Who gets to come along?

As of right now it doesn't look like I'm going to be continuing my schooling this fall.  I have LASIK surgery scheduled for the second of August and I don't know how long the recovery will be.  The clinic sent me an information packet yesterday, and I'm afraid.  I wasn't afraid until I read the disclaimers and the side effects, but now I'm very nervous about it.  Anyway, the recovery may be lengthy so I will probably be staying close to home this fall.  Add to that the fact that I don't have an apartment or a set of wheels yet, and all that equals up to a firm anchor in Malden for the next couple of months.  While I'm here I plan on getting my affairs in order, getting my bags packed and my things organized, and making some plans.

One of the things that I do want to do is decide which dolls I want to take with me.  The dorm rooms at SEMO were horrendously drab, and I ended up taking some of my girls to liven the place up.  This time around will be no exception, but I can't take ALL of them with me.  Who stays home?  Who goes with me?  Who can I live without?  Who am I so protective of that I won't even photograph?  Who can be easily replaced in the event of a theft?  Who has a place to stand in my room?  Who doesn't?  LOL, that's a lot of "who-this" and "who-that!"  Cue the guitars, LOL.  But that was what I had to ask myself.  Eventually I got it whittled down to thirteen names.  Thirteen out of the three-hundred-some-odd dolls in my group.

My Scene Nolee and Svetlana (Barbie dolls)

Back in the days when I hadn't worked out all the bugs with my watermark.  LOL

Perhaps a third of my doll collection consists of Barbie dolls, but these are the only two My Scene dolls I've ever owned.  They didn't appeal to me when they were in stores; I bought Nolee at Dollar General shortly after they were discontinued because I fell in love with her black hair.  Svetlana was a secondhand find; I found her at one of the antique marts that I frequent.  Back then that particular store carried modern dolls for reasons I'll never know.  But anyway, I bought Svetlana, combed her hair, and redressed her.  The two of them joined me at SEMO and served as conversation pieces.

Cinderella (Heritage Signature Collection)

This porcelain doll channels more of a Rapunzel vibe than a Cinderella vibe, but she has glass slippers so that leaves little doubt about her identity.  Cinderella was a Christmas present from my grandmother one year, and since I had no place to put her at home she joined Nolee, Svetlana, and me at Cape Girardeau.  She was the biggest doll I had there, and I always liked to pretend that she was supervising the activities of her smaller dolly friends.  Yes, I still like to pretend!  The year that I had her, I had plenty of reasons to want to daydream.  But let's not revisit that little nightmare.

Melody and Miss September (Barbie dolls)

Melody (left) is a redressed My Melody Barbie, and Miss September is a redressed Miss Sapphire Birthstone Beauties Barbie.  Both of these were gifts from a friend, and both have the Steffie face that I'm so fond of.  They suffer from a problem similar to Cinderella's:  my room is too crowded for them!  They have no place to stand, so they lie on top of another doll's box.  This is no way to treat dolls, especially dolls that were gifts, so they will probably come with me.

Alice in Wonderland (Madame Alexander)

This Madame Alexander #1551 Alice was a very recent gift from my mother, so perfect that she even has her hangtag on her wrist.  She resides in the box that Melody and Miss September lie on top of.  I consider her too pretty to hide away in a box, so she will be coming with me as well.

Lucy Ricardo (Mattel)

You may remember Lucy from this blog entry.  She is one of five dolls that I had up on a very high shelf in the front room.  I don't know how, but one of my cats got up on that shelf and knocked all the dolls over.  No serious damage was done, which I consider lucky since Lucy has small parts that are easily lost (the bottle, the spoon, and her shoes).  Now Lucy and her shelfmates have to sit in a curio cabinet.  This would be fine, except that the shelves are not tall enough for the dolls to stand up straight.  That won't do.

Katniss Everdeen (Mattel)

Katniss is another doll that I have reviewed, and was another of the dolls up on the shelf.  She has three arrows that could have been lost had she been knocked to the floor.

Life in the Dreamhouse Midge (Midge doll)

Midge is the third victimized shelf doll.  I have very recently reviewed her.  Her poseability and all-around cuteness make her a must-have.

