Skipper weather

My mom and I are on a strict no-buying rule for the foreseeable future, as bills were higher than Grace Slick on acid this past month.  Thus I'll have new stuff for the blog, but because I'm the queen of procrastination it was all bought in December, January, or early February.  Bills and taxes bite whale bubbles.  That said, for reasons unknown I tend to get bitten by the Skipper bug around February or March, and...well, y'all will see where I'm going with that in a bit.  I'm a moderately big Skipper fan, maybe not so much as Tam is (she did Skipper Saturdays for awhile), but enuff that I have quite a few.  Most of mine are the balloon-headed dolls like this bright-eyed trio...

...and the oldest one I own is Fluff, a friend from the late mod era...or she was my oldest, as we'll soon see.  Fluff is another product of Skipper weather; she blew in on the gust front of a mild winter storm, back in 2018.

The vintage Skippers are my favorites due to their sweet faces and their compact size.  I can tuck one of them into my purse and carry her anywhere, the way I can Stacie and Lottie and Licca-chan.  The Skippers I like the least are the ones from the mid-eighties.  Their smiles look too crazed for my taste.  Some of the Super Teen Skipper heads aren't great either, though I do love Horse Lovin' Skipper.  As for my own dolls...well, they're who I grew up with, so I like them, significantly more so than Jewel Secrets Skipper.  They're certainly not perfect with their buggy eyes and fragile necks, but I love me a good balloon-head.  But anyway, I like Skipper quite a bit, and when I saw this Pose 'n' Play Skipper for a reasonable price I grabbed her.  Tam had one of these once, and the little doll made the mistake of sleeping by a large window during cold weather!  The poor love didn't catch a cold, but she did want to go on a bike ride and that plan was foiled by the falling snow.  My Skipper arrived just ahead of Winter Storm Blair, and she has naught but her blue playsuit to wear so I kept her a mile away from the windows.  This is her; y'all got a glimpse of her at the end of January.

The Pose 'n' Play line saw two dolls, Skip herself and the elusive Tiff, who has the same head mold as Fluff and has straight red hair.  Tiff is VERY expensive on eBay, but I'm keeping my eyes peeled for a good deal anyway, because you never know when you'll find one.  Skip is easy to find, though; indeed, these were sold in baggies after their production ended, and many, MANY of the Pose 'n' Play Skippers I've seen have been like those.  My own doll was marked as a possible baggie doll, but without the original packaging it's impossible to know for sure.  My Skipper is in very good shape though, and she even has her cute little curly pigtails like Olga Korbut's.  

Those bows are a tremendous pain in the posterior to tie, by the way.  The right one was all cocky-doody, so I undid it and it took me the rest of the evening to get it done up again.  I won't complain though, because Skipper at least has her original bows.  Fluff does not.

Though Skipper and Fluff are from different lines, they occupy a very similar timeframe and have the same body.  Their posing is thus pretty much the same, though Fluff's joints like to freeze up if I don't move them from time to time.  She can't move her arms out as far as Skipper can.

Both dolls can bend their knees to two clicks (Fluff's legs are obviously concealed by her long skirt), and they can move their right elbow.

NEITHER doll can bend her left elbow!  I wonder what the odds are of getting two highly poseable dolls, and their only broken joint being the exact same one?  Not that that kills my enjoyment of Skipper and Fluff, of course.  As a last little tidbit, both can tip their necks.  Barbie and company couldn't do that before the Living era...or could Live Action Barbie tip her neck???  I don't know.  Here Fluff and Skip demonstrate their ability to cock their heads; Skip's neck is a little stiff.
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Here it's also somewhat possible to see the difference in these dolls' faces, and how aesthetics changed in a single year.  The Living dolls all had long eyelashes, as seen on Fluff, while the Pose 'n' Play line did not.  Living Skipper also looks a little like she's wearing makeup, and Pose 'n' Play does not.  Interestingly, nor does Fluff, despite being from the Living line.  Surprise, surprise, I like Living Skipper and I'm looking for her, but not too hard at the moment.  Y'all will see why in a bit, and y'all can look at Tam's doll in the meantime.

In many ways these two are similar to Marx Sindy, though they both predate Sindy by about five years.  All three have soft vinyl limbs and internal joints that allow them to outpose the Barbie dolls of the sixties. 

