Happy Fourth of July!

Happy Fourth of July! (belated post!)

I was busy on the holiday and managed to take some new photos of the Gene and Tonner girls that day in their holiday attire out front near our flag. This year we managed to plant our potage garden around the flag pole. This contains our bell and cayenne peppers, our Mr. Lincoln and White Floribunda roses, and our two different varieties of Marigolds, as well as our bachelor buttons/ cornflowers. A potage garden is a garden that contains both vegetables and flowers, in a decorative and useful / pleasing manner. My husband and I have been consulting French and English gardening books and the Flag pole garden was a small way to work on one of these small beds. 

But back to Fourth of July! More dolls enjoying the holidays!

Happy Fourth of July!

 

Goodwill thrifts and finds

I have been meaning to make this post but have not had time. I love to thrift for unloved toys and dolls and made a great discovery of three Madame Alexander Dolls of the World 8 inch Wendy dolls. 

I found these three little darlings in the local Goodwill which has had some marvelous finds on dolls in the past couple of years and months . The price on each of these with their stands were $3.99 each which was quite a steal!

Austria , the little doll in the middle with the braids, has a head coming off with worn out rubber bands, common in these dolls. I plan to teach myself how to restring dols with this one and start sewing for this size with some patterns as soon as I purchase the supplies and the patterns. The one at the top is Ireland, who I already own, and the bottom one is Germany. They are pretty much intact and their clothing is in good condition. Austria I might plan to play with and redress and make into a child doll for my Gene and Trent families for dioramas as I also am on the hunt for a Madame Alexander boy doll for a brother so I can 'complete' the family scene setting. I have a blonde Gene which would look great at a Christmas scene. More projects on the horizon- and yes I have already got the Christmas cards in the planning stages-LOL! 

Happy Father's Day!

 Happy Father's Day! This happy photo is from the archives. May all the dads, stepdads, granddads, uncles be appreciated out there. 

If you have a dad out there still living, give him a call while you still can. Dads are special and sometimes all they need is to hear your voice. 

Happy Memorial Day!

Happy Memorial Day! It has been a long time since I posted, have alot to report on. 

 Please remember those of our military who made the sacrifice for our freedoms , and remember them on this day, for those who are not here with us. 

I was able to decorate the mantle and table in the dining room this weekend. I have been so busy for the last few weeks between sewing for the Skipper sized dolls for the upcoming Memorial day & Fourth of July holidays, and going through my patterns and sorting them, it has been time consuming. 

Right now, I got the Tammy and friends dolls dressed in some holiday themed items I owned and Pepper is dressed in an ensemble I made with a Skipper pattern. The mantle is decorated but I intented to decorate it with my Gene dolls in their holiday attire, I have not yet sat down and started dressing dolls! I was finally able to iron the pennant and get it put up on the mantle today. 

Some of the decorating of the dining room table with dolls as centerpieces; I used my milk glass collection to augment my stunning milk glass lantern that hangs over top of the dining room table. This piece belonged to my mother-in-law and my husband treasures it, she found it in an antique shop many years ago and we both adore it; I collect milk glass it has a hobnail pattern on it. I used two of my hobnail bud vases on it with flags and my vintage gingham tablecloth with her vintage red and white lace doily. The Liberty Blue Independence Hall plates are collected on Ebay and part of my husband's grandmother's dinner plates, we are currently intent on collecting the bowls, teacups and saucers and other pieces. I picked up the milk glass tankards at Goodwill. Red, white and Blue are some of my favorite colors to decorate with during the year. 

This week I made some purchases on Ebay at great deals- a Vintage Ideal Dodi doll- (Tuesday Taylor's little sister and sometimes called Pepper's  best friend-) for $9.99 on eBay plus shipping. My next purchase was an auction win of a vintage Scooter Titan haired doll for $24.99 plus shipping. She has some slight fading on the side of her face but she is in nice condition. These two were great finds. To add to my Tuesday Taylor collection I just need to find Eric at a reasonable cost now. 

I have also added more Grolier Books to my Barbie book club collection! More in a seperate post on them soon with in depth photos. 

Enjoy~ Lisa 

Happy Birthday to me, and Sweet 16 Barbie gets a new body!

My birthday was on May 1st a few days ago, but I have been so busy celebrating has just passed me by and I have only had time to take photos this weekend. 

I purchased this Vintage Sweet 16 Barbie in 2019 for my birthday a few year's ago from Joe Blitman on Ruby Lane from his store there, and she came with all of her accessories. You can read my Blog Post Here    on photos of her as she looked back then. Unfortunately, Sweet 16 dolls have an unfornate habit of their bodies simply falling apart - which mine did- and though I have saved her body, she was in such disarray I could not dress her, or use her at all. I am thinking of purchasing another head and glueing this body together and just displaying her in her pink gown. Below is a photo of how she looked in 2019 when I received her-

So this year, I decided for my birthday, I have missed using this doll so much, I would get her a made to move body and revamp the doll and enjoy her. I have seen other doll vloggers put vintage and repro heads on articulated modern bodies and use vintage and handmade artisan clothing from vintage patterns and they look - fabulous! Also, I have been wanting my vintage doll to be my travel buddy. 

Here is the body I decided to use:

Barbie Doll & Accessories, Career Tennis Player Doll with Racket and Ball

At Walmart online she is listed as $19.97 but in store I purchased her for $15.97.

The body on this doll is wonderful and her head was easy to remove after softening around the neck with a blow dryer and my vintage doll head fit fine. 

THE RESULT-

It was difficult to get her to stand, but she did fine after a little fiddling with her legs and hips. The tennis ball sticks onto a little point in the middle of the racket. I love the outfit and the sneakers and she comes with a visor too. These photos are not the best because today it was overcast. 

Enjoy! More to come soon!