James, maybe

A couple of months ago I posted about the doll formerly know as Gidget.  I believe I'm naming her James and she has new hair!

A friend on IG/Ravelry had purchased this wig from Sleepy Elf.  She offered it up for me since this is exactly what I was looking for this doll.

I glued the wig on since there was no way it was staying otherwise.  I had dyed a Simply Vanilla scalp to switch back and forth with but it did not improve or enhance her.

Simply Vanilla hair is more yellow than it appears hence the green tint.

Remember Gidget?

Remember the Factory/TBL Gidget with a tan?

I tried selling her without success.  She's my last fakie.  There is not resale value and I like to sell my dolls too often to buy ones that have no second hand market value.  Since I cannot sell her, I customized her.

I cut the hair off of her scalp.  I'm looking for the perfect wig for her.  I'm thinking peacock blue.  She is no longer named Gidget.  She is back to no name.  This was my first custom using a dremel tool.  I over carved her eye sockets.  I will be more careful in the future.

Moth Rowan, part 3

Simply Love Me scalp

Should I keep searching for a Frosty Frock scalp???

I can't decided.

Moth Rowan, part 2

Moth Rowan made it to me safe and sound.  It was a pleasant surprise when I found that her original Fruit Punch (FruPu) scalp was included.

Right off I  tried the FruPu scalp and then went to taking her apart.  This was the first time I've ever seen EBL insides first hand.  I figured why not since she had been opened before.  There are better photos out there, but I thought I would snap them anyways (see below).

Face inside

Back inside

One of my concerns about her Simply Vanilla scalps is that I have Simply Vanilla with her original scalp still.  Turns out the only similarity they have is the scalp.  

I would like to try a Frosty Frock scalp on Moth.  Dr. Blythenstein posted a comparison photo of Border Spirit, Simply Love Me, and Frosty Frock's hair colors.  Simply Love Me (SLM) and Frosty Frock are really close.  I found SLM one for sale on BK, so I nabbed it.  I have a WTB on BK, also.  I figure the chances of finding a Frosty Frock could be slim. The SLM will at least give me an idea if I want to continue the search or not.  

P.S.  FBL scalp is not a perfect fit on EBL.  I doubt SBL or RBL scalps are either, but I'm not really concerned.  However, I wanted to warn anyone who wants to try scalps on an EBL thinking they would be a perfect fit.

Blythe a Day: June 3rd- 9th

June 3rd: Rainbow- Knit the rainbow.  Monroe working on a silk rainbow top.

June 4th: Laundry- Gidget is having one of those days where she has to wash clothes to have something to wear!

Extra: A chihuahua is always nearby.

June 5th: Decisions, decisions- Merrick is debating, healthy orange or sugary cupcake.

June 6th: Seashore- Peach and Pretzel are packed for the seashore. I haven't broken it to them that we are land locked.

June 7th: Don't give up- Nova posing with my grad school official transcript.  It was a challenging two years, but I did it.

June 8th: Stars/Moon- Moon showing off her star on her cheek and moon eye chips.

June 9th: Birthday- Lemon says, "It's my birthday and I can wear my dragon suit if I want to."

Extras:  

Top view- placement of items to get a clear view of face

Close up

Toy soldiers and chihuahua

To show the scale of the soldiers

Moon

My Can Can Cat, Moon (previously known as Paris), made a journey to and from New York safely.  She received a full make over while visiting Coffeedove.

I'm loving her galaxy style shadow.  It is so bright and fun.  I quickly threw together the outfit she is pictured in.  I will have to dig through my stuff to find other items for her.  At the moment I cannot think of anything suitable, but sometimes the most unlikely outfits look good on the most unlikely candidates.

Here are all of her chips:

I have another idea for a custom doll!  She will have to wait until I get some other things taken care of first.  I am really excited, but it is sad having to wait.

LPS Petite Project

I found the car interior paint in my town that I have used for making black Blythes! I was so excited I bought a can.

