Saving Samantha

Both of my Samanthas have had missing limbs for at least two years now.

You may be wondering, why do I have two Samanthas?

Samantha number one is a Pleasant Company doll that I got on ebay when I was in grad school.

She was my third AG, and a childhood dream.

More than a childhood dream, I did not dare dream for more than the two dolls I had, Felicity and Anne.

Then I got the second Samantha, also on ebay, more recently, as part of a plan to give each of my cousin's daughters an AG doll when they are old enough. The girls in question are still a bit young for this and I am not sure how/ if I want to do this.

Amway, the Pleasant Company Samantha, which I had already worked on once, lost both arms and a leg, and the second Samantha lost a leg. Plus her remaining limbs were wobbly.

Call it The Curse of the Two Samanthas. It could be a Nancy Drew mystery.

Llama Pajamas!

I saw that My Life As had llama pajamas for dolls and I really wanted them!

Llamas are a special thing in my family. I have two pairs of my own llama pajamas, one for Christmas and one for spring.

Luckily for me, mcooper of Isn't She Dovely found them for me! Yay! Thanks so much! Doll collectors friends are the best.

Here is Zia modelling the pajamas:

It fit just fine, which I was pleased with.
If it had been too small, my back up plan was to make them into pajamas for A Girl for All Time dolls.

Here is Zia getting ready for bed:

And all tucked into bed with mini Gabi:

I am so happy to have these cute pajamas!

Great Doll Blog award

I was nominated for a blog award by two of my favorite people in the AG fandom, mcooper and randomtraci of Isn't She Dovely?
Thanks, guys!


Award Rules:
Thank the person that nominated you.
Answer the questions given to you.
Nominate at least 5 others who you think has a great doll blog.
Notify them that they have an award.
Leave them at least 5 questions to answer.

I nominate  Keiko and Company, Jinjia Mixed Goods, Sabine the Great, Faithful Friends Forever Be and The Interdimensional Crew.



My questions: 
1. What is your least favorite outfit that AG has ever released?

I hate Felicity's red holiday dress with the fake jewels on front. It looks tacky and out of scale. But that red vinyl jumper from the JLY line is also revolting.
Nonetheless, I do like the color red!

2. Which AG doll is your grail doll?  

I got Kanani! What more can I ask for? 
Well, I do keep looking at #4. And lately I have been drooling over #55. 
But I am trying to be happy with the lovely dolls that I already have!

3. Do any of your dolls have a common, shared personality trait? 

I don't think so? They do tend to be like me in some way, though. But it's different for each doll.

4. What's your favorite pet/companion?

The only pet I own is Meatloaf, who is Laura Ingall's dog Jack, so I guess he wins! 
Lea's turtle and the Pomeranian puppy are pretty cool too.

5. What is your favorite piece of AG furniture? 

I love Addy's bed, because it goes well with lots of different quilts. It's very versatile! 
Most of the other beds have a specific color scheme.

Questions for my nominees:

1. What styles do your dolls prefer to wear?
2. Do your dolls have favorite colors to wear?
3. What is the most adventurous thing you have done with a doll?
4. What accessory would you love to have for your doll, whether already in existence or not?
5. What is your favorite picture of your dolls?

Ye Goode Olde Days

LOL, this blog post title is tongue in cheek.

However, as I was posting the pictures from the get-together with mcoooper and randomtraci, I realized that I did not have the pictures from my first meet up with mcooper, back in early April, on the blog. I did not have a blog at that point. We took some great pictures, though, and I love that our girls  (and guy) have a history together, so here are some pictures!

Here is mcooper's blog post about our get together.

Daken is a very special custom doll and possibly the most huggable doll I have met, despite his tough persona. Here he is in an antique jail cell.

Epic Get Together

Last weekend (was it really only last weekend?) the dolls and I had an extra special treat: a visit from the girls at Isn't She Dovely?

Wrennie, Chloe, Callie and Penny were in town to participate in a marathon! Well, they really did the 5K, but I keep calling it a marathon.  And they were kind enough to meet up with me afterwards!

You can see their post about the marathon here.

I should have already posted this, but my laptop was being repaired. I did manage to post the pictures on Flickr, but that was all.

Nana Nana Nana Nana BATMAN!

This is another quilt that I made as a surprise for a friend, or in this case, friends. It is hard for me not to post this early and spoil the surprise!

Mcooper and randomtraci have a blog together, Isn't She Dovely? As they live in different states, it isn't always easy to make blog posts that make it appear that their dolls are hanging out together.

I decided to make them matching quilts. Having the dolls use, or seem to use, the same quilt in pictures can make it seem that they are in the same place, not hundreds of miles away.

Both these ladies are doll fans and Batman fans. Sooooo it was pretty logical to decide to make matching Batman quilts.

Ta-da!

The logo is a little big for AG scale. My reasoning is that there are lots of comforters for kids with huge pictures of cartoon characters, or logos. I think it works.

Besides, it was difficult cutting out that Batman symbol, and I'd hate to cut out an even smaller one.

Anne volunteered to model, to show the scale. Besides, she wanted to "break it in" for Wrennie, Callie and their other friends.

The quilts arrived today!

Here is Callie with the quilts!

Yay, I love it when I can make people happy!

Zombie Dolls- the fine art of doll restoration

Warning: there are no actual zombies in this post.

There are, however, nude dolls in pieces.

Saturday was my first time experiencing doll restoration, under the extremely friendly guidance of mcooper.

I wanted to document the process to help others. I didn't get as many photos as I should have, and I don't necessarily know all of the technical terms. But here goes!

Hanging out!

Mcooper (from Up to My Eyeballs in Dolls) and I got together again!  I got to meet all her pretty dolls! She has an amazing collection. You should go to her blog and check it out!

Here are Samantha, Jess and Kaya doing a "Rub-a-dub-dub. three men in a tub" impression.

Mcooper very kindly taught me how to replace the elastic on dolls. My Samantha got all new elastic, and Kaya and Jess got new elastic on one leg each. It was much easier than I expected! I feel so productive now!

Samantha was in particularly bad shape, so I am grateful that now she can stand upright- although she refuses to do so unless she has shoes on. Silly girl.

Mcooper also did new hairstyles on Kaya and Jess. Kaya is rocking a 'do from the Lord of the Rings! And Jess' hair is so summery and perfect, I may never change it.

It was an awesome day!

Here are my gang and her two boys:

Yes, I go out of my way to tease Zelda by taking pictures of Daken.

Here are some more pics of the girls with their new 'dos:

I am so lucky to have such a talented doll friend nearby! I really enjoy being able to talk dolly gossip about upcoming releases and more.

Play Date

Today I had a grown-up play date with Mcooper from American Girl Collectors.

You can visit her blog, Up To My Eyeballs in Dolls.

She brought her dolls Charlie and Grace.

Grace is an Extra Special doll, dolls which were specially designed to lovingly represent people with Down Syndrome. You can visit their website here: Extra Special Dolls.

I brought Samantha Parkington and River Song.

I had been wanting to take pictures of Samantha in her sailor dress for a while now. And Mcooper has offered to teach me how to restring her! Yay! There is no denying she is very, very wobbly.

Grace and River were so pleased to meet another doll with wild, curly red hair. They immediately took a selfie.

We wandered around the park, carrying dolls with us. Trees were climbed:

And so were fences.

A good time was had by all.

And then we all went home and took a well-deserved nap.

Yay for doll friends!