Barbie Style Girls

During Amazon's Lightening Deals earlier this month, I got the Barbie Style Floral Jacket doll.

 Things I like about her:
  - Her skirt with the front faux zipper.
  - Her bracelets.

  - Her boots, faux slouch socks (they're more like gathered leg warmers).
  - The appearance of her handbag (it's molded plastic).

 

Things I'm not so fond of:
  - Her handbag is closed at the top, even though it's hollow.
  - Her biggish head and puffy face.

                 

      Here she is next to a Barbie from the '90s.  I prefer the smaller head.

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A few weeks ago, I got the Barbie Style dolls with the ankle joints.

Things I like about them:
- The look of  the ankle joint and feet - so dainty.

 - Their cute shoes.

- The clutch that came with one of the blondes.

- The new face on the blondes (even though they look a little puffy to me).

Things I'm not so fond of:
- The loose weak-kneed feeling of their knee joints and lower legs.
- Teresa's distressed look.  I don't think the eyelashes help. 

          I decided that she would donate her body to Summer.  

          **As an aside, when I removed Summer's head from her original body, 

              I found glue and hair stuck to her neck post.

               Summer is enjoying her new articulated body.

Things I'm not so fond of (cont'd):
- Raquelle's hairstyle.

- Raquelle's black top's too-exposed armhole (otherwise it's a nice top).

- Teresa's high heeled boots, which are too tight and are really difficult
   to put on and take off.  This surely puts stress on her tiny feet and ankles.

- Their inability to sit with their knees together.  See an earlier Fashionistas body
   on the left and Summer on Teresa's body on the right below.

I wonder if we'll see more dolls, with ankle articulation, in the future.

Merry Christmas!

From our dolly house to yours.

A New Barbie Fashionistas Girl

When I saw this new set of Fashionistas on Amazon.com, I knew I wanted to add Summer to my collection and eventually change her to an articulated body.

I finally got her last week and she's even lovelier in person.

Her packaging was easy to open, as it was held closed with plastic tabs:

There were no wires, but these plastic tags (I think they're called Kimble Tags). I have always dreaded having to cut off the ones at the back of dolls'  heads, as I am scared of damaging the doll's hair.   The ones at the back of the box were not difficult to cut, though.

After carefully cutting off her head tag, here she is, out of her box,  and I didn't damage her  lovely hair.

I saw this line on her skirt and thought that the top was stitched incorrectly to the skirt.  It turned out that it was just the impression of the plastic tie that was across the doll's midsection that created a crease.

These are the shoes that she came with.  I don't really like their bulky appearance:

 Plus, her left shoe is slack and keeps falling off.

So, I switched to the shoes that came with the University Cheerleader dolls.  They are neater looking and a much better fit.

I was enjoying her so much that I almost forgot that she had a pair of sunglasses on her head; and, horror of horrors, it was secured with a tag!  It was secured very close to her head,  so there was the risk of damaging the lens of the sunglasses and her hair.

 Even after I had cut off the horizontal piece of the tag, the sunglasses still wouldn't budge and I couldn't see what was keeping it so secured to her head.  Me and my aging eyes.

After parting her hair bit by bit, I saw the clear plastic band looped around the nose of the sunglasses and around the doll's head.  Good grief, why didn't I see it before?

At last!  Or so I thought, as my relief was short-lived. I still couldn't get the sunglasses to disengage from her head.  Instead of being able to pull the sunglasses over her head and pull her hair through the loop of the band at the base of her neck, the band just wouldn't come out from under her hair. 

It was tangled in the hair at the back of her neck.  I wondered if I had inadvertently tangled it, but I didn't twist and turn the band or her head.

I turned her upside down to get a better look at what I was dealing with and found a mess of tangled hair.  I didn't want to pull at her hair and make it worse, so I cut the band.

The last row of hair plugs at the base of her neck had wavy, tangled, frizzy strands, unlike the straighter, smooth hair on the rest of her head.

There were also several strands of hair coming out of the base of her head at the back of her neck.  Eeeek!

I just don't know what to say.

 Neither does Summer.

Despite her issue, which she has successfully hidden, she has settled in with her new family, after being warmly welcomed by (self-proclaimed) Princess Stardoll Kayla (a Barbie Basics Model #5, collection 002 on a pivotal body) on the left and Lea (a 2012 Ballerina Barbie on a Liv body) on the right.

Sisters Three.

New Bodies in da House

Raquelle: "Look what came today! An EMS package from Japan!"

Raquelle: Let's see who it's from.  Hobby Search? Are you expecting this?

Me: "Why, yes I am! I didn't expect it so soon, though.  This package took five days to get to Trinidad.  It spent one day in customs and it took three days to be processed at the Post Office and for notification to be sent out. That was fast!"

Raquelle: "Let's see what the Customs Declaration says.  Hmmmm. 'Detailed description of contents: Doll'.  'Number of items contained: 2".  

Raquelle: "Really? More dollie friends to play with!"

Raquelle: "Ooooooh! 'Inspected by Customs'!"

Raquelle: "What's this?  Oooooh an invoice!"

Raquelle: "Pure Neemo? What's a Pure Neemo?"

Me: "It's a type of doll."

Raquelle: "Oh my goodness! So much paper!"

Me: "Take your time. I'll help you; just pass it to me."

Raquelle: "I can see something!"

Me: "Careful now, you don't want to fall."

Raquelle: "Here take this paper!"

Me: "Okay, okay, slow down."

Raquelle (sobbing): "OMG! How cute! Take it out.  I want to play with it."

Me: "Not yet. Let's take a photo of the two of them in their packaging first."

Raquelle: "Ladies and gents, I present Pure Neemo Flection Small and Medium." 

Me: Thank you, Raquelle. I need some room to remove them from their packaging so we can have a closer look.  Go over there and wait with your sister."

Raquelle to Raquelle: "Boohoo! They're so cute.  I just want to eat them up."

Raquelle to Raquelle: "Okay, dear.  Take a deep breath."

Raquelle (after much deep breathing): "Hi, I'm Raquelle, what are your names?"

Pure Neemos in unison: "Hi.  We have no names yet. We don't even have heads!"

Raquelle (scooping them up in her arms): "Teehee.  You're still so cute and heavy!"

Pure Neemos in unison: "Wait 'til you see us with heads. Um, you can let us go now."

Raquelle to Raquelle: "Yeah, sis. Let's give them some space."

Raquelle to Raquelle: "But they're new here and probably feel scared. I want them to feel at home."

Pure Neemos in unison: "We're fine. We're fine.  We do feel at home. Thank you so much for caring.  You can let us go now."

Raquelle to Raquelle: "Let's go shopping and we can get ice cream after."
Raquelle to Raquelle: "But, but....
Pure Neemos in unison: "Bye!  Nice to meet you! See you later!

Pure Neemo S to Pure Neemo M: "She's super friendly."
Pure Neemo M to Pure Neemo S: "She's scary, if you ask me."

Me: "Okay.  Everybody line up, line up!"

Now to assign heads (all Obitsus) to bodies (three Obitsu's on the left and the two Pure Neemos on the right).