That's too much blonde, though!!!  LOL, during the sixties Skip came in all three hair colors, though by the seventies she'd settled into a blonde trend just like Barbie.  Though I love redheads, I'd like to find a little brunette to match Mama's Barbie...my, oh my, look what I have!  She popped onto the blog in January too.

She's a straight leg with dark hair, just like #3!  For the record, I often compare my dark brunette dolls to the very menacing Hesston, Kansas tornado, and most of my dolls fall short of that blackness.  Skipper does (she's more Ash Valley brown), but not Barbie!

I told Mama that I've reached a new level of eccentricity, what with comparing doll hair to the colors of various tornadoes.  When I find a Barbie with hair the color of the Rochelle tornado then I'll REALLY be impressed...and come to think of it, there has been one, LOL.  Anyway, this Skipper is not in perfect condition; notice that she's missing her headband, and her hair needs some TLC.  Indeed, right now Skipper looks a little like Witchy Woman.

Plenty of Skipper dolls are missing the headband though, and it has a penchant for turning Skip's scalp green, so I won't complain.  My doll's hands and feet are also free of chew marks; poor Fluff did not dodge this bullet, though she's not as mangled as some dolls I've seen.

I also threw Pose 'n' Play Skipper in because her feet are immaculate (she's on the left).  Some of my dolls got lucky and some didn't.  The soles of straight-leg Skipper's feet also tell me a thing or two about her.

This Skipper is not a sample Skipper.  Tam has a sample Skipper (also called a test market Skipper), and the "Japan" mark on her foot is lengthwise rather than across the ball of Skipper's foot.  Sample Skipper also has slightly bigger feet than my doll, and she has resin legs with a slightly wider stance.  Piddling little differences, mostly, but they help tell one Skipper from another.  Tam's lovely examples can be seen here, here, here, and here, and she points out that the "sample" moniker is kinda misleading because the sample dolls weren't really samples, but rather the first Skipper dolls on the market.  Other special dolls from this early era include two-tone Skipper, who had hair fibers of two different colors (one of Tam's sample dolls is like that), and Color Magic Skipper, who had hair left over from Barbie's Color Magic days.  Over time Color Magic hair oxidizes and turns one color or another, and this is what happens with Color Magic Skipper.  Tam's doll was a brunette, but now she's got flaming red hair and she's my favorite of Tam's Skipper dolls.  Red hair, y'know.

Speaking of red hair (I detest the term "titian"), I've also got Skooter.

Skooter is a late addition to the party, and she was pretty short-lived in general, only seeing the straight-leg and bend-leg eras, with mine being the former.  She's got her perky little pigtails and her original bows, and her original swimsuit, though it's showing a little wear here and there...if you could call a few loose ends wear.

Brrrr, Skooter arrived on January 22nd at the end of a sharp cold snap, and it was too cold to even think of swimming!  Anyway, Skooter came in three hair colors like Skipper, Barbie, and Midge did, and...believe it or not I think they're all cute.  I just happened to like this little redhead the best.  She's not the prettiest thing, but she has plenty of cute factor.

Chocolate eyes!  And freckles, y'all know how I love freckles...but what is that sandy crud on her face???  I hope it's not mold!  Time to bust out the Clorox wipes.

Much better.  Y'all can probably see that Skooter's blush has faded to an unusual pallor...but only in two places, one on each cheek.

I knew that Barbie and company could develop some unusual lip colors as time passed (I've seen some with lemon yellow lips), but paling blush is a new one for me!  Oh well, it just makes my Skooter unique. 

Sweeping change of subject, is there any literature out there that reveals who these smaller kids are in relation to Barbie's friends?  In my youth I had guy friend Ricky designated as Allan's kid brother, pigtailed Skooter as Midge's sister, and Fluff as...P.J.'s sister?  Stacey's sister?  I've always leaned in P.J.'s favor since she and Fluff both have brown eyes and blonde pigtails.  Or the older P.J. dolls had brown eyes; Malibu P.J. has violet eyes.  

Skooter, on the other hand, has brown eyes vs. Midge's blue.  They favor, regardless.

