🗝️ chatelaines part 2 🗝️

Featuring the triumphant return of the twin mayors of birthday town: I made a couple more chatelaines for my girls! I wanted to make a silver one and a gold one, and here are Vesper and Citron to model them!

Lowdown on the silver one: Wow, I found some little tassels amongst my craft supplies that I got to attach to the miniature suitcases I made YEARS ago, and since there was an all-silver one, I thought, "Sure!" I don't know what the item could represent in terms of a tool or useful item for Citron, but hey, who knows. But upon further inspection of charms at the craft store (I went back to get more chains for these chatelaines) I actually found one that had tools, specifically! Two types of saws (I used one on here), hammers, wrenches. That's so funny to me. While the wrench might have been the most useful for an artificer-type gal, I liked the shape of the saw the most! I believe this one is a hacksaw, specifically! And I found a fork charm at a local bead store, as well as whatever the one on the rightmost in the photo is. I don't know what exactly this is, other than a drop-style charm, but in my imagination, this could be some kind of scent pot or holder for some little tool or gadget!

Again, I used a gear for the medallion portion of the chatelaine, and just jump ring-ed it on.

For the gold chatelaine: Another local bead store finding, but there is this little gold clasp-looking charm, and I don't rightly know what it is. But it looked like some sort of pocketbook or a cover for a notebook, so that's what I'm pretending it is. (It might be a clasp, but I'm really not sure.) There's also a clock hand from the gear packet, and a colorful charm from the Explorer packet I got for my first chatelaine. Also, I made a little keyring out of a jump ring and several small key charms from a packet I got at Michael's. Even though the keys aren't bright gold, I still felt like it gives the chatelaine a more lived-in, vintage and useful look, instead of just being fancier-seeming items.

I didn't put a medallion on this chatelaine since I didn't really have anything I liked for that.

But here's Vesper's full 'fit...

As you know, I like more elegant looks for Vesper. Things that make her look, dare I say, elfin! While nothing will ever look as beautiful as her stock, which to me is exquisite, this outfit gives her the vibe that she is the keeper of a little fairy garden. One surrounded by a rock wall; one with an ancient well hidden within, which may or may not be a wishing well. She strolls and tends to the flowers in the fairy garden.

I don't think I listed all the outfit deets for Citron in my last chatelaine post, so I will do that now!

Vesper's deer headband: made by me
Vesper's leaf crown: made by me
Vesper's peplum top: Sugar Mag (I got it in 2010 off eBay)
Vesper's skirt: CraftyCoraShop on Etsy
Vesper's shoes: her own stock

Citron's goggles: her own stock
Citron's black blouse: HelloCoolCat
Citron's skirt: CraftyCoraShop
Citron's shoes: Time After Alice's stock shoes

Finally: "the twin mayors of birthday town" is an old My Brother, My Brother, and Me reference (I was an early MBMBAM adopter back in the day, and also an early MBMBAM abandoner, haha) and when I Googled it just now to find the episode I was referencing, the first result was not MBMBAM, but my own blog post about Vesper and Citron??? Whoa. Wild. Real snake-eating-its-own-tail stuff.

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lofty ambitions part 1

So I know I said that I felt like doing some more doll-dressing, but what I actually ended up doing is taking off all my dolls' clothes. All twenty-one Neos are standing around nakedly in my room this past week.

I did this because:

• I wanted a blank slate for all the girls. Some of them have been wearing the same 'fits for a really long time (over a year) because I liked them, and I just realized all of a sudden, "I'm never going to want to change some of these outfits, but I should anyway."
• I wanted to see every single pair of shoes I have, specifically!
• I wanted to see if I had proper storage, still. All my dolls being totally undressed is a thing that never happens, really, but I wanted to see the state of my storage options. I need to change some of what I'm doing; boxes are overflowing as it is.
• I wanted to see if all my girls had underwear. A couple don't! I don't strictly think they need panties. Some things fit better without that layer in the way, taking up valuable space. But I also irrationally don't want any of them to feel less loved because they don't have undies. Hahaha.
• Just really want to do Blythey stuff right now. I want to do dressups I've never done before. Revisit my doll wardrobe and find pieces I've never used (I have many, haha) and use them, finally. Maybe even declutter??

I kind of had fun grouping my girls somewhat, as I put them all back where I keep them (atop my desk and on a ladder shelf). All the blondies and peachies. The gingers. The sandies/brunettes. I love seeing new (old) girls like Olive betwixt Fey and Zasha. I love seeing Lamb and Holland side by side -- those curly girlies. It's inspiring me. And the utter hilarity of Klara and Tiphanie sitting on the same bench when they have scads of hair that fells them so easily...

So, I'm going to have to dress all these girls again, when I hardly have the time to even do so right now! Because I am trying to do a lot of stuff right now. So as ridiculous as that sounds: Dressing all these gals again officially falls under the heading of Lofty Ambitions. I'll post about another Lofty Ambition I am undertaking quite soon. I feel insane for trying to load more onto my plate these days, when I have sort of bitten off more than I can chew already.