Miranda and Mary (Barbie dolls)

Miranda (left) is a Pioneer Shopkeeper Barbie, and Mary is a Barbie had a Little Lamb.  They also were shelf dolls, and Miranda got the worst of it.  She did get knocked off the shelf, and one of her shoes got lost.  I have the other shoe tucked away in my pocket, but I'm still looking for the mate.  I'm not going to cry too loudly if I don't find the shoe (a lot of pioneers went barefoot anyway) but it's the principle of the thing!  I've had Miranda ever since I was eleven, and she was the first really special doll I'd received so I kept her nice.  She was perfect, nothing missing...and now those shoes are gone.  I was ready to strangle the cat, I was so ticked.  Mary's lamb also got knocked off, and I consider myself lucky that one of the dogs didn't find it and chew on it.

Heather (Seymour Mann)

She's just a tad creepy...and difficult to photograph.

Heather is a large porcelain ballerina made by the Seymour Mann company (one of my favorite companies).  She is one of the items I got during my most recent antique mall hop; we originally went in the hopes that I could walk off my kidney stone, and my mother insisted on spoiling me a little while we were there.  I ended up coming away with four dolls, and Heather is one of them.  She, like Cinderella and most of the other dolls on this list, has no place to stand and look pretty, so she'll end up coming with me as well.  I do need to get her a proper doll stand, and then she's good to go.

Sophie (Midge doll)

Sophie is my booty call.  Whenever I need a doll to photograph or model a new outfit, I get her out.  Sophie is very special to me because she has red hair and a Steffie face, and she was one of the first Steffie-faced dolls I bought.  I've also done some cosmetic work on her and photographed her in some unorthodox places.  Based on that history her presence in my apartment is not really an option.  She HAS to come.

That brings the count to thirteen dolls.  Two porcelain, one vinyl, and ten Barbie dolls.  Diverse enough to be interesting, small enough to be controllable.  Of course, I can't guarantee that I won't gather some more newcomers while I'm at Mountain Home; I did that when I was away at SEMO and I probably will again.  When I do, you can guarantee a new review.  Until then, cheers!

Yours Truly,
RagingMoon1987

President Barbie review

This is the second of my Barbie/Barbie-sized Christmas dolls.  She is the President...or at least, what Barbie would look like if she were President.  WARNING:  this doll has a unique set of joints and is partially nude in some pics to show these joints.  Proceed with caution.

BarbieCollectors.com says that she is no longer available, but some versions of this doll are still in stores.  Mattel released four versions of this doll:  white, black, Latina, and Asian.  Mine is the Asian version; I thought she was the prettiest, and I love Oriental dolls.  She reminds me of one of my favorite political figures, the beautiful and intelligent Michelle Malkin.  And Michelle she has become.

Before I get into the review, it's time for my usual tangent.  Note how I said in the last paragraph that some versions of these dolls are still in stores?  I have been to five different Wal-Marts, one K-Mart, two Targets, two Big Lots, and one Toys R Us, and the vast majority of the dolls in stock are the Caucasian version.  To compound matters, the Caucasian doll is your typical cookie-cutter Barbie:  blonde, blue-eyed, with a big dippy grin on her face.  Why, oh why, must the majority of white playline Barbie dolls look like that?  There ARE brunettes and redheads in this world that like to be represented too.  Anyway, during my search I occasionally saw a couple of black dolls or Latinas in stock, but TRU was the one and only place that had my beautiful Asian doll.  Lo and behold, I didn't have money...but my sister did.  On the day that I obtained Moonlight Dance Daniela, my sister nipped over to TRU, found my coveted Asian president...and ripped the very last one out of another woman's hands!  According to Sister, said woman was furious and yelled various explicatives down the isle, insisting that the doll was "for her granddaughter."  My sister gave her some sass right back and left the store with the doll.  My doll.  The last one in the store.  I feel pretty darn lucky to have her...and such an awesome sister!

Tangent over, let's look at Michelle:

She's a lot more simplistic than Lucy is.  Her hair is straight and black with a deep side part.

She has a very attractive face, with brown, almond-shaped eyes.  Her eyes are highlighted with pink eye shadow and an outer layer of shimmery stuff.  She has brown eyebrows and long painted eyelashes.

I'm not a huge fan of that pink crap around her eyes.  I'm not a makeup expert, but I don't think the pink eye shadow matches.  Brown or gold would've been better.