I sprayed this little girl down.  She was floating around without hair until this weekend.  I finally discovered where I put my easy peasy rerooting tool.  It was in a good spot actually.  I just forgot I put it in my sewing basket.

This is Pilot (the pen company, I believe) Purple to Blue thermal hair.  First thing my daughter singed the hank to make it turn colors up against our heater. It is super heat sensitive and melts quickly.  It changes with the slightest touch now.

purple

blue

I really love the blue with the dark brown skin color.  I wish that I would have bought blue to mix with the thermal.  I was trying to get out of my comfort zone (blue) to wild (purple).

Now to find where I stashed her body!

ETA- Found her body.  Created this collage with hair in transition between colors:

La Tora's make over

Years and years ago (translation: 3 or 4 years ago) I purchased a Blythe clone doll, Basaak, for my daughter.  She was young, too young for a Blythe.  She ended up with 3 customized Basaak dolls.  La Tora is the youngest of the group which I purchased through Blythe Kingdom.

After many years of play La Tora was in bad need of a re-make over and hair treatment.

Left, "quitting while I'm ahead" philtrum, Right, "okay, let's try it" philtrum

I was not overly adventurous with carving.  I am still not overly confident in it.  I took a chance in carving her a more defined nose, philtrum, and lips.  As bizarre as it sounds, I observe the philtrum in actresses and "real life" people to demystify a feature I never thought about prior to Blythe.

Before photos:

After photos:

I kept the make up design basically the same.  The heart was upon request this time.  I couldn't get eye lashes back in to the slot this time.  La Tora got a new body also- an Icy body.

Poe's adventures

I bought Poe, SBL Pow Wow Poncho, from eBay maybe a little over a year ago.  The seller lived about 2.5 hours from me which I found interesting.  I only know of one other Blythe collector in my state.

She arrived without her stock eye shadow and that typical SBL downward gaze.  If I remember right, she had a slight melt mark from her pull chord which I buffed out.

I started following a fellow Blythe collector on Instagram named Coffeedove.  I was drawn in by her images of reptiles, and other animals, and her illustrations.  About a week ago Coffeedove posted an offer of free custom work.  I though why not!

I never could decide what to do with poor Poe.  She is the most neglected doll in my collection.  In preparation for her travels I opened up Poe.  I've had some experience opening SBLs, including the hack saw method.

Now, she looks amazing!  The following are Coffeedove's images:

First image and lid painting

Lids, Very Vicky chips (in prior to travels), pull chords

hand painted chips

Very Vicky chips with faceup

I should be seeing her on Monday!  

Blythe hair cutting tips

Typically, I cut my Blythe's hair on a whim without planning.  So far, no one is bald.

This time with my new Factory Heather Sky-like Blythe, I put some planning into the hair cut.  Due to the thickness of her hair and it being from a different type of material than Takara released Blythes, I had to cut more like an actually hair dresser.  Here are a few tips and methods I used:

1.  Tape the doll stand to the work surface and secure Blythe to the stand.

I'm using an ADG stand and I tied ribbon around her legs to keep her stationary. Do not forgot to secure the pull chord so it does not get cut also.  I wrapped her's around her neck. 

 Here are the types of combs I used and how I proportioned her hair out to cut in layers.

2.  As shown above I used the comb with the metal pic to split the hair around to make it thinner to cut.  I went along the full line rooting of the scalp.  For some reason I did not take of a photo...   The first layer is the hardest.   

The other comb was needed to for the larger teeth.  I used it to comb out the hair in between cuts.

Start by cutting the hair longer than you intended.  If the hair is wet, it could shrink up significantly.   You can always trim off a little more and you will trim more in the finishing.  I also quickly learned that I cut at an angle even holding the hair in between my fingers as a guide.*  

After the first layer, I realized that this hair texture needed to be damp for cutting.  On stock Takara, I typically cut dry.  I dipped the comb into the water rather than wetting the entire hair.  This helped by making the hair just heavy enough to stay in place while I was cutting.

