mad at me for referring to them as "Lagoona's vagina shoes" back in the day ahahahaha. I stand by it, they look like vulvas!
they're pink and frilly!
Or am I just seeing vaginas in things again? hahaha

Eagle eyed people migh notice that is NOT FCA Clawdia but in fact Pack of Trouble Clawdia. Both were in the bundle and I always preferred Pack of Trouble's more casual outfit but FCA's faceup and curly hair. When I used to own a Clawdia I changed her into Pack of Trouble's outfit and really thought she looked quite good. I sold her when I did my big rage purge and now I have her again i'm considering keeping her. So I did the switcharoo before I took pictures.

Elissabat and Viperine's hair is GROSS. It's like.. so sticky and disgusting. Elissabat looks like she's balding but it's actually just because her hair is so lank and sticky and disgusting it's not sitting right.
I haven't got the patience to try to fix this shit, they'll be sold "as is" to someone who wants to spend time trying to fix Mattel's bullshit.

Viperine's glasses were also broken when she arrived, they're thin plastic and you have to kinda ram them into her hairline which being so sticky hasn't got much give. That said, given the glasses were still on their original plastic backing I don't actually think she'd ever been played with. I think the glasses were broken IN the packaging. Which wouldn't surprise me either.

Honey however is lovely and they all have their accessories (Clawdia kept her pen and book)
and they have their diaries, but they like all of these are european ones so you know.. shit.

Freaky Fusion. All apparently complete which is cool. I already have all three of these dolls but gosh it reminds me how beautiful Dracubecca and Cleolei are.

And more Freaky Fusion. Damn that movie was disappointing. I mean not as frustrating as Frights Camera Action's "get to the damn point already" schitzophrenic style of story telling but just... such a missed oppertunity. I'm still mad that Jackson and Holt were absent till right at the end and did NOTHING. Just.. eugh.

Anyway,

Sirena and Bonita. I had forgotten how annoyingly overlong Bonita's hair was. I HATED it almost as much as I hated her fugly 80s ice skater dress. It tangles into her wings constantly and is just really hard to manage, and it makes her head so top heavy she's constantly looking UP.
at least her hair isn't a gloopy mess though.

Sirena's hair is frizzy as Sirena's hair always is. She is pretty though. I'd also forgotten what a pain in the arse she was to get to stand up on her fins.

Boo York Nefera, who's missing her crown thing and yet has her crystal meteor fragment thing, and Mousedes who seems to be complete.

Eugh Mousedes... just... another massively missed oppertunity. When I read "bratty daughter of the rat king" I thought "omg she needs a yellow maze print suit like Cher in Clueless!" and immediately assumed platinum blonde hair.
Imagine my disappointment to see she was YET ANOTHER pink haired doll for no damn good reason, and that both her outfits were shapeless granny outfits who very little in the way of cute mouse/rat print. *sigh*
I was also sad that they didn't sneak a little knot into her tail. COME ON! She's daughter of the rat king! you could have played on what a real Rat King is and given her a knot in her tail, a teeny little reference most people would miss but the OLD mh team totally would have given us.

I still absolutely HATE her gala dress. It doesn't fit her very nicely, it's garish as shit and the "cheese print" of the top doesn't work, it just looks like dots while the cystal print is too vuage and generic. Her shoes are boring too. Her other version's shoes were boring as shit ribbon things as well, these are just grey crystal. Neither feels very rat girl specific but then, BYBY had a lot of that problem. They COULD have done crystal kinda twists on the iconography for the characters and they kinda did with Catty and Nefera but the new ghouls just got "eh, random crystal pattern, that'll do".

I dunno, Mousedes has quite an interesting face sculpt and I feel like she could have been a far more interesting doll. Instead i've never felt any desire to keep one in my collection.

Nefera is... mmm.. I don't like how they made her paler for the BYBY release and later scream and sugar, it felt a bit.. inappropriate you know? it's not just that her skin is pearlescent, she and Cleo are noticably lighter skinned and more well.. white... and that is.. unfortunate.
The fact she has no rooted parting drives me insane. WHY!?? I know it's meant to be all swept back but eugh, it just.. it doesn't sit right and it annoys me.

the copper streaks are pretty though.

Both are in pretty good condition. I just feel no need to keep either.

Batsy Claro. Strangely enough the only exchange student in the bundle. I'd forgotten what a chubby little face she had, or how damn cute her ear sculpt is.