Michelle's mouth has an open smile.  Her lips are pink.

Again, I'm not a huge fan of the color.  It is washed out in this pic; the color matches the clothes that she's wearing, but I don't find it particularly flattering.

Speaking of what she's wearing, let's take a gander at Michelle's clothing.

Michelle wears a three-piece suit, or rather, an outfit that looks like one:  she has a jacket, blouse, and skirt.  The "blouse" is actually a panel of baby pink stretch material sewn into the front of the jacket.  It has a slight sparkle to it.

The rest of the jacket and skirt are made of thick hot pink material that I can't visually identify.  The pink has an acid-washed effect to it.  It looks almost like it was hand-dyed, which I love.  This material has no stretch to it whatsoever, and I don't love that.

The jacket has a gathered patriotic edging on each seam.

There's also this button.

It's the Barbie logo, but in this case it serves as a campaign button.  It is sewn on.

The skirt is a pencil skirt.  It has three horizontal gathers at the top and fits Michelle very tightly.  The skirt is so tight that I had difficulty maneuvering it over her shoes.  These dolls are best left dressed.

Michelle's jewelry is minimalistic.  She wears a plastic "pearl" necklace and matching earrings, both of which proved to be near impossible to photograph.  Not that there was much need anyway; the jewelry is plain white plastic.

What Michelle lacks in jewelry, she makes up for in some very interesting footwear.  Check these shoes out:

Pink, of course...no shock there.  They are enormous slingback wedges with a very unusual shape.  There is a good reason for their odd shape.

The 2012 President dolls are billed as the first Barbies that can stand on their own.  Michelle can do this, but she has to be carefully balanced on a hard, flat surface.  She does faceplant sometimes, but like all play dolls she can take the abuse.  One other thing of note is that those shoes are molded to Michelle's feet.  She can't take them off AT ALL.  I've seen molded shoes on Barbie dolls before, but they were always flat shoes.  This is the first time I've ever seen molded high heels on a Barbie.

That takes us into the body.  Again, I have never seen a Barbie body like this.  Michelle has a one-piece torso with the standard swivel neck and ball-jointed shoulders.  Her arms are jointed at the elbow and wrist:

The range of mobility in these joints is lousy, however.  This is as far as I can bend either joint, and I even took her tight jacket off to free up those joints!

These joints are so hard to pose that even the position below is a challenge:

Compare this to Katniss and Alexandria (Barbie Fashionistas Wild), both of whom have similar arms.

Breathe easy, Katniss...this isn't President Snow.

Alexandria can fold her arms like a champ.  Katniss cannot cross her arms, but she can bend her arms to a much sharper angle than Michelle can.  Overall, Michelle's arms are more similar to Katniss's than they are to Alexandria's.  It's a bit odd that Michelle the toy would have similar arms to Katniss the collectors' item, and not to Alexandria the other toy.

Odd as Michelle's arms are, they were nowhere near as big a surprise to me as her legs!

They look normal at first sight, but these dolls do NOT have the rubber click-knee legs that the majority of my other playline Barbie dolls do.  Nor does she have external knee joints like Alexandria and Katniss do.  Heck, she doesn't even have the wimpy peg joints that Musa and Artemis have!  Michelle's legs are all hard, probably hollow, plastic.  The knees do not bend AT ALL!!!

Michelle does have mobility at the hips, obviously.  However, this movement is drastically restricted by that tight skirt.  In all, Michelle has nine joints.  That's more than the three that my Stardoll has, but it's nothing like most of the play dolls available right now.

Michelle and Raven compare arms.

Under normal circumstances I'd find it odd for a play doll to have such stiff legs.  However, the more I thought about it, the more I realized that it makes sense.  This doll's main gimmick is being able to stand on her own, right?  If she had rubber bendy legs OR jointed legs like most of my other dolls, then she probably would not have the strength to stand on her own.  But then again, I do have dolls who can stand perfectly well on their own...and they have jointed knees.  Again, we turn to Katniss for a demonstration.

Katniss has jointed knees and flat feet, plus some very substantial boots, and she can stand on her own.  Thus it is indeed possible to make a doll with bendable knees that can stand unaided.  Therefore I don't know what Mattel's deal is with the President dolls.  Perhaps they didn't want to take a chance with any dolls not being able to stand?  Maybe they feared warped legs, like Artemis and Musa have?  Or maybe those high heeled shoes threw things off a bit?  I don't know.  Your guess is as good as mine.  If any of y'all have actual, verifiable information about why Mattel designed this doll this way, please give me a holler.

