Blythe a Day October 19th-22nd, 31st

October 19th Favorite ghost story- Lady in Black: A young woman fell in love with a man from a rival school and He left her for a freshman at his own school. The lady in black took her own life out of despair and today she searches out the freshman girl who stole her beau still to this day.

October 20th- fall: I cheated. Our fall colors are still pretty green at the moment

October 21st- Halloween decor:  My plastic pumpkin that goes up every year.

October 22nd- Hats:  Moth out in the yard in her casual clothes.

Then my nephew was born and my BaD fell apart, lol.  I had planned to jump into the middle of the month and do all of the fun Halloween themed days.

I never got this posted for the last day of BaD October 31st,  but this is what Moth wore for trick or treating:

The romper is little Lalaloopsy, Nicki Lad glasses, and Mandy Cotton Candy boots.  

New knitting pattern- Swimsuit for Blythe

Modeled by Moth

I've made all kinds of bathing suits for Blythe.  I have never written out the pattern though.  After releasing the one for Petite Blythe I had a request to write one up for Neos.  I took me a lot longer to actually get the pattern out than it did to knit it! 

I should work up one for Middie also.  The one for Wonderfrogs does not fit Middie.  If I remember correctly, the problem is in the shape of Middie's chest versus the frogs.  I would also like to design a few other suits maybe eventually.

You can find the pattern on Etsy or through Ravelry.  It's 3.50 USD.  

P.S.  The suit fits both Takara Blythe bodies and Licca bodies.

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.

Moth Rowan

Another Blythe joins my ranks today, Moth Rowan.  She has been carved by Milky Robot and her face up is by Little Dear (Merwing on Flickr, also the author of Doodle Stitching.)

Merwing's photo from Flickr.

Moth Rowan will probably keep her name, but I think she will be known as Moth.  Moth started out in this world as an EBL Fruit Punch.  She has a Licca body and I believe she has sleepy eyes.

I have had a FruPu before and overtime I fell completely out of love with her.  I really love EBL customs.  I'm pretty excited to see Moth today (she is out for delivery as I type.)

Only change I may make eventually is her scalp.  I would like to see if I can find her a Frosty Frock scalp maybe.  I'm going to wait on it.

Lottie dolls

When you collect dolls that are not mainstream, like Barbie, Bratz, etc., you are constantly searching for clothing and shoes to fit that doll. With Middie Blythes there are a few options for shoes and clothing.

Mattel's Chelsea (and friends) and Kelly/Tommy dolls shoes fit Middie, but the clothing does not. Some shirts almost fit with Velcro extensions. And, surprisingly, some Monster High tops and bottoms work. 

Clothing made for Lati Yellow fit Middie. Beware the shoes DO NOT fit; Lati's feet are larger. 

Jun Planning's Ai BJD dolls clothing fit really well. They can be a little short, but I find this adorable. Some shoes might work on Middie if they are boots. The Mary Janes are way too big. 

I am sure there are other items out there besides the above mentioned.

Stargazer, Fossil Hunter, Rockabilly, Muddy Puddles

One doll that shoes and clothing are nearly always a perfect fit is Lottie doll. 

Lottie is an UK company, Arklu, that has dedicated itself to creating healthy image dolls for little girls. They are really sweet and have good quality clothing and accessories. These days, that has become a rarity- "good quality, what is that."

Between my daughter and myself, we are up to 8 dolls. They retail for about 20 each- shoes, clothing, and most accessories are a perfect fit. Hats and other head wear obviously will not fit Middie. They work on Petite Blythe!  Separate clothing packs are available also that retail for 10 each.

A new series of Lottie's were released recently and some of those are retailing at 25. They have a few more items with them. For example, Stargazer came with a telescope and Fossil Hunter has a backpack, excavating tools, and "fossils." The new Muddy Puddles has yellow rain boots and jacket! I about died from a cuteness overload.  

Each doll seems to be slightly different so far in looks and skin tones. There is one that reminds me of my Pakistani friends, especially their little sister. Right now both of the blondes have blue eyes. I hope they release green and brown eyed girls too.

Stargazer, Muddle Puddles, Autumn Leaves

Rockabilly, Pandora's Box

Branksea Festival, Fossil Hunter, Rockabilly, Pandora's Box

I love Lottie's diversity.  It make is hard to part with even one doll.

