Lottie reviews (link)

In case you're curious about the new 2015 Lottie dolls, Confessions of a Doll Collector's Daughter is reviewing one each day of this week (or something like that). Finn still looks like a troll, but there's an adorable '50s inspired Lottie I hadn't seen before, so go check'em out!

Amazon sale, new Arklu doll, stain removal tricks

The GQ Christmas issue got awfully arty this year...

Happy Those-Days-Inbetween-Christmas-And-New-Year, everyone! I'm not sure whether there's a name for this period in English, but in Swedish it's literally known as The Inbetween Days. In case you're wondering why I'm spending my precious holidays doll blogging, I'm just waiting for this cold to pass so I can go visit my parents and help them finish the last of the christmas food. Not that I've ever needed an excuse to babble about dolls!

One of my favorite little Christmas traditions is actually buying yourself a present at the post-holiday sales. Maybe you got some Christmas money from Grandma, or you're returning the sweater you got for one in your favorite color and for half the price. Maybe you just spotted a good deal. Last year I finally caved and ordered Howleen Wolf from ebay - not necessarily a great deal, but not too bad, and at least I finally got her! - and this year I'm getting EAH Cedar Wood from Amazon's toy sale. She's not in stores here yet, but I signed up to CamelCamelCamel to keep track of Amazon's prices - it's quite handy actually: if you register, you can specify a price level and they'll send you a notification once the price drops below that. (Or if you don't want to give them your email, just check the site every day and analyze the graph of the price fluctuations.)

I have a list of a few EAH dolls I sort of want, several of which are on sale right now, but when I had to limit myself to one (otherwise I'd soon be broke and drowning in dolls) there really wasn't a question: of course I'm getting the fake wooden girl! That might sounds weird considering I'm working on a real wooden doll, but there's just something about fake plastic wood grain I find - kind of hilarious, I guess. And that's not a bad quality in a doll. I actually love that Mattel has taken this fairly unconventional approach to individualizing the MH/EAH dolls, even with the same basic body mold.

Anyway, as I poked around Amazon's doll department a bit I discovered this guy:

Amazon.co.uk

That's right - Arklu's Lottie now has a friend! A friend who is a boy, but probably not a boyfriend. To be honest I'm not at all tempted by this doll, even though I'm actively looking to add more boy dolls to my collection - he looks weird and troll-like, and his hairline is way too high. The clothes and shoes look ok, though, realistic and versatile - plus there's at least one new clothing set to go with him. I like the one that comes with a fishing rod and what looks like tiny boat shoes, which is kind of cool. Unfortunately British Amazon doesn't do free international shipping anymore, so that'll have to wait. :/ 

Oh, and I managed to remove a stain (sharpie or ballpoint pen) from a doll dress with hairspray! I didn't have stain remover, alcohol or ammonium, but after a bit of googling I found this guide which suggests shaving foam or hairspray as a last resort. Since this is just a ratty old goodwill dress, I wasn't too worried about ruining it. 

Look closely and you can sort of see a darker spot center-left on the skirt. Silly me forgot to take a before pic, but the spot was VERY visible. 

I once ruined the print on my shower curtain with shaving foam, but this stain didn't budge. Hairspray did the trick, though! The fabric is blue nylon and the spot was black or dark blue and perfectly visible on the front, but now there's only just a darker shade on the inside and no visible damage to the fabric (although for a seconf it looked like rubbing might bleach it). Who'd have thought?? A chemist, perhaps, but not me. 

Sewing for Lottie, OHC sale

What I usually do at the beginning of each month is, a: stock up on toilet paper and rice, and b: go through my dollieh wish list and check if anything's on sale, or about to be discontinued, or if maybe something I've wanted for a long time just happens to be on ebay that week. While my wishlist is practically endless my funds aren't, but having to choose between buying Cool Thing A or Cool Thing B is hardly the worst problem you could have in this world. :)

There's finally a sale on Only Hearts Club at one of the few shops that still carry them. Still not super cheap, but the alternative is paying ridiculous money for shipping, so... I got two clothes sets, the pink party dress and one of the riding outfits. 

Unfortunately the shoes didn't fit the dolls I had in mind: the rubbery pink party slippers do fit obitsu, but they're rather wide and clumsy-looking. The low riding boots (shoes? I'm unfamiliar with the terminology here) look really nice but were really tight even after I'd extended the slit in the back all the way up. 

The most annoying thing is they were sewn to the packaging, so there are two holes in on one side, and of course one had to be placed just where the wider doll feet put extra stress on the material... Since I don't want the plastic to split the Super Model girls and their notoriously wide feet will have to do without riding boots. I might go back and get one of the sets with sneakers, we'll see. 

On the other hand, the pants from the riding set fit Fashionista and Super Model really well (although a bit shorter of course), and the pink party tights were aaaalmost the right size for Howleen (a bit too short, but you can't tell under the skirt). My dolls hardly have any tights, and I haven't had the courage to try and sew any, so that's a plus in my book at least.

There should have been pictures but I got lazy, sorry! Here's what I've been working on instead today: 

Lottie's new clothes!

I found a bunch of fabric samples I forgot I had, and those little strips were just big enough for a skirt for Lottie. Not big enough for a pleated skirt, but I wanted to try something simple (and there's always the big sample bit if I decide to make something more complicated later). 

I thought I'd make something similar to those Licca clone clothing sets by Daiso I've seen. Out of curiosity I ordered a couple from a place that sells them at a reasonable price (www.foundinjapan.com) but they haven't arrived yet and Lottie was getting cold, so I decided to make my own school uniform inspired outfit.

(Dollar store doll clothes are actually great for sewing inspiration: they can be low quality, lopsided with wonky seams, but still look pretty good as a whole. For someone prone to perfectionism it's a much needed reminder not to get too caught up in details.)

Not so sure about that snap, but I didn't have anything smaller. 

I didn't have any plain white cotton fabric that was thin enough for a shirt, so Lottie gets some kind of t-shirt/blouse thing instead (made from a human sized dollar store t-shirt). Something I'm really proud of here is how the sleeves came out, even though it took a couple of tries to get them to cooperate. 

To make it more school uniform-like I thought of adding a collar and some kind of decoration (bowtie?) but I'm not sure if the fabric is too bulky for that. We'll see. 

What I'm not so proud of is the skirt, partiularly the waistline. That's what happens when you just wing it. But hey, I have fabric to make a different skirt for each day of the week, sooner or later I'll get it right. In the meantime, the top covers the mistakes. :)

Lottie's only shoes are the beige and pink gumboots she came with, but I found that these Obitsu mary janes will work in a pinch. 

Oh, right. The blog.

Not much bloggable happening at the moment. I did get a Lottie doll, though, one of the new ones released last month. There will be pictures, as soon as I figure out this iPhone thing and remember that it gets dark (and therefore unsuitable for photography) early this time of year. Lottie is one of those dolls I wasn't terribly interested in at first, but she grew on me. It's a cute kid doll that looks like she could be the younger sister of the Super Model girls (although with much less articulation), and this new batch had several different styles I liked better than the original few. Apparently the pirate girl is popular, but I just had to have one with glasses, and since my store only had one of them the choice was easy. My old computer is still horribly slow and noisy so I try to avoid using it, but hopefully I'll be able to find the perfect app and return with some pictures.