No pretty eye lids for Arvella

Arvella is my Skate Date.  She came to me already opened so I thought I would customize her eye lids.  Well tonight my husband, the reluctant doll daddy, and I were trying to pop the eye mech out and we heard a scary crack.

Arvella's face plate cracked right in the front.  We quit immediately.  I am no longer planning any drastic customizing.

I am removing eye chips and eye lashes right now.  I don't think I am going to do anything else.

It is okay.  I was looking at Funny Bunny's Sweet Strawberry, who is also a Skate Date, and she is cute without any major changes.

I am very likely to have some photos of Arvella tomorrow.

Pansy is saying good bye

For awhile now Pansy, Takara EBL Fruit Punch, has been unhappy here.  She is cute but I am feel less content with her.  Plus, I am feeling my Blythe family is getting out of hand.

I found a trade offer on Blythe Kingdom about a custom work for a trade of an EBL doll.  I jumped on it. I am sending Fleur, Simply Vanilla, on a spa vacation to China Lilly in Australia.  She will return home with face up, new lashes, 4 new eye chips (2 Brain Worm and 2 hand painted), custom pull cords and lip carving.

I am super happy with the trade.

Good bye, Pansy!

New addition!!

I got a middie!  She is super cute here is some photos:

Size comparison, Angelica Eve, Macaroon Q Tea Party, and Kitchen Queen.

She is perpetually sad looking.

Clothing by me.  I used the Puchi Collective patterns at a smaller ratio.

The poor girl doesn't have a name yet. 

I also purchased/traded a SBL Skate Date from a friend.  I am contemplating lip carving and other customizations.  

I am ordering Hujoo Pastels to use on my Hujoo Wawa. My pastel are just not working.  I am hoping to use them on my Skate Date also.  

Hopefully, finished photos of Sally will be coming up! I need to get her finished before starting any other projects.

Ken the nudist has clothes

Ken finally has clothes.  I still suspicion he brandishes about naked late at night.  Good thing he is on a shelf away from the ladies.

Nicki Manaj

I feel finished with my custom Nicki Manaj.  Right now she is my favorite lady rapper, pop singer, what ever she is considered.

I purchase the most perfect wig for her! Pink.

My little brother (who is not so little) saw the wig and said, "Nicki Manaj!" The best part is he had no idea about my current undertaking.

I have new clothing for Nicki (thanks, Barbie) but the lighting was terrible.  She is hard to photograph.

The Barbie clothing were really strange.  It is like toy clubbing clothing- all that was missing was a bottle of booze. I haven't been into Barbie for years and fortunately my daughter prefers Blythe.  I guess I was oblivious to the slut-wear.

I am looking for pink giraffe print to make a body suit like the one seen in "Super Bass" video.  No such luck yet.  I have been checking baby clothing for a tee or pants.

I made this hot pink dress this past weekend.

Photos of my daughter's new Basaak doll coming after Christmas morning! I have her ready with a box full of clothing.  She looks completely different from when I used her for the comparison photos.

Sally has stitches

Sally is starting to look like a rag doll.  This weekend I have had many opportunities to work on her.

Mab Graves necklace

She has received her final paint and I am beginning to draw on her stitches.  The good news is that they are drying and not smearing.

Face plate, socks, necklace and boots

Boots are Ruby Red Gallery.

Socks are made by me.

The body stitches are "organic" looking- a nice way of saying very sloppy.  But, overall I think that is okay.  I am not bothered by them.

Her wardrobe is growing little by little. Now she has socks to go with her boots and necklace.

The face plate is finished also!

Progress Report on Sally

Things have improved since my last update on my Sally the Rag Doll.

I scrubbed and cleaned off the majority of the Valspar paint and have successfully repainted her with Krylon Indoor/Outdoor.

My poor Sally is looking like the Black Dahlia in this photo.

I tried painting her lips last night and decided to give the face plate and body a fine sanding before attempting again.  I really don't like the glossy paint, but had no other option!