Also, how old are these kids supposed to be?  Preteens, of course, but not little little like Tutti and Todd were (I'd estimate that they were about six).  Ideal Tammy's sister Pepper was listed as eight years old in the commercials, and Skip didn't hit puberty until 1975.  By 1979 she was a Super Teen, which sounds pretty reasonable, and then in 1997 Skipper herself admitted that she was sixteen.  Time is a strange entity in Barbie's world, I must say, especially since Dreamhouse Skipper is fourteen.  Sigh...being fourteen bit whale bubbles, and being sixteen was amazing, so why Skipper would want to age down is anyone's guess.  I reiterate:  time is a strange entity in Barbie's world.  Based on all that useless conjecture I guess eight is a reasonable age for Skipper's vintage self, just as it was with Pepper.  But again, if anyone knows for sure, let me know.

Now...it ain't just Skipper weather!  Tornado Season 2025 is gonna hit the ground running.  Today is Saturday, and this is predicted for Tuesday.

Ryan Hall and Reed Timmer have been talking about this system since last Wednesday, which isn't good.  When a severe weather system is predicted to have tornadoes a week ahead of schedule...well, odds are that there's gonna be a serious tornado somewhere.  I pray it's out in the middle of nowhere, where Reed Timmer can measure it without it hurting anyone.

I think that's a good place to cut it off!

All of my love,
RagingMoon1987

Ms. P's dolls

This is sort of an epilogue to my Barbie doll haul in December.  Ms. P promised to show me her childhood dolls, and yesterday she came in with them!  She told me about bubble-cut Barbie, Midge, an Ken, but she had some other stuff too.  First out of the box was the bubble-cut.

All of these dolls have been played with and thus have some paint missing, but Mama's Barbie is missing paint too so that's no biggie.  Bubble-Cut was Ms. P's first doll (Ms. P was seven), and she's wearing a dress that an aunt made.  When I told Ms. P that she was my favorite of the dolls she told me she'd put that in her will, LOL.

Crew-cut Ken was there, the kind that loses his hair as time goes by.

I don't often get to see vintage Ken dolls, so seeing this young hunk was a real treat.  He's got a lovely face.

Then there was Ms. P's "first Midge," clad in a dress that I think her mother made.  I love the colors!

I was particularly excited to see Fashion Queen Midge, as I've never seen one of them IRL before.

For the uninitiated, Fashion Queen Barbie and Midge had short molded hairstyles that could accommodate three wigs that they were packaged with.  The wigs came in all three hair colors and in flip, pageboy, and bubble-cut styles, though these wigs have been...well, played with!  They do still have all their hair though.

Of course Midge has lost none of her girl-next-door cuteness.

There was a Twist 'n' Turn Barbie in the mix, clad in a lovely blue ballgown.

TNT's hair is in rough shape, but she's got a beautiful face.  I've always loved these late sixties dolls.

Rounding out the bunch were a blonde Skipper and a brunette Skooter.  I can't tell if that Skipper is a Malibu doll or not, but they're both cute.

Ms. P also saved a couple of old paper products, one Barbie-sized magazine and one booklet that had Barbie and co. inside.

Tutti, Casey, and Francie are listed on that booklet, giving y'all an idea about how old that thing is.  I didn't photograph the inside, but there was an advertisement for Francie's Afro-American variant in there, and the illustrations were bordered in Piet Mondrian-esque colored blocks.  It was all unabashedly sixties and I loved it.  I really loved seeing all of these dolls too; despite being rough around the edges they could be easily restored if Ms. P so wished, but she likes 'em as is because they've got so many memories attached.  She admitted to me that she played with the dolls well into junior high, which I got because the heyday of my Barbie days were in high school.  Hey, it was better than the dumb, sometimes dangerous things that some of my classmates did!  Anyway, I ended my bull session with Ms. P by showing her pictures of my vintage things, and she sounded very impressed.  Sadly, neither of us have Francie, despite us both liking her!  I may have to change that...

Warm hugs,
RagingMoon1987

So random, January '25

We start the month (and the year) with a Failbook memory, from January 3rd, 2022.

Adam and Mei together.  Both of them need new eyelashes now.

January 4th I took this image of my vintage Skipper crew, which had by then grown to three.

From left, Living Fluff, Pose 'n' Play Skipper, and straight-leg Skipper.  I'll discuss these in more detail around March or so.