So let's sum it up.  This doll has good things and bad things, and my mother always taught me to break the bad news first, so here goes.

BAD
*Poor posability.  The doll's arms are stiff, and the legs only have a hip joint to keep them from qualifying as "frozen."
*Standing feature isn't the greatest.  You have to play with her a bit to get her to cooperate.
*The clothes are too "Barbie."  Nothing but pink, pink, and more pink, with only a bit of patriotic ribbon to break it all up.
*Certain ethnicities are hard to find!  In my area, only the blonde doll was ubiquitous.  The other three were very hard to find.  Either they were more sought-after by collectors and children alike, or there were just fewer of them.  Again, I don't know which of those is the true story; maybe both are true!
*I'm not a huge fan of the pink makeup; it doesn't look good with her skin.
*Not too versatile.  If I were playing Barbies with my little cousin, I could see Michelle playing the president she is supposed to be, or a lawyer, or a businesswoman.  But that's about it.

GOOD
*In spite of the instability, this doll does stand.  Once I have her in the right position she stands very solidly.  She lives up to her promises...unlike certain other politicians!  LOL
*The lack of posability adds a certain degree of durability to this doll; she feels very sturdy when I pick her up, though I am not willing to subject her to my "throw the doll across the yard and see what happens" test (LOL again).
*No warped legs!
*The molded shoes won't fall off and get lost.
*Nice hair.  Soft, smooth, and yet not ridiculously long like some other Barbie dolls.
*The clothes are an unusual shade of pink.  Michelle's suit looks like it's been acid-washed, or maybe tie-dyed.  Furthermore, that pink may actually be a blessing in disguise; instead of the Republican red, Independent white, or Democratic blue, she's her own party's color.
*The clothes are well made.  They feel like seersucker or some sort of ridged fabric like that.  I wouldn't mind wearing a suit like that myself...in a different color, of course!
*This doll is not very pretentious.  Mattel said she is supposed to be the President, and she looks the part.
*She's pretty!
*She looks like the ethnic group she's supposed to portray, without being too stereotyped.
*My particular doll is a gift, which is always a positive.

Perhaps the most important good thing is that she's unique.  There's something about this doll that I just can't put my finger on.  She doesn't blend in with all the others.  When I put her on my shelf with the other dolls I have on display, she had a very commanding presence.  If my dolls were alive, I could see them flocking to her for advice and leadership.

"Vote with your lady smarts, not your lady parts!"

Maybe all that pink is a benefit after all!  Or maybe those stiff legs are what does it.  Either way, this is a very special doll.  Hats off to my beloved sister for bringing her home to me!

Happy last day of February!
RagingMoon1987

Time to gripe: Blonds Blond Barbie, Mattel's latest controversy

I'm going to be perfectly honest:  I have no idea what "The Blonds" is about, nor do I even know what it is.  I don't know if it's a television show like "Mad Men" or if it's a movie.  <hesitates to look it up so she won't look like a complete dunce>  Apparently it's an Argentinian movie about...hmm, the plotline is rather shoddily described on Wikipedia, and I'm in no mood to look up another more respectable site.  Do your own homework on this one.  LOL, can you tell I'm not in the best of moods right now?

Anyway, Mattel released a doll that is in the likeness of one of the characters.  Here she is:

Now, what do you see when you look at that???  Do you see a blonde doll in a sparkly dress and a fur coat?  Do you see a run-of-the-mill Barbie that's been a little more bimbo-ized than usual?  OR...do you see an object that glorifies animal cruelty and the wearing of fur?  If you answered yes to that third one, turn around and bend over so I can kick you around the block.

Yep, that's what some folks are saying.  Animal rights activists and the anti-fur lobbyists are all up in arms over this doll's fur coat.  Some are swearing up and down that the fur is real (never mind that they probably don't own this doll themselves), most are saying that this "glorifies animal cruelty," and some are even saying that this doll is telling children that it's okay to wear fur and abuse animals.  Check out some of the comments folks have been leaving on The Blonds' Facebook site; some of 'em are downright nasty!  Not all of the animal rights activists I know are up in arms about this doll; they are the ones who actually bother to use their heads.  But a lot of folks are and it's insane!