A friend of mine, who is a paper maker, is looking into some nice thick handmade artist paper.  All of my paper from my art student days have too much tooth.  I am needing nice smooth, stark white paper for the custom eyes.

I am really happy to see this project starting to come together.  Once my nylon hair came in I started preparing for the knot method of rooting all I was waiting on was the scalp.  Last night I determined it was dry enough so I started on the hair part with the strands.  Now I am sewing wefting on the bulk of the head. I nearly have been late to work twice because of the hair!

Coming soon are photos of my completed Nicki Manaj custom. Or, re-custom! One of my black Blythes now has a Nicki Manaj face up with a perfect pink wig!

My very own wawa

This little guy came to my house.  I had to let him out (and pet him and snugly him) while my husband was not home.  Joe, husband, is jealous that I got to play with my Christmas toy and his has been strictly forbidden.

No, I am not fair. 

Mahahaha. 

Gah, Paint!

Once again, paint has been the issue with my custom Blythe. I am transforming Blythe (clone to be specific) into a Sally from The Nightmare Before Christmas.  This time I thought I covered my bases.

I made sure to buy paint that said most plastics, tested it, sanded the Pure Neemo body, washed the body and still disaster.  I even waited between coats- days and even weeks.

I thought I was putting the last coat of paint on yesterday.  I put some pieces together and the paint slid right off.  Gah.

I looked on Flickr and Google for some answers.  I found a nice "How to Paint on Plastic" tutorial and on Flickr observed that someone used plain Krylon (not Fusion) on her Pure Neemo.

So, last night I started scrubbing- yes, scrubbing - off the paint.  It is pealing right off for most part.

I think I figured out the culprit of my disastrous experience.

My husband, daughter, and I went to pick up a few household goods from the store. One of the goods was dish soap.  I grabbed Gain or something.  My husband said he preferred our previous soap.  Guess what it was- Dawn Hand Renewal with Olay Beauty.  

Okay, so I am assuming the soap put a oily lotion film onto my doll body and that is the problem.

Well, that is at least what I am hoping.

I am sanding the rest of the paint off and washing the body with a different soap.

I am going to use Krylon Indoor/Outdoor.

Wish me luck.

Hujoo Wawa Review

I wanted to share this review.  

I am getting one of these little canines under my Christmas tree.

Heart.  

What do you dress a Burtonesque doll in?

So what do you dress a Burton-esque doll in?  I am trying to create a wardrobe for my Sally the Rag Doll Blythe custom.

Sally is going to have a kitty necklace made by Mab Graves.

photo from Mab Graves Etsy shop

I am so obsessed with Mab Graves right now.

What else would you dress a blue gal in?  

This is the current state of Sally.

ICY Doll

I purchased another so called Blythe Clone.  I guess what makes her a clone is the pull chord system.  I am not sure the reasoning.

She is an Icy Doll.

Whatever the case, I am pretty pleased with her.  I took some photographs to share with my Ravelry friends and I am going to add them here, also.

Photos with her goodies: Dress with arm pieces, shoes, necklace, earrings, purse, and purple dress.  A stand is included not pictured. The pull chord piece is plastic and says her name, Angela.

These eye chips are a nice purple color. Her lip color has a glittery appearance.

These chips are an ice blue.

Something unfortunately is that the stock clothing bled onto her arms.  This happened only on the arms.

Her box has wine bottles and glasses! I find this really funny!

On the box product materials is listed in English.

I read accounts of other Icy Doll's hair being thin. I do not find that this doll in particular.  Her hair is thicker than my Simply Mango and Guava Blythe dolls.  

Some other interesting facts I found on Flickr: 

Scalp system is similar to RBLs

Arms similar to Liccas (my biggest complaint, more in a second)

Legs is the 3 click system like Blythes in general.


The arms seem to be the weakest part of this doll.  I think if I try to shape them too often the wire inside could potential break through the plastic. I do not know how this compares to Liccas.