Bae Day Mondays this month went with the various Coleco years, and January 6th was for 1983 and 1984.  I have no Cabbies at all from 1983, but I have three from 1984.  From left, Valencia Rose (Coleco), Nathan Hunter (Coleco Preemie), and Candela Laura (Jesmar). 

I am still casually looking for a fuzzy boy; they are strictly 1983.  But these will do just fine for now.  After taking in Gary Collier and getting the electric bill I need to take a chill pill with Cabbies.  January was colder than average, so the bills were outta sight.

January 11th.  Candela Laura flew solo that night.

It was cold that night, and I was listening to a YouTube documentary about Texas Tower 4.  The saga of Texas Tower 4 is not a happy one, so I lightened the mood with Candela.  The Cliff Notes version of the ill-fated tower can be found here, and an excruciatingly detailed version can be found here; the latter was the one I was watching.

January 13th, Bae Day Monday.  The years this time were 1985 and 1986.  For them I have my popcorn girls, Idalia Gale and Beryl June (both 1986)...

...Matt the Brat and Kitrick Randolph Fergus (both 1985)...

...Hugo Jack (1985) and Ernest John (1986, Preemie)...

...Elisabeth Clara and Shelley Fred (both 1985)...

...and finally, Stella Rae (1985, Preemie).  Her friend and carer Angela Fitzpatrick agreed to sit with her.

Angela cares so Stella doesn't have to, LOL.

January 17th I learned that there's a special term for Cabbies with arms like this.  

See how Matt's arms angle up and out rather than straight out?  Apparently this is called the cheerleader pose, and out of forty-six Cabbies (including figurines and clones) Matt the Brat is my only one like this...for now, anyway.

January 20th.  The years were 1987 and 1988, with that latter year being the earliest I could conceivably remember.  As a result I'm fond of dolls from this era...and yet I only have two big ones, Karen Sheila (1987) and Andrea Doria (1988)...

...and two little ones, Esmond Brant and Cara Raelean, both from 1987.  Esmond is a bean-butt and Cara is a Preemie. 

Also very early on January 20th, I took this head shot of Gary Collier. 

Gary had proven popular with my Failbook friends by this time, and I can see why.  He's a cutie.  I can also see why Treesa couldn't initially see his teeth, as they're ridiculously hard to photograph!  I personally didn't think I'd like the #17 head, but now that I have it in my collection it's not so bad.  That leaves the #18 head that I'm not enamored with...no, Moony, stay off eBay!!!  But yeah, when I started collecting Cabbage Patch Kids the #4, #15, and #30 heads were my favorites, while #5, #17, and #18 were deal-breakers.  #5 and #17 grew on me after I added them to my collection, so #18 potentially could too.

January 21st.  Y'all know how I like opposites, and Draculaura and Venus McFlytrap are pretty much that. 

I tried to take a conservative approach with G1 Monster High dolls, and as I've said before it bit me in the butt.  So I'm not playing this time around; if I really, really, REALLY like a doll, I'm goin' after it, budget or no.  Luckily for me I haven't seen any that I'm absolutely dying for yet...except maybe Cupid.  I've always loved Cupid.

I returned to clippings from the Cabbage Patch on January 22nd, with a new outfit supplied by who else?  Mama!

I knew immediately that this would have to belong to Clio Teresa.  Her yellow body matches the trim around the waist, and some of the letters match her hair.  Some of the letters match her hair bows too, but that's hard to see.

January 23rd.  Venus McFlytrap returns, this time with Skooter, who'd joined the Skipper Squad by then. 

And I thought that Draculaura couldn't be more opposite of Venus!

January 27th, another Bae Day Monday.  1989 got a year of its own, and Cleopatra Chantale and Gavin Andrew share it.

Some of my favorites come from 1989, but I only own two of them.  The rest of my Cabbies are 1990 and beyond, or clones.

Also January 27th, a memory from 2021.  I was comparing Always Sisters Vanessa to my beloved Courtney Moore.

This came from an aborted review of the Always Sisters line.  I was excited about a doll that was soft like the Hot Looks but had honest-to-God joints, but Vanessa's internal skeleton was too warpy to make the joints enjoyable.  I can't say as I've gotten much enjoyment out of my Always Sisters dolls, though they have sweet faces.  But as always, if anyone wants a review I'll root 'em out of storage.

Not much of a month for dolly photography, actually!  More same ol', same ol'.

Love,
RagingMoon1987