Darwin, Wonderfrog, in Lottie shorts and tights.  They are charming even if they are over sized.

I hope to order more soon.  I'm starting to think I need them all. 

Don't they look like they could be Licca-Chan's little sister?

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.

Little Severus

Little Severus (name for now) is complete with a boy body!  I ordered the Licca Boyfriend to be the donor.

The neck is a lot different than Licca.  I did not get photos of any of my alterations, but there is a good photo on Flickr by a customizer.*  I essentially mimicked her solution.  I did find that the two pieces of the body at the neck was not sealed well so I had to resort to a type of glue, that I will not mention, to keep the screw in to hold the washer.*

Severus and Gatsby.  

Severus is about one inch taller than a stock Blythe.  Gatsby has a Licca body.

His feet do seem to be very similar to this Licca's feet.  I am hopeful that I have shoes that will fit him. So far, all that I know will fit him is his stock clothing.  I will try out the rest of Over the Stripes stock. 

I hope to sew him some jeans and make him a knitted slouchy hat this weekend.

*Search "boy Blythe."   The customizer is named Astrosnik.

*It is not recommended type of glue for dolls.

Little Boy

I have in the past tried to create a boy Blythe.  It was not a success.  I gave it another try with an Icy doll.  I have seen some really amazing boys from Icy dolls on Flickr and I happened to have one on hand.

The base dolls is the blue hair Police woman.

This is the first try:

I wasn't happy.

He does not have hair in this photo and I did not have money to buy anything.  

I decided to use the original scalp.  It looks really cute with the part line off to the side so I will be attempting to glue it off center.

This is the most recent photo of him:

Isn't he Snape like with the blue hair?

I sanded the lips again. Re-did some of the faceup.  It is really hard to find a happy place between too boring and too much.  I took a chance and added indigo into his eyebrows.  There is blue shadow around his eyes just to depth.

Right now his still has the green eyes from the first photo.  I like the brown eyes the best.  This a project on a budget so I will re-purpose the green by painting them.

Now, to order him a body.  I'm going to try the Licca boyfriend doll as a body donor.  

I hope to share him completed soon.

Progress-ish

The paper got caught by the wind.  Fortunately nothing was damaged.

Still pissed over how the paint is spraying.  In this next photo you can see how the paint is speckling. The back plate has been sprayed with MSC already (then I stuck my finger in it GAH), the face plate looks terrible!!

I am going to sand her down again and try respraying her.  Then try it again.  The MSC seemed to even out the back plate's paint and made it look prettier.

When I stuck my finger in the MSC (at right bottom screw hole), it caused a huge wrinkle.  I will be sand that area down again as well.

Every time when I start a painting project I think I've got if figured out.  Well, I don't.  The last time I bought this paint it sprayed nice and smooth.  This can seems to cough it out...

Ugh.  I will make this work.

The Licca is still tacky.  I may strip the paint and get plastic primer.  I should have did that first, but you know, I apparently like to do it the hard way.

I do hope to have this girl together by Monday.  She will be so lovely if everything else goes as planned!

Painting

I always say I'm going to take progress photos and then get into the moment.  I sprayed my head pieces and the Licca body yesterday.  I do not think the Licca is going to work.  The legs felt like they were drying but this morning they are sticky again.

I'm not overly thrilled how the paint is spraying from the bottle.  In fact, it pisses me off considering how much I paid for it.  I'm hoping another coat will even out the overall look.

I will spray the Neemo body today and give the Licca body probably a week dry time.  Since I have 3 body options, I don't feel as rushed to get things finished.

After I painted the face plate, I realized that I did not enlarge the eye sockets to compensate for the painted eye lids.  That will require repainting.  Since the paint is not as smooth as I wished for, I'm going to give her a light sanding before the next coat of paint.  If I'm correct, this is a proper way to paint anyways.

I will attempt to get a photo to insert into this post later.

Trying it again

Lately, I've been gathering supplies to give another African American Blythe a go. Since my last attempts, there has been a fair bit more experimentation and a good article written on these lovelies.

