Sindy 2021 - Fashion Blogger

 The first black sindy made for the UK market! 

that's pretty special isn't it?

Now i'm gonna admit, i'm still salty that the teased black collector sindy never got made but at least the playline version made it to production. 

Back in the late 70s Sindy finally made it to the USA, distributed by Marx toys. They didn't last long but the few dolls they did make included Gayle, a dark skinned Sindy on an active/ballerina body. Later they also released a standard bodied dark skinned sindy under the name of "black sindy" as well. 

Neither were released in the UK and weren't made in great numbers in the US either which makes Gayle and her basic bodied sister very very hard to find. They tend to sell for well over £200 at this point which is frankly INSANE for a playline doll imo. And a lot of us doll collectors could never justify such a price. 

So naturally, Fashion Blogger is the one that keeps selling out online. Lol. 

Sindy 2021 - Kid Kreations playline Sindy dolls - Riding Club Sindy

 It's SINDY TIME!

lol. 

no seriously, I woke up at 8:30 this morning to the news on facebook that Sindy had finally hit Argos. Everyone in the Sindy group lost their collective shit, it was glorious. We might have broken Argos for a bit, and risked breaking Facebook again (hahahahah)

Anyway, 

let's start from the begining shall we?

Back in 2020 Kid Kreations released their collector line Sindy dolls, a collection of 6 dolls inspired by the vintage dolls but redesigned for the modern era. 

At a whopping £79:99 they were pretty pricey and a bit prohibitive, but I ended up with all of them anyway thanks to a few sales and some lucky ebay sales. 

You can find my review of some of them here

Now I was quite pleased to see Sindy back, but the price point was a bit painful and the loss of the Dog Walker Sindy (the black one) left me pretty salty. 

But come 2021 KK annouced, a little out of the blue "oh hey, we're doing a playline range, here they are."

Available only through Sainsburys supermarkets and Argos, the exact release date for the 6 new playline dolls is a bit uncertain. Hence the excitement to have two of them suddenly appear available to order from Argos this morning. 

So I treked to Argos and picked up Fashion Blogger and Horse Rider. 

Let's do this thing!

HelloNana Nana dolls - Nana Makeba

 So this is an unusual one.

In my random ebay scrolling I came across a listing for a doll i'd never seen before, new in box.

It peaked my curiosity and was pretty inexpensive so I picked her up. 

 

 

Glo Up Girls by Farout toys

 
I always find new dolls lines interesting, especially when they're from toy companies you've never heard of. 

it's interesting to see what fresh new stuff might hit the market. 

Glo Up girls are made by a company named Farout Toys, who prior to this have been mostly known for Love, Diana and Ryan's World blind bag toys and a couple of gimmicky kids board games. 

From what I can establish, they're a pretty new company and tiny. 

So it was a bold move to try a fashion doll when the market is so saturated with those and big hitters like MGA and Mattel are looming large over that whole aisle. 

It was also bold to opt for a higher price point product. At £25 the Glo up girls are NOT a cheap alternative. They're only £5 less than a Rainbow High or LOL OMG doll and more expensive than a LOT of Barbie's offerings. 

so are they worth the price and are they worth the shelf space? 

Rainbow High Jett Dawson

 She's finally here! 

And she was bloody expensive. 

At £60 this is a pricey set, but I took the plunge because well, I have poor impulse control okay?

Bratz 20th anniversary reproduction Cameron

 2021 is Bratz 20th anniversary apparently, which is pretty cool. I mean I feel old but I was in my teens when Bratz launched so I lack the same level of nostelgia a lot of people who were kids back then have.

So when MGA said they were rereleasing their original dolls I was like "that's kinda cool but whatever."

Until they also mentioned they'd release one of the boyz.

Now as I said, I was a teenager when Bratz launched but when I first got into doll collecting Bratz Boyz were the first line that really grabbed my attention. It was toward the end of Bratz initial run but it meant they were pretty cheap on ebay and I fell in love with the idea of this boy only doll line. 

I really like the Bratz Boyz, they're still one of my favourite doll lines so i'm always eager to get a hold of new Boyz stuff lol. 

I ordered Cameron off Amazon on July 7th, at that point they were claiming they'd have stock in a week or so. Well that ended up being six weeks before he FINALLY came into stock. Frustrating as all four girls had been in stock for well over a month.

But he finally arrived, which was a relief because there was a period where I was wondering if MGA had simply changed their minds about releasing him at all. 

LOL OMG opposites club Moonlight BB and Sunshine Girl

 Yeah MORE omg. I know I know... I admit it, i'm kinda addicted to them okay?

These two have been teased for ages and FINALLY I found someone in the UK selling them for retail. They don't seem to have hit regular stores yet, I dunno why. It's SLOOOOW here in the UK for toys this time of year and it's really frustrating. 

Anyway, 

let's get into it.

LOL OMG Present Surprise - Miss Glam

You know, when this girl was first annouced I was like "meh pass" but then I saw the doll and fell head over heels. 

Wierd how that happens sometimes right?

Anyway, let's get into this.

LOL BTW be tweens by MGA

 It's finally here! RESTOCK!

or rather, partial restock.

A lot of stuff still hasn't hit or had any sign of doing so before september but some new stuff hit so... yay partial restock?

This means new LOLs including the brand new line, the BTW or "Be Tweens" (Anyone else feel like MGA are kinda scrambling for acronyms at this point? lol)

Let's get into it.