News flash, sheeple:  this doll is NOT for children!!!  She is intended for adult collectors, like me.  If you don't want to expose your kids to this, then DON'T BUY THE DOLL.  Show some common sense...oh wait, most animal rights activists have no common sense.  They've never even heard of it, probably.  Furthermore, Mattel doesn't normally use animal products in their wares, and they haven't in some years.  Oh sure, there was a time when Barbie and Ken probably wore real leather jackets or belts, but not anymore (thanks again to animal rights activists for that little hit in quality).  But I'm willing to bet that in this case the doll is wearing faux fur.  Some lobbyists will tell you that faux fur is real fur from dogs and cats, but I don't believe that nonsense either; I believe that's just another lie that the lobbyists made up to try and prove their point...and they have done that in the past.

But then again folks seem to like throwing darts at Barbie.  This is the fourth big controversy that I can name in the past two years.  In the summer of 2011 there was a campaign done by the idiots at Greenpeace, called the "Barbie, It's Over" movement.  Basically they took Ken hostage, claimed that he broke up with Babs because she destroyed rainforests in Borneo, and refused to get back with her until she stopped utilizing Indonesian lumber.  It prompted a huge protest and a boycott, and lo and behold Mattel actually stopped using Indonesian lumber!  Never mind that Indonesian lumberjacks are now out of a job.  Never mind that Ken was packaged in the same kind of box as Barbie.  Never mind that Barbie sales actually went up, thanks in part to devoted collectors like me who saw through Greedypeace's evil little agenda.  As long as tree-huggers have their ugly old orangutangs to fawn over, then never mind anything else.

Yep, Ken left Barbie for this.  What a looker!

Then in the fall there was Tokidoki Barbie.  This is her:

Tokidoki Barbie was a stunningly beautiful Steffie-faced doll with pink hair, a Japanese-inspired outfit, a cactus dog, and a full-sleeve tattoo that stretched across her chest and back.  She was a work of art...and thousands of mommies and daddies flipped the heck out.  I assumed that the source of controversy would be over the dog (his name is "Bastardino"), but no.  It was over that tattoo.  This surprised me since just about all parents are against swearing in front of children, but not all of them are against tattoos and body mods.  Heavens, one of the best mothers I know has a full sleeve tattoo, just like Tokidoki Barbie!  But the criticisms flew fast and furious anyway.  Barbie promotes risky lifestyles.  Barbie advocates deviant behavior.  Barbie encourages kids to get tattoos at an early age.  It was unbelievably stupid, and this did have some adverse effects, not for the company, but for collectors.  Tokidoki Barbie had been advertised for half a year before finally being released in October of 2011 (just in time for my twenty-fourth birthday).  And then, two days before she was to be released...BOOM!  All the flack hit and the doll sold out in two days.  Most of the dolls were snapped up by jack wagons who don't collect dolls at all; they just wanted to pay fifty dollars for a doll and then jack the price up on Ebay.  I saw some morons advertising their Tokidoki dolls for SIX HUNDRED BUCKS!!!  That's a pretty far cry from the fifty she originally was going for.  Meanwhile, hardcore collectors were left with nothing, and one of those collectors was me.  I set aside fifty dollars to buy and pay for that doll myself, and she sold out before I could get my hands on her.  No Tokidoki Barbie for Moony's twenty-fourth birthday.  I got the Japanese DOTW couple instead (and they're a great pair of dolls...I owe y'all a review on them).

Needless to say I was not eager to repeat the Tokidoki debacle with the next doll that I wanted from BarbieCollector.com.  As luck would have it, the next doll that I absolutely had to have was the Katniss Everdeen doll.  

My lovely Katniss.