Finally -- and this has nothing to do with any of the rest of this post -- I did some light Halloweening with some cat ears and makeup for a family party. My mom took this pic of me and my nephew, who has grown so much lately. He is fifteen months old, a big boy who has started walking and can say "hello," "bye-bye," "kitty," and "night-night," and I have been treasuring time with him especially of late because he and his parents are moving a few states away in just a few days time. So this is just an addendum of a memory, for my own enjoyment.

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four blue eyes

It's been gray, rainy, and increasingly chilly out, which for me is more than welcome. I have the opposite of seasonal depression. When it's gray out, I come alive and feel very cozy and energized. But it has made it challenging to get some pictures of my girls in some autumnal duds. Luckily it's only a little wet today, so outdoors I tromped! backstreetboystellmewhy.gif I simply had to take two girls who have the very most hair out to model in the wind?? Well, it's because I got Vesper's dress especially for her! And Klara was already wearing this outfit, so I grabbed her spur-of-the-moment.

Klara's mushroom dress: TiredMomKnits
Klara's petticoat: MINIJIJO, many years back
Klara's boots: her own stock

Vesper's autumnal dress: BostonBlythe
Vesper's crown: I made it yonks ago
Vesper's shoes: her own stock

Personally I love both of these shops very much! I have several dresses from each and can't recommend them enough! And you know that Vesper needs elevated wardrobe pieces. I always have my little eye out for things Vesper and Citron especially can wear.

Goodness, can't you see the bonkers difference between the FBL face mold and Radiance Radical or whatever (give 'em the boot, the roots, the radicals -- just kidding, I looked it up, it's Radiance Renewal) mold? Vesper's eyes look humongous!

Well, pals, I picked the ideal day to make beef stew in the crock pot. It's chilly enough out that the hearty vibes of nice, hot, slow-cooked stew are just hitting the absolute spot. I loaded my stew down with carrots and those very fancy baby peas from that brand with the silver label, and made some cheesy toast too. I'm devouring it as I type this and the angels are singing overhead, I swear.

And I'm so frickin' inspired by the dolly dressing I did today that I'm going to attempt to do some more, haha! I just haven't had the time for months now. Sometimes I go for a while without doing Blythey stuff and when I get back to it, I am hit hard with serotonin.

Tonight: Evening walk through the neighborhood and band prep. Tomorrow: band. Friday: Halloween hangs with my great friends J and L. Saturday: Halloween dinner party with my family!

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springtime sittin'

STOP. This picture of Vesper!!! I'm in love. Vesper is very regal in style and this is the first dressup I've done with her where I thought it remotely began to approach suiting her elevated style. She's wearing Vinter Arden's dress and Dear Lele Girl's flower hair pin, and her own stock shoes. The hat looks like Very Vicky's, but in fact, it's one from the craft store that I doctored up with a lace bow!

But let's talk about this bench! Right now in their spring decor section, Michael's has these two miniature benches that are perfectly sized for Blythe!! They're supposed to be tabletop decor, I think. (They have a lot of miniature bathtubs right now too? For putting flowers or crystals in, or something.)

They are extremely cute, needless to say! It's actually rare I see stuff like this out in the wild. By "stuff like this" I mean miniature furniture that is the correct scale for Blythe. These aren't being sold in the miniatures section and aren't meant for dolls, I guess, but I think they're just about 1/6 scale by coincidence.

I not only took Vesper outside for a pic, but Wisp (I couldn't resist the green+brown color combination they've both got happening). It was quite chilly out despite the green spring grass, and windy to boot. Lots of stray hairs flying this way and that, and I quickly gave up before getting too many pics. But I'm pretty dang pleased with the cuteness this bench provided.

In personal news, I'm a month in on a dosage increase on one of my meds. I was on this dosage for a while and went back down a dosage again, but now I'm back up here, MG-wise. It's been messing with my sleep and my creativity. But your girl's out here tryin' her best.

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family portrait 2024

Yooo! Class picture!

I've actually gotten a few requests for an updated family portrait in the last couple of years, but even with five less dolls than I have now, I have been like, "I have no idea how to accomplish such a thing..."

I used to take my dolls out into the backyard and pose them on a bench we had, but we don't have the bench anymore, and ~20 dolls makes a quick hike to the backyard not terribly feasible anyway. It took long enough with seven dolls, and now I have just one shy of twenty. You might not think it's a lot of work to wrangle them, but just moving them across my bedroom to line them up here took sooo long.

(I know that people have far larger Blythe collections and manage to photograph all their dolls at once, but I don't know how these people do it!! Lots of time?)

For this, I turned some plastic storage boxes upside down in order to create a riser, like this is choir class, and draped the boxes in fabric so they wouldn't be too distracting. The dolls aren't in any particular order per se, except that the back row is RBLs, the middle row is FBLs, and the front row is RBLs again. Also, Aury is in front because of course she is!! The newer dolls are in front just by virtue of having been farther away from the desk, and so the last to be placed on it.

There was nothing on god's green earth I could do to keep the dolls' hair from sticking to each other and falling in their faces. I tried to fix Gavin's hair so many times, but it just wouldn't cooperate! So, what you see is what you get, in terms of all that doll hair.