 

It's clearance time!

 That's right, after weeks of boring nothing newness, it's finally time. Reset looms, which means stores are clearing old stock in preparation.

Which means bargains to be had! 

So of course I couldn't resist. I've been waiting for a few things to go onto clearance and while I didn't buy everything I wanted because I decided to have SOME restraint, I did get a lot of new goodies. Ahem. 

I know I know, i'm a slacker.

 I have been really slacking off on the doll updates. It's not that I haven't been working on stuff, albeit slowly, it's just I haven't really felt like I had anything worthwhile or interesting enough to share. 

I haven't bought any new dolls this month as i've been paying off a layaway instead, which has taken all my funds and i'm waiting for a few things to drop in price anyway.

But I did realise I have several things I didn't actually talk about already here because i'm forgetful <_< 

lol. 

So here's a random assortment of dolls!

I'm alive! honest! (March roundup)

 I've been pretty bad at keeping up to date I know. Fact is, we're at the drought point in the year and i'm not able to get out to stores like I would usually.

More sadly, our local charity shop is closing down, unable to survive lockdown 3 (or is it 4? i've lost track honestly) which means i'll have far fewer "thrift store fun" stuff going forward. 

However, Ebay is still an option and toy stores are still shipping. I just... I dunno, i'm finding a lot of playline stuff isn't really doing it for me. 

Rainbow are very pretty sure, but something about their faces, particularly their rather blank eyes makes me find it difficult to warm to them. Having purchased the ones I liked best I feel no real drive to go out and complete the collection and i'm not entirely sure WHY. It could be that colour blocking just isn't my jam. It could be that their faces are all a bit too samey that I see no reason to have a lot of them... whatever the case, with those being the big "must have" right now I find myself apparently in the minority for not getting as excited about them. 

Meanwhile Barbie continues to be boring with terrible clothing, cheap hair and grainy dotty facepaint. Which is a shame as a few of the last fashionistas had really nice sculpts but they're so screwed over by the crappy printed faces and I don't want to have to repaint them you know? I don't see the point of paying full price for something i'd have to fix. 

Which leaves us really with just LOL OMG. And I mean I quite like the LOL OMG dolls because their costumes are really fun and varied and despite all having the same face the variety of hair colours, styles and makeup helps to differentiate them a bit. 

I dunno, they appeal to me more than Rainbow High does despite Rainbow High arguably being the better value buy. 

so this month i've bought a few Rainbow High dolls on clearance... ahem. 

I mean at £21 it was rather too tempting. At full price of £30-40 I was holding off on getting any more but then loads of them dropped to £21-24 and I was like "sweet, i'll have that."

lol. 

I also went a little mad with aliexpress. 

So let's take a look at my March purchases shall we?

It's a huge plushie bundle!

 Something a little different this time. Instead of a huge doll bundle, today I picked up a huge Plush bundle instead lol. 

It was free, but collection only a fair trip away (two bus rides hahaha) but I haven't left the house in so long it was an excuse to go outside. 

It's febuary already? - A monthly (ish) roundup

 2021 seems to be shooting by, but I suppose it's difficult to determine the passage of time when you're stuck in the house 24/7. 

Still, lockdown and late season snow hasn't stopped me from indulging in online shopping. In fact it's probably made things worse. 

I've noticed the prices of most stuff on ebay is shooting up as more and more people give in to boredom and go on a spree, and a lot of parents are desperately ordering toys to try to amuse their house bound kids who are off school for the forseeable future. 

I've been trying to be good, trying to sort of focus on finishing up stuff I have here (like getting wigs and eyes and stuff for bjds who need them still) but inevitably the "new stuff!" itch happens and I end up splurging on stuff just for the sake of that momentary buzz of seratonin. 

Dum de dum. 

So let's have a look at "stuff I bought this month"!

Fail Fix PrettyArtee by Moose

 New catalogue day!

though the past few years Argos really hasn't made much of a fuss about the launch of their new lines, which is a shame because new catalogue day used to be a big event for myself and husband. It only happens twice a year, when the big restock happens (it's the fourth Saturday in January and then again in the summer) and back in "the day" we'd make a day of it. I'd hit every Argos in town, get on a train to the nearby other city and hit their Argos too as back then they used to actually get stock IN for new catalogue day.

Nowadays it seems half the stuff isn't actually due for release till weeks if not months after the catalogue launches, it's bizarre. 

Anyway, new catalogue day happened and Argos' site was glitchy as heck for most of the day but while a lot of new stuff wasn't in stock, the new Fail Fix girl was. 

What's nice about Argos is they do same day delivery for the same cost as any other day and I can use my Nectar points (that's a loyalty card scheme for the non Brits) for some money off. 

Sadly Fail Fix as a line haven't really had much hype related to them, but I really like them so of course I needed to get the new girl.

Let's take a look at her shall we?

Happy New Year!

 Good riddance 2020, oh god it's 2021. 

lol. 

Still, Happy New Year to everyone. 

This time of year in the UK usually means a massive drought in terms of toys. Restock isn't till the end of the month so January is a BORING month. You have all this christmas cash and nothing to buy. And that's when you're not on lockdown as well. *sigh*

In London we're being told not to even leave the house unless we HAVE to so it's pretty major. And what do you do when you're housebound? Why, you go crazy on ebay don't you?

Well, I did. <_<