Costume Shopping

I only have a few dolls out right now, but they wanted to try on some costumes since it's almost Halloween! They managed to find a few that they liked. (be sure to check out my Instagram for more pictures of their adventures!)

Andrea: "That dress is perfect on you Anya!"
Anya: "Thank you! You look amazing as well!"

Melody: "HI LADIES!"

Melody: "Do you like my costume? Saving lives is so sexy! Also this floaty thing has room for candy! The only downside is that I have to run everywhere in slow motion."
Anya: "Oooooh candy!"

Melody: "OH ANYA I LOVE THAT MOVIE sing the song!"
Andrea: Oh no...

Andrea: Now I'll never get it out of my head! At least Anya has a good voice!

Charahub

I've still been mostly unable to reach my dolls. It's been a sad, doll-less summer. But I have made a few doll purchases, despite my mostly-shut wallet. There were a few I just couldn't pass up!

This lovely lady was one of them.

     I also fulfilled a (slightly revenge-fueled) childhood doll dream and I'll be making a separate post about that as soon as I get some good pictures.

    Mostly what I've been doing to get my doll fix, however, is making profiles for my doll characters on a site called Charahub. It's free up to 100 characters, 10 pictures can be uploaded per character. It's awesome for story organization! There's a system in place for grouping, and another for linking characters and creating custom relationships between them to keep track. I have 85 characters to figure out the relationships between them, their backstories, their personalities, their names and occupations, everything, and it has helped immensely. It's even helped me flesh out some plot ideas!

    Being the somewhat overly-organized person I am, this site has been amazing for keeping me sane while I physically can't organize anything else in my life. Plus, I'll have a much better idea what I'm doing with my dolls when I actually start building physical sets someday.

Melody is not a morning person

        Instagram is where I'm doing most of my photo doll stuff for now. I have pulled out Melody, Andrea, and Anya for short adventures when I can do them.

Waiting...

    They're living in a tiny shelf cubby "studio apartment" with no furniture. It's not glamorous, but I guess it beats being stuffed into the doll storage box!

Introducing the Twins

     Hi, all! It's been quite a while since I last posted here, I know! I've had to put away all of my dolls this summer due to the heat and losing three air conditioning units in a row (whew, that was bad!). But I found a really sweet pair of dolls recently, and I couldn't resist grabbing a few photos of them with my phone...
    

"Hi, I'm Kasidy, and this is my brother, Avery! He's a genius, and also a doofus."

    Meet Avery and Kasidy! They're twins. Like most siblings, they're quite different, but they love each other just enough to torment each other constantly without really meaning harm. They live together, currently, while Avery works through his first year at architecture school and Kasidy works full-time at a popular amusement park.
    They both had today off, so they decided to take a break from studies and housework and go to the neighborhood park for some much-needed outdoor fun.

"Avery! I wasn't ready for that picture! Gimme that phone!"

"Hey, now I wasn't ready...!"

"Okay, now I'm ready!"

They're currently the only dolls I have out, and I don't have any other doll things (clothes, accessories, rooms, etc) so they may spend a lot of time outside this summer! Hopefully it won't be too long before I can dig their friends out of storage. 

My other news is, I now have an Instagram! I'm lightwavesdolls. I've never had a smartphone before, so this is very exciting!

More Sparkle For A Rainy Day

     The last time I went to WalMart, they didn't have any new Sparkle fashions to catch my eye. However, I still had a few on the card leftover from several other shopping trips, so I decided that it was time to set them free. Of course, I asked for help from Lilu and Paige, our resident fashion models. They were more than happy to lend a hand and do a little photoshoot, despite the suboptimal lighting. They are definitely thinking "summer" thoughts, and they are ready for some fun in their wardrobe!

The outfits in question.

     Lilu went first. This outfit has a nice casual, summer look to it. I like the rolled detail on the pants.

     It fits her just fine, but she has a slightly thinner body than Barbie. The pants are a bit stretchy, however.

     Paige looked great in the next outfit. It's another I would not have chosen for myself, but actually worked well on the doll. I chose it for the skirt and broke my "rule" of not buying anything pink. I'm relaxing that rule a bit more now that I've built up my non-pink wardrobe a lot more!

     This outfit was slightly disappointing, as the top did not close in the back, even on Lilu. It will not fit a normal Barbie. The shorts are large and stretchy and fit just fine. It's such a cute little set, I wish it was just slightly larger. I haven't tried it on the Liv girls yet, but it will probably end up being theirs.

The final outfit was this interesting top that looks like a beach towel tied around Paige's waist. It has clear shoulder straps, so it doesn't slide right off!

    I'd love to see Sparkle get more summery with their clothes, maybe even put some swimwear out? Either way, it's always like a little treasure hunt when I get to the Sparkle box!

Monthly Update

It's been a busy time here! Andrea is excited because the "studio soundstage" (my house!) has finally arrived on location to be finished and built to our specifications. Soon, we will have plenty of space for dolls and humans and tiny robots to roam freely, as well as areas for sets to be built and lit! It will be very nice not trying to do photoshoots in cramped corners of this RV trailer!





In the news, two stars of TV and film have arrived, but they don't want to make an official appearance just yet. They will probably get their own posts.

I made a few more jewelry items. Anya needs stuff to sell at her vendor booth, after all!

