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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adventures in hand-sewing, part 3 - long-sleeved tops

My hand-sewing ambitions have lead me to making legit shirts! Well -- knit tops! That counts!

I kinda can't believe it?? Like, look at this dark green top. I made this!!! Waaah! It's kind of peasant blouse-inspired, with the lace on the sleeves and the bow at the neck, which is crochet thread. (It was experimental...)

Honestly! I sewed it inside-out on accident. This is the "wrong" side of this knit fabric. It is so hard for me to put things together correctly. But I am sooo stoked on it anyway!

This was my second attempt at this pattern -- the boatneck tee from xoxoBlythe.com. My first attempt came together wonderfully. Full of ambition, I sewed some rick-rack onto it, around the bottom hem... and it ceased being stretchy enough to close in the back. So I can't really use it now. Lesson learned, hahah. Or maybe I'll just cut off the bottom and make it into a crop top. And maybe next time I make this pattern I will make it correctly?? Who can say.

My second (technically third) long-sleeved top is this turtleneck (pattern from Like These Dolls). As I have a goodly amount of this ribbed knit fabric on hand, from which I make socks, I made a white ribbed turtleneck.

This pattern has a video tutorial, which was very handy for me, despite it coming together in similar ways to the boatneck tee in the end. Even with the video, I managed to do several things wrong... or wonky, at the least. I sewed the collar on backwards, so the "wrong" side faces out. I hemmed things in the wrong order. I congratulated myself on getting it hemmed in advance. But surprise surprise, order mattered! So the back is not hemmed at all. Hilarious.

Still, I ended up with a perfectly wearable item...

Look at this! LOOOK AT ITTTT! That's a TURTLENECK if I ever saw one!! HERE IT IS ON LAMB! (And look at this Farrah Fawcett hair on Lamb...)

Despite all my mistakes (at least four very distinct ones) I am elated! I think when it's actually on a doll, you can't really tell it's riddled with mistakes. Rather than a snap, I sewed a tiny square of velcro onto the neck, and I'm so happy with the way it sits. Even if the wrong side of the fabric is showing.

I don't feel I have become good at sewing. I don't feel confident I can tackle any pattern. I can't. I need really great instructions, or really clear video tutorials. I have bought patterns I don't understand how to make. But I have still gained experience and ambition, which was a goal of mine a year ago. To quote myself: I've wanted to re-enforce my hand-sewing skills and just practice a lot, with the aim to increase my comfort level with sewing in general. These skills are imperfect but hard-won and I'm very happy I have kept trying new things.

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adventures in hand-sewing, part 2 - crop tops

Another thing I have been sewing a lot of is these tiny... crop tops? Sports bras? Not sure what to call 'em. But they're awfully cute. This yellow one on Klara, here, was the first one I made and it's a skosh wonky. Almost everything I make is wonky the first time around, because I don't really have a handle on it yet. All the ones I've made since look better!

The pattern is really nice and I highly recommend it, especially because in the scheme of Blythe wardrobe items, this one is super unique, IMHO. I don't have anything like it already! T-shirts, yes. Blouses, yes. Turtlenecks, yes. But crop tops...no! And I could totally see it styled cutely under overalls (in fact, Drew's wearing one under overalls right now!), loose sundresses with thin straps, and vests. I'm just dying at the idea of a little denim vest over one of these!

I've yet to make the undies, but I do believe I will, since Winny came sans panties! Not that I think dolls need underwear. I would imagine some outfits fit better without that layer at the waist. But since all my other girls have panties, I want Winny to as well, for egalitarian reasons!

You can see a better picture of Winny in this rainbow top here.

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