I will get some photos of this lovely lady soon in clothing.  I am renaming her also.  Angela just doesn't fit her.

New Blythe Patterns!

Apparently cold weather, no internet, and the holidays has jump started my creative juices!

In the past two weeks I have developed six new patterns for Blythe garments.  I had no idea they were even floating around in my noggin.  Once I got started I couldn't stop!

Here the patterns are, if there is a story, I will include it:

Romper for Blythe 

2.50 USD 

Mohair Caplet for Blythe

2.50 USD

Angora Cape for Blythe

2.50 USD

Mohair Skirt for Blythe

2.50 USD

Mohair Coat for Blythe

3.50 USD

This pattern was designed to showcase the button.  It came from my grandmother's button jar.

Angora Coat for Blythe

3.50 USD

I have a new love for angora and mohair!

My internet company went belly up. :( So now we are shopping for a new provider.  I don't know when I will get plugged back in the the world wide web.

From Busty to Flat Chesty

On Ravelry a member of the Knitting for Blythe group inquired about sanding down LPS Petite Blythe's boobage.  I just happened to have a tester LPS Blythe (stolen from my daughter) and a new set of diamond grit files.

I set to work.  It took me only about 20 minutes total to get the flat chest. This will be longer if one is using only sand paper.

Here is a couple of in progress photo and then the final:

in progress

in progress

finished!

finished!

These are both LPS; hence, the eyes open while laying down. 

A few suggestions, lay the body flat and sand across the tops first.  Once the chest starts flattening, sand the top, side and under carriage. I wish I had arrows to show you.  I will see if I can get a photo edited with with arrows to demonstrate where to sand.  I stopped sanding when the black dots appeared. Use a fine grit sand paper to smooth out any uneven spots

Now you have the makings of a boy, or a more child-like Petite!

Basaak vs Blybe comparision

For my new project, Sally the Ragdoll, I order something called a CCE doll.  Which, I call a Blybe. I maybe compleletly incorrect, but I am just going off of the information I got with previous doll. 

So, for the sake of this comparison, I call this little lady a Blybe.

I just happen to have a new Basaak too.  I found one one Blythe Kingdom for a good price and I bought her with the thoughts that it would be awhile before my Blybe comes in the the mail.  She was my back up plan. 

Turns out I did not need a back up plan! The Blybe and Basaak came on the same day!

This was the first time I could do a side by side comparison. So here goes:

Eye chips, Basaak left, Blybe Right:

Eye chip clarity goes to Blybe.  

The Basaak eye chips remind me of ADGs.  They are very difficult to remove.

Left Basaak, Right Blybe: 

The eye mech of the Basaak is slightly smaller than the Blybe.  

Left Basaak, Right Blybe 

For this photo, I could not get the eye mech out of the Basaak head.  I need a second person and my husband is not home. 

The noses are different shapes as are the lips.

The eye holes may have slightly different shapes too, it's hard to tell with the mech still in the Basaak.

This is the Blybe scalp system.  Between the two, it was significantly harder to separate the pieces.

There is a dome and the scalp fits inside it.  That is what this pic is showing.

The two pieces to the Blybe scalp system.

This is the Basaak scalp system.  It is easy to remove, the trick is getting it to stay together. 

It is three pieces- dome, ring, and scalp.  This photo is showing it assembled.  

The three piece to the Basaak scalp system.

Body comparison:

Left- Blybe, Middle- Basaak, Right- Takara 

The Blybe is smaller than the other two with a fixed waist and slanted feet like Barbie.  The other two are very similar except the Basaak quality is poor.

What fate does the Basaak face? 

I plan to fix her up for my daughter.  R has Pinkie and Margo already, but I don't really need another doll for myself.  I thought about practicing some carving on her and maybe bobbing her hair.  Decisions, decisions....

Coming up tomorrow is my Petite Blythe experiment.

WaWa Love

I so want Hujoo WaWa.

OMG, who could say no to this image:

I want! I want! I want!

I have to start super saving for this little cutey.