Here is the supply list:

Head plates
Eye mech- about to order
Cool Cat dome- about to order
Belton RAL paint- about to order
Non-tilt neck Licca body
Hasbro World of Love, Soul body
Pure Neemo Flection Medium body
Cool Cat Scalp
MSC
Mohair wig- will order eventually

I know that the paint will match Soul's body, but I wanted to experiment a bit on the other 2 bodies. The Licca body had to be taken back from R (she's not happy).  It was the Ebay one that was stained and discolored-- perfect painting candidate. (See the label "Licca" for the post)

I may eventually order the 2nd dome piece, but I have spare scalps.  I will glue it down to make the wig stay on better.

The prospective date for this project to start will be in about 3-4 weeks depending on how quickly the pieces will arrive.  The paint is in the US so that should be snappy. If the eye mech makes it before the dome I can go ahead and start the project.  The dome really doesn't have to be painted.

I plan to spray paint the head plates without any carving.  Essentially, I want her to look exactly like a stock Blythe with different skin tone.  I may attempt to paint on lips but I doubt it. I just want her to be simple and pretty.

Hopefully all will go well.

What's going on?

This weekend's sewing was rather disappointing at first.  One of my fabrics kept ripping at the stitches.  I believe it was because my stitches were set too large.  I plan to try again.

After 3 fails, I did successfully make a few thing for my girls and shop. I didn't get pics of my personal items, but here are a few of the items for Blythe Knits:

To see the bloomers go to the Etsy link:  https://www.etsy.com/listing/121210225/eyelet-dress-and-bloomers-for-blythe

Here is another listing for bloomers:  https://www.etsy.com/listing/121227555/toy-box-bloomers-for-blythe-white-and

I only uploaded a few pics to my Flickr to show my second Icy's face up!  Pretty, right?  Poor girl is still nameless.  Maybe Imp? 

Well, at first I inadvertently made her look like Mimi from The Drew Carey Show:

Not at all what I wanted!!

I thought I was going to reroot her in lemon yellow mohair.  After washing her scalp and the make up being more elegant, I have no plans doing it.  I will use the mohair for a shop scalp or something.

I hope my 3rd Icy gets here soon!

The little Licca arm donor showed up on Saturday.  Claudia now has perfectly matching Licca arms.  I was really surprised by the perfect match!

Sorry for her naked appearance.  I want full visibility on the color.

I plan to go shopping on Friday for room box stuffs and more shadow boxes!

Room box it

I want a room box for my Blythes.  I tried to buy supplies on Saturday, but realized that I didn't know what I was doing!

The wood planks I were exactly 12 inches high and I need my hubby's assistance (he was in ass-mode) to plan out how to make it taller.  I abandoned the project all together until next paycheck.

Look at my knitting/dolly friend's room box:  http://www.flickr.com/photos/knitnchoc/sets/72157632362270271/ .  Helen is an inspiration with her creations.  Check out her dolls too!!

I did get a shadow box to make a room for a Petite. I think it will be a nice once I can work on it.  The Petite that will call it home is my Moon Flower, Hollywood Hills Party. Sadly, I no longer can play with her because her plastic is cracking on her arms and legs.  I fear she will fall apart soon.  I can do a body transplant when it happens but I will loose her sweet painted on undergarment. :(  It was a very sad day when I discovered her injuries.

The plans for the shadow box includes: removing the glass, papering the back board, painting the frame (or just a sliver tarnished looking layer), and adding little pretties.  I guess she will just stand since I can't bend Moon Flower's legs.

The glass has to be broken out.  For some reason it is not removable any other way.  That is the hold up. Everything else should be fun and easy.  Since Moon Flower is a mini-Marilyn Monroe, the room box will be Hollywood Glam...although, I'm not sure how to pull that off.  I sure will try though!!

Moon Flower looking glamorous.

Maybe I can create a chandelier from beads.  OH, that would be awesome.  If the box was a bit bigger I could even add red theater-like curtains and have them pull back-- maybe next time....

In other dolly news, I did my second arm transplant.  I learned a lot from the first so this one went much better on Blythe arm removal and Blythe arm reinsertion.  I'm much happier now about my mini-me girl.

Oh, I was bad. I bought 2 more Icy dolls!!  Considering how much the first one did not really appeal to me, I'm really loving my new ones!  I haven't customized the second one yet.  I'm still debating on her hair.  I bought mohair yesterday to dye.  I guess I should wait until then before I decide on the faceup. Odds are I won't wait.