I figured that since there hadn't been a big fuss over the last line of dolls based on books and movies (that being the Twilight line) that Katniss would not cause a huge fuss either.  WRONG!!!  Folks had a fit again, claiming that the doll glorified killing and violence and war, and it didn't help that the Katniss doll carries a bow and some arrows.  Uh, no...that couldn't be further from the truth.  If you read the books then you know that they DO NOT glorify killing; in fact, the books are downright grim and glory is about the last thing you think of when you read them.  Furthermore, the Katniss doll is not intended for children.  She, like Tokidoki Barbie and Blonds' Blond Barbie, are for adult collectors and shouldn't be allowed within a mile of destructive little kids.  And frankly, I originally thought that some of the Barbie-haters out there would be pleased with Katniss, since she's about as far a cry from uber-feminine Barbie as a doll can get and still be an appealing product.  But noooo, we have to have a stupid fuss anyway.  Ignore the positive, magnify the negative, vilify the whole thing.  At least this time I didn't miss out; the picture above is of my Katniss doll (apologies for recycling a pic from a prior post), and my review on Katniss can be found here.

Oh yes, there is another one I forgot!  Earlier this year a bunch of parents got a bee in their bonnets about a bald Barbie for kids with cancer.  Barbie's Facebook page got inundated with posts like this:

And this:

Name her Hope, and she ceases to be Barbie.  Sort of defeats the purpose.

In truth about 99% of the bleeding hearts who saw this DID repost this.  It quickly got to the point where I wasn't sure whether the page was about Barbie or about kids with cancer!  Some even went as far as to boycott Barbie until Mattel complied with their orders, which I think is ridiculous.  Mattel STILL hasn't complied, so there are some poor schmoes out there who are boycotting Barbie to this day.  Don't get me wrong, I support this idea.  I love it, in fact; I'd own one of these in a New York second if they were produced.  It just got extremely annoying...I'd jump on Barbie's page hoping to see pictures of other folks' beautiful dolls, and instead I got the images above.  Some folks were so obnoxious with their posts that I even reported them for spam!  I wanted to hunt up the people who started the movement, shake them, and scream "YOU are the parents!  It's YOUR job to build your children's self-esteem, not Barbie's!"  It was all too much.  

Frankly, as long as Barbie isn't too risque I'll always support her.  If I were to draw lines I'd draw them at Porn Star Barbie or Junkie Barbie (LOL, hopefully those will never come to be).   Blonds Blond Barbie is neither a junkie nor a porn star so I support her.  I don't find her particularly attractive; in fact she looks to me like a glammed-up version of Nancy Spungen.  Imagine Nancy, below, with permed hair, a diamond-studded dress, and a white fur coat, and you've got Blonds Blond Barbie.  <chuckles>  I can hear thousands of punk fans demanding my head on a silver platter for that analogy!  

No offense, Nancy!  No need to malign the dead!

It's just the principle of the thing.  Blonds Blond is a doll, meant for the pleasure and joy of collectors like me.  She does not glamorize animal cruelty.  She does not glamorize the wearing of fur.  She is not supposed to be a political symbol.  She is merely something rich and decadent, pimped out with all the luxuries of life.  And what says luxury more than FUR???  If being luxurious is a crime then ninety percent of modern day collectors' Barbies would be behind bars, with their diamonds and furs and gold and such.  If you are dim-witted enough to think that a Barbie doll would wear real fur, then YOUR LOSS!!!  Instead of protesting Barbie and insisting that she be pulled from shelves, stick to your normal modes of lunacy by stripping down naked and throwing red paint on the rich folks in Manhattan (which, by the way, can be considered vandalism).  You will be making your point that way...and I'll have my Blonds Blond Barbie.  Everybody wins.

Unfortunately Blonds Blond Barbie will probably be one that I'll never have.  She costs $125, which is pretty steep for a doll, especially one the size of Barbie.  I DO have that money, but as I've said before that money is probably going to pay for schoolbooks...or for that infernal dental exam that I have to have this coming Friday.  So Blondie may get away from me...but I still support her and Mattel and will continue to do so.  Oh, and if she does get to come home with me, you know the drill.  I just hope she's as awesome in real life as she is in her publicity pics; Mattel sometimes likes to fool around with images of their items to make them more appealing.

Check out those eyelashes!!!

As a final note, I'd like to point out that not all animal rights activists, vegans, and PETA-pushers are dumb enough to boycott this Barbie.  In fact, some of them actually like Blonds Blond Barbie.  A vegan friend of mine recently mentioned a desire for this doll, and was shocked when I told her of the controversy.  When I told her why, she said "it's just fake fur."  Well said.

Courage!