This one has some lip rub, again, probably mattel's QC.  Also much like a lot of the later dolls, her arms won't sit flush with her body, this is actually as close to her body as either of her arms will go. Wtf? I've noticed this with a fair few of the later releases, it's like they didn't bother to remove excess plastic or something in the joint so it just.. sticks and effectively freezes the shoulder joint.

Poor doll. She's a really pretty doll. I wish they'd made her outfit as two pieces though, that seam through the middle bugs the hell outta me.

Her diary has some water warping but seems to be okay despite that. It's european though, so it has like one sentence repeated over and over and therefore SUCKS.

Waste of paper Mattel, you should feel bad.

Speaking of weird Mattel qc... the 2015ish rerelease Draculaura.

there's also a cleo in the bundle but i'll get to her later.

Draculaura is... hmm.. well, at least her arms can sit closer to her body that poor Batsy, her face is cute and looks very close to the screening of the 2012 rereleases but oh god her hair. WHAT DID THEY DO TO HER HAIR!?? it's choppy and it's just... bad. It sticks out randomly in every direction for no obvious reason and eugh.. her outfit offends me. The printed on buttons and stitching is just... vile.

what's really odd is her stand, I THINK it's her stand, because there was a gold one which i assume is Cleo's and then this one which is a paler yellow to the Freaky Fusion stands but also feels... different. The plastic of it feels lighter, more... scratchy almost? It has a strange texture, and so does the brush. The brush feels a bit... rough in places and really lightweight, not at all like the smooth glossy brushes of previous MH. It struck me as very odd, the plastic these two things are made of is clearly different to the plastic all the other stands and brushes are made of, so I assumed it went with the cheap doll. But then I was thinking "Did these even COME with stands?" because it felt a little too generous of Mattel given how shittily they crapped these out.

So.. who the heck's stand is this? It's not a freaky fusion stand, it's a different shade of yellow and it's made of different plastic, same with the brush. So... who the heck's stand??!

Jane wierdly has her paper instructions and the paper for her sloth, but the pen staff thing has lost the lid. Uh... random?

Her hair is annoying, it's in like two ponytail things? I dunno if I reset it correctly, it was starting to come out of the hairties so I redid it. It's a bit poofy.

13 wishes Twyla. what's weird is that my original Twyla had horrible hair, like truly wretched lank looking disgusting hair. This one's hair is actually okay. Hmmm. weird.
she has the exact same bug eye as my old one though ahahah, what the heck?
also, and this is hilarious. I took her earrings out to comb her hair and then when I went to put the right one back in I was like "why won't this go in the hole!?" for ages, then I noticed the ear wasn't actually pierced there, they'd managed to pierce the BACK of her head beside the ear! so the earring goes into her damn skull ahahahaha. Hilarious. I mean terrible, but hilarious.

I always wondered why they didn't bother to sew a little ribbon into her skirt to stop it spinning on the doll and slipping down. It's annoying.

I was torn with this girl. On the one hand, a 13wishes Twyla with tolerable hair.. on the other, bugeyemcbuggy.

I decided I liked my other Twyla's better. Haunted Twyla gets to stay as my display Twyla. Hah.

I think this is a complete set. As with my set, Deuce's glasses feel just one moment away from snapping in half. They also won't actually sit on his damn face correctly.

I always loved Gil's face sculpt, he's so damn pretty.

Euro diaries again, one sentence... -_-

The rest of Ghoul Spirit. Slo Mo was the only interesting thing about this line IMO.

This Slow Mo is fine, his wonky legs are just because they rotated wierd and I didn't notice lol.

Spectra's hair is DISGUSTING. Can you see the grease in the photo? Can you just feel how sticky and revolting that is? Oh god... it's... my skin is crawling just remembering.

*shudder*

Venus however has perfectly fine hair. Wtf? It's the inconsistancy that really pisses me off about this.

Venus actually isn't a terrible doll, her makeup is kinda interesting but she's got the exact same hair as like.. every other bloody Venus and is nothing special. None are as terrible as Pink Eye Frankie though, I mean what even IS that about? She looks like she has an infection!

But yeah. They have their random accessories too. I think these are correct, there's a shitty plastic foam finger too but I can't remember who got what.

Coffin Bean Abbey who's like new and Frankie who's hair needs a bit of a boil wash to get it to sit DOWN again.

I think those are their cups.

I always thought this Frankie had the cutest face. She has hamster cheeks! hahah.

Some Clawdeens too. Dead Tired w2, Ghouls Alive and Swim Class.

Swim Class has dead sexy heels right?

I own examples of all of these so yeah...