Also, I have been hard at work writing intro scenes for Lightwaves' large cast. The trick will be to make them all memorable, plausible, and set the stage for the complicated storyline. Materials for building the sets have started accumulating, but some have been stuffed into storage until I can get my full-sized house built. I may not be able to start shooting until next year.

In the meantime, I will try to get a few dolls out now and then for some shoots. I've been trying to get out to explore some interesting locations, but the weather has not cooperated! Oh well, at least the dolls have lots of new clothes and jewelry to occupy themselves with!

Review: Black Label The LOOK Blonde

    (I apologize for the lack of photo quality! I'm in a moving transition stage and still living in a place with terrible lighting and no room for doll photos.)
    This doll has accessories galore! I wasn't too sure about her outfit/hairstyle, but I'm glad that I took the chance. They were actually very well-executed.
    She came with her COA and stand, as well as sunglasses, "leather" jacket, dress, magazine, coffee, handbag, necklace, and shoes!

    Her bangs are very blunt, but not horribly choppy. The jacket is sewn to the sides of her dress. If she is to be used for display, there is no reason to remove it, however...it can be clipped apart and the dress can come off. The delicate lacy top of the dress is so sweet!

Her accessories are very detailed. There is coffee in her cup, her handbag is shiny, with black sides and a wrist strap, and the magazine can "open" (there is nothing inside).

Her articulation makes me very happy! She bends at the neck, shoulders, elbows, wrists, hips, and knees.

    I am sure that there will be more pictures of this doll in the future!

Review: Barbie Game Developer

    Once upon a time, I actually did work in game development. Sort-of. Another of those weird, convoluted stories that makes up the fabric of my life. I didn't look anything like this Barbie, aside from the jeans, but nevertheless, I wanted her. Something about the red-streaked hair spoke to my teenage self.

Aww, how cute!

    Her packaging was a nightmare. After very carefully freeing her from the cardboard (I wanted to save the background) I discovered that not only was her head plastic-tied to the cardboard, her headset was plastic-tied to her head. That's six plastic-ties to the noggin! It took some extremely careful cutting to leave her with her hair intact.

    Very nerve-wracking!
    In addition to the glasses and headset, she came with a laptop and tablet, both plastic! The laptop opens and shuts, and contains program code for the game that she is working on. The tablet seems to be where she is testing the game.

   The tablet has a little finger notch so that she can hold it.

   The cardboard background of her box is not an ordinary box background, and has been designed to look like a (very pink!) work cubicle!

    I think all of the details are super adorable! The post-it notes and the action figures! And of course, because it's Barbie, it is color-coordinated and very organized. This woman is amazing.

    I was having so much fun with all of her stuff, that I forgot to get detail pictures of the doll, herself, but I really like her! The red-streaked-brown hair is very cool, I am loving the different-colored hair that Barbie has started putting in their "normal people" dolls. She also has golden brown eyes (like me! yay!) and glasses, nude lipstick and minimal/no makeup, and basic articulation. Her outfit is well worth it, with the "Ctrl-Alt-Barbie" top, green drab jacket, and faded jeans.

   She has flat feet and wears sneakers!

   I do think it's odd that her cubicle is pink and she doesn't wear much pink. But maybe because she works for Barbie, pink cubicles are a company policy? I am certainly not complaining! I am more than happy to see less strictly pink stuff in the Barbie aisle!

Review: Fashionistas Love That Lace

    I first saw this gal in stores, and was not overly impressed. In the box, she looked sort of flat. But after alternately putting her in and taking her out of my shopping cart, I finally caught her on sale on Amazon. She is my first Petite body Fashionista!

   There are many other comparisons of the heights, so I didn't bother with a photo, but she is indeed shorter than regular Barbies. The way she is packaged, she doesn't appear to be, as they raise her feet up. Her torso and legs are shorter, and she actually seems more proportional. I really like her overall shape!

   Out of the box, she is less flat-looking and actually has a bit of personality. Her eyes are extremely light golden-brown. She has very minimal makeup, except possibly some dark eyeliner and heavy brows. Her hairstyle is blunt, and I may trim up her bangs a little to fix some of the "choppy" parts. It is stiff, like Va Va Violet's.

I combed it with my fingers, and it fluffed out a little

   Her necklace is feminine in style and can be removed.

Her shirt is a soft, horizontally striped fabric, with blocks of lace. It is secured in the back with velcro.

Her red metallic skirt slips on with an elastic waist.

   And she wears interesting brown buckle boots that I didn't even see!

Her outfit from the back

    Her limited posing and one arm stuck in a bent position drives me crazy, but other than that, I am very happy with this doll!

Jewelry Day!

All of this weather fluctuation we've been having here has kept me off my feet most of the week. In response, I have been very bored, so I brought a bunch of my craft supplies in and started playing around with some beads and things. Eventually, I started making doll outfit accessories. I've never been particularly good at this in the past, as I tend to make them too bulky and complicated, but I think so far, these have turned out pretty cute!

Attempt #1, a colorful metal hoop necklace

I went much simpler with this one.

This one took several tries until I was happy with it!

My first ever DIY doll earrings

Then, I made a set!

This one was tricky, but I'm proud of it.

This can be worn this way

Or this way

My latest project: fun with memory wire in doll scale!