Okay yes, I know, it's been months. The end of the year is chaotic for me and this year it was just a mess. I had no motivation to do doll stuff.
But i'm back now, i'm actually alive and all that.
And i've FINALLY gotten a hold of Rainbow High Emi Vanda.
Why has it taken me so long? Well 1: I'm cheap so I didn't want to buy all of the wave 3 ones I wanted at once (because it's ouch expensive) and 2: She kept going out of stock.
Let's get into this.
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.
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!
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.
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?
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?
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.