Oh Ghouls alive... I just.. while most of me hates the line for being so gimmicky and fugly, a small part of me admires the ambition of Clawdeen's gimmick. It's pretty complicated.

She still works, just needs new batteries.

we're up to 38 dolls so far.

So far i've spent two evenings reuniting accessories and cleaning things up.

And there's more to go through. EEEP.

This is Scaremester Catty Noir, who seems to have all her stuff too. Score!

A recent rerelease Cleo who compared the Draculaura isn't actually that bad. Her outfit looks correct and is separate pieces, the only difference is her accessories are now plain gold rather than the painted plastic of the originals but I dunno, I think her shoes kinda work gold. Certainly they're way softer and thus easier to get on and off heh.

I toyed with keeping this doll, she's missing a headband and bag, if she came with a bag, I don't even know, but I need to be frugal and I need to stop amassing dolls I only "kinda like"

I sold my first wave Cleo years ago, I always preferred later releases. Go figure.

Coffin Bean Toralei's hair was tied up so it's a bit kinked. She appears to be complete except for the mug/cup? I'm not sure.

Both Zombie Shake 2 packs! I have Rochelle, always loved her, she's stunning. Venus is fun but her hair thingie drives me batty. I always loved the twins shoes. Fish bone heels!

They have euro diaries too.

2 inner monster sets. They have their stands too. There's actually 4 or 5 saddle stands in the box but I don't know what dolls they came with. I know these two had them, and I believe original Catty Noir did too, but beyond that? I dunno.

One digit of the crab backpack thing is missing. ONE! the rest were all disarticulated in the bag and scattered through the box. I found one in another doll's hair lol.

Their wigs do not stay on very well, they only latch at the back which seems a very poor design choice.

Die-ner set. Draculaura has weak knees but otherwise seems to be AOK.

I don't know if this is all the Diener's stuff. There's little blue tickets and all sorts of teensy bits and bobs.

Also Draculaura's bath set. Count Fabulous was in the box as well, I just forgot to put him in the photo (DOH). There's teensy toothpaste and a toothbrush! hahaha.

I don't know what the blue jar is or if it goes with this set.
I really find the mirror decal very funny. I think it's a shame Mattel gave up on that running gag of Drac not showing up in mirrors or on camera. *sigh* it was amsuing.

Also Casta. I cannot work out how her hair goes. My original one is at the back of a shelf and I wasn't in the mood to go find it. Her hair is kinda like Jane's in that it's in two pigtails and then loose. I dunno, it's odd.

Then there's Secret Creepers playset with Crescent and Chewlian. Chewlian is apparently a shredder lol. What?
It noms paper.
Crescent is supposed to growl or something but I haven't got a teensy tiny battery to put in it.

the "key" leash thing to open the set is inside the ottoman, which has a secret drawer. You push a button on the back and whatever you put in the drawer "disappears" lol. It's clever, like one of those magic boxes that does the same thing with a big and a small compartment.

Gloom and Bloom Jinafire. A line I never bought in stores as it wasn't an overly easy one to find and was really expensive.
Jinafire is GORGEOUS, like wow...

Her dress is just stunning. Really spectacularly beautiful.

She has a diary too, which isn't euro! YAY!

I was tempted to keep her but I just can't justify it. I have literally no space on my shelves.

and these are the ones I decided to keep.
Ghoul Chat Catrine and Rochelle, I wasn't sure about Catrine but it feels a bit wierd to split them up you know?
Pack of trouble Howleen and Clawdeen who I already started playing with clothing for hahah. I haaate Howleen's default outfit, it's just so.. cheap. Clawdeen has a fairly nice dress under the sweater.
I can't find my Bratz clothing to try on Howleen sadly.

Field Trip Gigi who's gorgeous, Gore-geous accessories Robecca who was a Smyths exclusive and fairly expensive so i've never actually seen her irl, and FCA Clawdia wearing Pack of Trouble's outfit and her original socks and shoes hehe.

I sold my original two Clawdias during my big purge and then felt bad about splitting up the family.

So she's back where she belongs, on my "one of every character" shelf.

The rest I had to kinda RAM onto my other mh shelf and hope they'd be okay. I uh.. I have reached MH saturation point. I don't think I can actually add any more now. oops? 

And then there's these bits which I honestly have no idea what they are. Can anyone help?

So.. in total I count actually 58? dolls. 55 of which are in good condition. 3 of which are basically bait.

55 dolls plus 3 playsets... not a bad haul, not bad at all.

Most of these will be going on to new homes, most of which are going to Hungary lol. Random.