3.  Once finishing with the first layer, split up another section of hair.  This layer is much easier to cut since you go by the bottom layer!  

Repeat dropping more and more hair until you are finished trimming it all.  

After doing this, clean up strands that you missed and level it out.  Get down eye level with the front side of the hair combed at the same points of the face.

You can see that the hair is slightly damp.

After trimming bangs and length

There are other tutorials out there for bang cutting.  I just trimmed these to even them out a bit.  My main warning/suggestion is to be careful not to let the scissors scrap Blythe's forehead.  I cut little bits at a time.

Scissors- I used my sewing ones...probably not a very good thing for the sewing scissors.

The hair pile.

*I nearly cut my finger.  Please be careful.

As always, if you choose to use my suggestions you take full responsibility for damage to your doll or yourself.  I am by no means professional.  I just prefer to do things myself. 

Elf Bomber Jacket

For people who are wondering if the Elf on the Shelf Bomber Jacket will fit Blythe the answer is- kind of!  It is over sized and has velcro down the under side and sides of the sleeves, but over all fits pretty well.  I surmise the velcro placement is to make it easier to dress the elf.

Severus and Coco

A friend on Flickr said she removed the velcro and stitch the jacket together.  She scrunched the sleeves to make them shorter for Blythe's arms.  I didn't bother, but good to know that it could be done.

I love the patches.  They are Christmas themed, but could easily be painted over.  You could even create tiny patches and sew them over then decals.  The best feature is the working zipper.

Is that a Mermaid?

Story goes like this, I was watching Alfred Hitchcock Presents on Netflix and was looking at all of the items that my daughter left in the den, one being a Blythe body.  I assume this body is a factory body since I have not found any of my formally released dolls bodies falling apart.  It fell right apart without much persuasion.

This is the first time I've gotten to see how the legs function.  The peg that is inside the leg that is inserted into the hip to created joints have a more rotating motion that I did not expect.  The reason this is not noticed on the doll is because of the way the hip hits the "groin" area; it makes the legs' motion more fixed.

Interesting stuff, huh?

I pulled the plastic away from the hip and cut the piece to get the hip joint I needed for my experiment.  After some whittling, sanding, cutting, and, finally, dremeling, I was able to get the joints the exact size to insert into the Monster High Create-a-Monster mermaid fin.

It is not a tight permanent hold yet.  I have to problem solve that.  For most part, the project went as I wanted it too.  The tail was not designed for a head as big as Blythe so a stand will be needed to hold her up.  I  used my customized TBL as the test subject.

Sorry for the blurry pic.

I do not care for the pink band's decor, but I really does make the fin look more complete.

This doll is still for sale.  To see her specs, see this post:  TBL for Sale---SOLD.  As of right now she is "as is."  I might remake her some and try to sale her later.  If I do that, I will consider selling the mermaid body with her. :)

No Dresses for Severus

Great news! The Licca Boyfriend body is actually just about the same size as a Blythe body! Severus is pleased, now he won't be wearing dresses.

The boy body has slightly longer arms and legs, but this isn't enough to worry.  I surmised that the feet were really close to Licca and Blythe and I was right!  The boots that come with Prairie Prose(?),* Cousin Olivia, Slow Nimes, Gentle River, etc. fit perfectly.

You can see a little bit of wrist, but not enough to matter.

Since daylight savings time my afternoons are already dark and I have mediocre photos.  Sorry!  Severus is wearing Coolcat shirt, Over the Stripes pants, and PP's boots.  

I was really happy to know that I am not starting completely over on his wardrobe.  I have several pairs of cargo-style pants like OTS and Casual Affair.  OTS stock is perfect.  The set was on the masculine side, except for the skirt maybe.  I also think Love Mission's police uniform might be passable for Severus.

A new adventure started last night when I found a falling apart Factory Blythe body.  Hint?  The is a tail. Bahahah! Feeling a little bit like a mad scientist of plastic.

*I can never remember her full release name.  The redhead with freckles that came in a prairie-style outfit.