RagingMoon1987

UPDATE:  According to a couple of my collector friends who somehow have already obtained this doll, the dress is plastic and snaps on and off!  How chintzy can a toy company get???  Especially since she's supposed to be so luxurious!  <sigh>

Being for the benefit of Miss Kite!

At the end of my review on the Katniss Everdeen doll I told you of a Barbie clone that I snagged yesterday.  I'll get to that, but first I have a bit of a Twilight Zone experience to tell you about.  Katniss has those arrows, right?  Well I went to bed very late last night, and since I am completely out of room in my bedroom I put Katniss on the top of our bookshelf in the front room.  As far as I know those arrows were in her quiver.  Then this morning I got up, traipsed in here and I found those arrows on the floor!  It was almost like she'd shot them!

I'm Katniss Everdeen, and I'm going to kill you.

LOL, okay so it's not so Twilight Zone-y; I probably forgot to put them in her quiver and dumped them when I stood up in my half-awake state.

Secondly, most of my page views are not coming from folks on Blogspot.  They are coming from sites called uglystat.com and adsensewatchdog.com.  I don't know who they are or where they're from.  I just want them to quit bugging me.  If you are out there and work for either of those websites, STOP IT.  I have nothing to hide, no shady activities for you to investigate.  This is a dolly blog, no more, no less.  If any of my followers have any ideas for how to put a stop to this, please drop me a line.

Now...on to Miss Kite.  This is her.

Her full name is Miss Katherine Lorelei Kite, Kate Kite for short, and Miss Kite until I get to know her better (LOL).  Her original name was Lovely Patsy or something like that.  How then did she get the name Miss Kite, you ask?  Because of this.

Her hair is held back with these ugly-as-sin rubber bands, and they had nothing covering them.  All I had were these two scraps of black ribbon, long enough to tie in knots but not into bows.  The back of her head looks a little like the tail of a kite with those ribbon bits fluttering around, and that reminded me of that song by The Beatles.  That loud outfit also looks like something that a circus performer might wear (if what The Beatles said was true the original Mr. Kite was part of a circus act).

Tangent over, let's look a little closer at Miss Kite.

She is your typical Barbie clone, with a soft vinyl head and a hollow plastic body.  Her hair is a reddish brown and is surprisingly well-rooted.  You know how clone dolls can sometimes have thin hair with bald patches on their heads?  Not this chica, babes!  Heck, it's even got a halfway-decent style; two parts of the hair are twisted and held back by one of those butt-ugly rubber bands.

The rest of the hair is swept back into a ponytail.  The ponytail falls to Miss Kite's waist; without the rubber bands it's a bit longer.  There are no bangs.

The hair feels smooth and soft like hair should, but it wants to fly away into a big fat mess.  I'm constantly having to brush it to keep it looking decent.  When I brushed it the first time a fair amount of hair came out.  Not enough to make Miss Kite bald, but still it was enough.

Miss Kite's face is average in appearance, not stunning, but not hideous either.

Her eyebrows are single-stroke, single-layer strips of orangey paint.  It's a good match with her hair, but it's very faint.  I find myself wondering what she'd look like with slightly darker eyebrows.

The eyes are surprisingly detailed, especially for a two-dollar dime store doll.  Miss Kite has blue eyes with long, thick eyelashes.  The eyes have painted white lines and spots to add some depth and shine.  There is also some pinkish-red eye shadow which doesn't match Miss Kite's dress.

Miss Kite's mouth is pinkish-red like her eyeshadow.  She has painted teeth.  Her mouth is just a teeny bit off-center...kinda like my mouth!

The paint is pretty good here; nothing's missing or rubbed off.  Miss Kite has a sweet smile, not too showy or flamboyant.  She's not as precisely painted as a Barbie with the same expression, though; the edges of the teeth aren't as well-painted as the rest.

Miss Kite versus Barbie

The dress was the main reason why I bought Miss Kite.  It's very...interesting looking.

The whole thing is made of a shiny, smooth, satiny material.  The bodice is completely black:

There's something odd about the fit of the bodice; it's baggy around Miss Kite's middle.  She almost looks pregnant.

That's a gnarly-looking baby bump!

The top of the bodice ties around Miss Kite's neck in halter-top fashion.  There are two black ribbons holding this part together.  The rest of the bodice Velcros together, though the bottom of the seam gaps open.