Speaking, you might notice that Drew has her original scalp back on, even though the fading on it is so atrocious.

As a bonus, I have a couple of other group pics to share:

The redheads! The gingers, really, as Fidelia is certainly a redhead too. I have been seriously wanting a little pic of all my gingers together since I got Citron!

Also:

The blondes! Are you seeing these ringlets on Holland??

I thought of breaking down the family into groups by hair color and doing a whole series of portraits, but the rubric breaks down by the time it reaches dolls like Gavin and Miette. I didn't want to have a group I was mentally thinking of as "the leftovers." I know they are just inanimate objects and cannot care, but I still would have felt bad! So I stopped here.

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some fall lists

Happy October! Which is almost over already. I've kinda missed it.

As usual when I neglect Cure Touch it's because I'm having A Time. A highlight reel:

• week-long power outage
• dad in the hospital
• sister having a scary medical ordeal
• weird dating/breakup experience
• COVID-19... after three careful years, I finally caught it 😥

Big sigh. I know this is just life. But I feel like I've not had much time to recover between each of these things. I felt really tired before catching COVID, so COVID's just exhausted me.

Really, it was rough. Not just because it knocked me on my ass, but because my bestie and I came down with it while we were having a much-coveted visit. Being sick as dogs together basically became the bulk of our visit. She stayed for a week and a half, and only two of those days were we functional. COVID hit us both so hard we couldn't stay upright. Even just eating took us both out. We slept a ton. It was really surreal, but also unfortunate and disappointing, since we only get to see each other every few years.

(That's my bestie's Daunting Drusilla with Vesper, Citron, Zasha, and Winny!!!! We got in a skosh of dolly time before taking to our beds like Victorian invalids.)

But, this blog is meant to be more of a place to blog about happy things and accomplishments and fun hyperfixations. I feel like listing some positive stuff too.

• I've made a new friend in the last few months. A rarity for me 🥰
• caught some Pumpkaboos in Pokémon Go (Pumpkaboo being my favorite, and I had only ever caught one before! I loveeee watching her on the AR camera!)
• made beef stew, so incredibly comforting while sickness dragged on
• finished up a big project I've been working on since December
• watched The Cat Returns and really enjoyed it
• went on a little 20-minute walk in the rain yesterday morning, and saw colorful foliage and Halloween decorations all over the neighborhood. The temperature was ideal, refreshing and cool, and the rain was mild. It did me sooo much good after three weeks of feeling dreadful!
• close to finishing a ripple throw

And my visit with my bestie wasn't a complete disaster, despite everything.

• As mentioned, she got a Blythe!!! Of her own accord! I can't believe it! We dressed our dolls together and it was so much fun. I also sent bestie home with a care package of socks, tights, and little crop tops I made! I loved doing this!!!
• we attended a concert together and made Swiftian friendship bracelets for it! Successfully traded 'em, even! And the concert was great
• we watched Over the Garden Wall together 🐸 (barely managed it, but we technically did it)
•  if I had to be that freaking sick with someone, she'd be my #1 choice. we both felt godawful but true comfort is being able to be in a bad state with someone without it being super awkward or damaging your friendship at all. New friendship level unlocked...?

I'm really behind on everything and that'll just have to be okay for a bit yet.

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twin mayors of birthday town

Well, this is wild beyond belief for me to be typing. But I was gifted two dream dolls for my birthday: Lady Panacea and Shelley Victorian. My Neo Blythe family has expanded by four dolls this year. It's been a long time since it's seen that kind of growth, and I am in a state of shock, a bit!!

Of course I filmed my unboxing of them both, if you would like to view it.

I named these girls Vesper (Lady Panacea) and Citron (Shelley Victorian). Currently they're standing on my desk with Zasha and Winny. The new girl gang!!

They both break my heart with their beauty.

Directly after unboxing these girls, I lost power for a full week. (!!!) There was a huge wind storm and the vast majority of my city was without power for multiple days. It was a miserable week, to say the least.

As a result of the outage, I kind of lost out on what is ordinarily a super special time for me as a Blythe collector... those first days after I unbox my new girl, wherein I am bonding with the doll via touching, dressing and undressing, combing out and washing their hair, changing them out of their stock for the first time, shopping especially for them, and other general fussing. It's such a fun time for me. Feeling happy and spoiled and thinking about the dolls' name, their style, how they fit in with my Blythe family.

So that experience was delayed by the power outage. I felt sweaty and grimy and grumpy 24/7 while the power was out, and after the power came back, I was exhausted. I had work to catch up on, Etsy orders to complete and ship. I had to throw out everything in my fridge and get replacement groceries during a time when the store was picked over and swamped (because everybody had to replace their groceries). Et cetera, et cetera!!!

Finally editing my unboxing video afforded me the belated opportunity to get tactile with my new girls, since I wanted to take pictures of them for the video and for this post. My twins, my special purple-eyed gworlies. That time fussing with them was something I needed, emotionally, after such a rough week. I feel doubly blessed, let me tell you!

Nearly two weeks after getting power restored, I'm still recovering from the week without it... or so it feels. I want to dolly-sew and crochet and craft and spend even more time with The New Girls so bad!

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