This time I got the Police woman who has dark blue hair and the Halloween/witch one with purple hair.  The witch is intended for R.  I showed her last night and she seems excited about the purple hair.

Fun stuff ahead...

Licca feet update

One of my new Liccas feet do not fit Blythe shoes as well.  Oh course, loose fitting boots will fit.  I'm seriously thinking about switching arms rather than keeping the Licca body on the doll in particular.  I liked using her for my Etsy photos and I rather show the clothing on stock bodies.  Plus, her hips are really loose and she will not keep a pose.

Since the Licca in question has a tilty neck I assume she is new and that all the new dolls have slightly larger and wider feet.  This means for Blythe shoes to fit, feet alteration will be required.

Licca

I know I have been making references to Licca dolls.  I'm not familiar with the doll except for people using them for the bodies. Yikes that sounds naughty but it isn't, I promise!  I've been comparing them to American's Barbie doll and apparently I'm right! They are the Japanese fashion doll.

I bought one on a whim off of Blythe Kingdom.  And, I actually like her.  Off course, she became a body donor for Gatsby.

They are great.  Their heads just pop off and the neck part fits just about perfect on a Blythe.  

Edited to add:  Something I forgot to mention, Licca and Blythe are both manufactured by Takara.  I'm thinking that maybe one reason for the compatibility.  (More down below about clothing and shoes.)

Then I was left with a charming little red-haired head.  R found the head and wanted it.  Here she is now with a Blythe body:

Quite cute.

I'm surprised by how cute they are in person.  I bought another one off of Ebay and she is much different that this one.  Well for one, the plastic has discolored and her bust is much smaller.  I don't know enough about Liccas to identify one type over another.

My 2 new ones seem to have the same bust as the first one.  Except they did not have the collar bone bumps which I sanded off of the first one.  

The 2 new ones both had tilty necks.  One was taller than the other so she became an arm donor as mentioned in my previous blog post.

Sorry about her nakedness...Here she is with Blythe arms.

My first NRFB Licca is winging her way to me. She is some sort of pet shop doll. The plans are for her to be an arm donor also.  She will find lots of happy play time with a 7 year year old once her arms are replaced.

Clothing and shoes:  I have read things by Blythe people saying that not all clothing and shoes are interchangeable between Licca and Blythe.  So far, all of my shoes have fit the Licca feel pretty well. In fact, Very Vicky stock shoes fit better on Gatsby's new body than they did on Victoria (VV). 

My friend, Lyndell, altered the feet on her Licca body.  Linky here: http://fashionedbylyndell.blogspot.com/2011/10/lillians-new-body-plastic-surgery-drama.html.  Lillian is an ADG so Lyndell had to do a bit more creative neck stuff.

This person on Flickr has paper dolls:  http://www.flickr.com/photos/peppermint_kiss_kiss/sets/72157594358393146/

Want more general information on Licca?  Here is a Wikipedia link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Licca-chan. I just read the information....omg, this is good stuff.  Preggers Licca?

Ginny is recovering...

Ginny was my very first Blythe.  She hasn't had anything but freckles and a fringe trim.  Oh man, now she is recovering from an arm transplant!!

I bought a Licca off of Ebay that is pretty discolored.  (I couldn't tell from the pics.)  I thought the arms would match my Simply Mango but they didn't! I had already pulled out one arm and then I couldn't get it back into the socket.

Fortunately, I won another Ebay auction with 2 Liccas.  Both are tilty necks but one was taller.  So, she was a perfect arm donor.

Nearly ripped off the second Blythe arm and cracked the socket in the process. I also sustained an injury of a busted knuckle trying to get the damn thing into the Licca.  Finally, after many attempts the Licca is a whole person again.

I give the Licca heads on new bodies to my daughter. She loves them.

But, Ginny now has new arms.

Here is the tutorial on Blythe Arms Transplant made by Sai and hosted by Jaszmade:

Edit, 12-18-2014 The tutorial appears to be no longer available. I will keep my eye out for a new one.  http://www.jaszmade.com/customising-blythe/licca-arm-transplantation-by-sai/

My mini-me, a custom I Love Your It's True, has a new Licca body, also.  I want to do another arm transplant on my Claudia.  I'm going to buy a brand new Licca for her since she is so pale.

My mini-me I customized.  I will try to get a good photo of her soon.

Silver Snow is on the way to her new home!