Miss Kite's skirt is unusual.  It has a fifties-style shape to it, but I can't imagine any fifties female wearing material like this!  The front is a zebra print:

And the back, oddly enough, is solid black.

If Miss kite is standing with her back to you she looks like she's wearing a completely black dress.

Or it would if the zebra front didn't show.

Miss Kite wears basic black plastic pumps on her feet.  They fit poorly, so I have to use blue putty to keep them on.

She has no accessories or jewelry, which I find odd because she has molded ear holes.  At least give her some cute little black studs!

Oh well, I'm not helpless.  One of my favorite things to do is make jewelry for dolls, so I can make some earrings for Miss Kite myself.  I might even go further than studs and give her tiny kite earrings!

Miss Kite's body is typical of clone dolls, comprised of stiff, cheap, hollow plastic.

Her shoulders and hips swing back and forth but have no lateral movement.  The knees have no joints and the waist does not twist.

The right shoulder is extremely loose.

Due to the stiff hip joints Miss Kite can't sit very gracefully; her legs splay out like she's...well, like she's got something on her mind.  Having stiff knees doesn't help much.

Keep your pants zipped and your legs together, sis!

Miss Kite's head fits on a knob; this knob allows for limited mobility; she can swivel her head but not tilt it.  It can also pop off if I twist it just right.

Again, par for the course with a clone doll.

And that, my dears, is Miss Kate Kite in a nutshell.  She's not really a bad doll for two bucks.  I can see a little girl having fun with this doll.  She breaks up the humdrum and monotony that a Barbie collection can have.  You've probably seen it; the sea of blonde Barbie dolls with wide blue eyes and the same toothy smile, covered in every shade of pink you can think of.  Patsy/Miss Kite is certainly not that.  She has different hair, different makeup, and a different expression.  Yes, she's got an open-lipped grin like Barbie, but she doesn't look like she's about to star in a toothpaste commercial, like Barbie sometimes can.  And Miss Kite isn't wearing pink!!!  Nor is she wearing anything overtly slutty; that dress covers her knees and most of her chest.  Yeah, she's revealing a decent part of her back, but that's nowhere near as much skin revealed as some other playline dolls.  <cough> Bratz <cough>

The thing is, Dollar General also has basic Barbie dolls at the store for the same price, and they're of better quality than the generic dolls like Miss Kite.  While I was browsing I saw this doll:

She's a bit more imaginative than the doll I have.

I've also seen Moxie Girlz and basic Bratz, and yesterday I even saw one Monster High doll (Dead Tired Draculaura).  Draculaura was the most expensive, at fifteen bucks (high for a Dollar General doll, and a little ridiculous for a Dead Tired doll); the rest of the dolls there ranged from two to five bucks in price.  All of them were of superior quality to Miss Kite...or Patsy, whatever her name is.  Some of them also have gimmicks; this Barbie has jointed ankles to do ballet poses.  Obviously this issue with quality isn't a big deal to me.  I bought Miss Kite because she looked unique, not because I expected her to be a collector-quality item.  I just wouldn't expect a child to pick this doll over Barbie unless they want a break from the same-old, same-old that Barbie brings (and some kids do).

So that's Katniss and Miss Kite covered, and believe it or not, that's not the end of my dolly haul yesterday!  I STILL need to share my new Lalaloopsy dress.  In a prior blog I lamented not having any extra clothes for my Lalaloopsy...then I went out and managed to find three new clothing sets.  The next blog will be devoted to those and to my Lalaloopsy doll.  I've had her for almost a year and it's finally hitting me to do a review of her.  Keep your eyes peeled for that.  I also bought another outfit for my Cutie Pops doll.  Until then, stay safe on those roads and don't get killed during Black Friday sales.  Seriously, don't.  I highly recommend staying home tomorrow, in fact; our local Super Wal-Mart had people sitting in the isles waiting for bicycles, Lalaloopsy dolls, clothes, and God-knows-what-else to go on sale.  My sister and I could hardly move, and it doesn't do any good to say "excuse me, can you please let me by."  We had to push and shove a lot just to get to the checkout line.  And we weren't even there for the sale!!!  Long story short, please just stay home.  Eat some leftover turkey, spend some time with family, sleep late, and enjoy yourself.

Ciao,
RagingMoon1987