Whoops!

I committed a cardinal sin in the world of weather spotters:  I let my guard down!  After a couple of noisy but harmless thunderstorms Mama and I made it home safely.  I was even able to have my nightly shower.  Then Mama texted me with this...just to our northwest.

Here's the text; it's not as bad as it could've been, but it still merits attention. 

Please ignore my mother's commentary in the picture on the left, LOL.  The storm is currently directly to the north of Malden and booking it east.  It IS still rotating, but no tornado has been spotted yet.

Now, the main reason for my concern:  my sister has been to Fayetteville, Arkansas and back, and she chose to cross southern Missouri in the thick of this.  She's currently holed up at the big Wal-Mart in Poplar Bluff, waiting for this crap to move on out.  She's lives in Jackson, which isn't far, but still sadly out of reach in this weather.  Sikeston is in the line of fire for this storm, by the way, and Sikeston is a large town, so say a little prayer for them.  

So I'm cuddling with Rita Cheryl, my dogs, and...<pauses to count> hmmm, just one of my cats!  We're watching Ryan Hall and keeping tabs on things.  If y'all are in the path of any of these please take all weather alerts seriously. 

Be safe,

RagingMoon1987 

The oncoming storm

Despite my rather chirpy entry over on my hair bow blog, I'm regarding today with a fair amount of trepidation.  My resident storm spotter Rita Cheryl is scanning what little of the horizon she can see.  The tree line is a bit of a hindrance.  

Don't let that ordinary gray sky fool you!  The weather folks have been predicting this storm system all week, and they've been saying ever since last Saturday that it's gonna be intense.  Wind advisories were up as early as three o'clock yesterday morning, so we knew we'd have that much.  Indeed, I had a hard time keeping Rita Cheryl balanced in the picture above, and y'all can see her hair whipping around.  Here's what the wind advisory looks like; it extends until early tomorrow morning, and it may get re-issued.

Here's a screenshot of the radar as of 8:30 this morning.  

Not much to see right now, but I'm dreading what it'll look like this afternoon.  Tornadoes and severe thunderstorms are not exclusively an afternoon/evening thing, but afternoon is the best time, when the air is the warmest and the atmosphere is unstable.  When the storms are all in a line like in a squall, that's not great, but when the storms are fewer and spread apart like zits on a high-schooler's cheeks, that's when they can feed on their surroundings and get bad, like they did in December of 2021.  It's hard to tell in the screenshot I got back then, but those storms were spread out over a wide area instead of being in a single line, and as such they didn't have to compete with each other for all that warm air coming in from the south.  This afternoon they're predicting something similar, though nothing is quite set in stone yet.

So Rita Cheryl is clad in her friendship bracelet and her favorite Shinedown shirt, and I have her "go-go bag" packed with her mini doll, her backpack (which has a few trinkets in it; all my dolls like trinkets), and a few items of clothing that y'all haven't seen before.  

All of that is crammed into the zippered compartment on the bottom.  You okay in there, Mini Gabby?

Yeah!  It's cozy!

In that case, Rita Cheryl is all set.  If I'm going over the rainbow I'm taking my favorite doll with me.

I don't know why these doll carriers are advertised as holding two dolls, because when I do put two in there it's a tight squeeze.  I also think it's a pity that they don't come in my size, LOL. 

Of course I also have my purse loaded with necessities.  My identifications, my medicine, my W-2 forms (still haven't done my taxes, LOL), a little dab of money, house keys (if I still have a house to go to at the end of the day), assorted girly stuff, the works.  My mom is packed up too, just in case the sh!t does hit the fan.  Malden has been incredibly blessed over the past few years and I pray that good fortune will hold up.  Even when the last significant tornado came through there were no deaths (not here, anyway).  Property damage?  Yes.  Injuries?  Yes.  But thank God, no one died.  The folks on the south side did have a mess on their hands, though!  

If anything goes down, I'll keep y'all posted.  Be safe out there; these storms are predicted to cover a wide part of the central U.S.

Love,
RagingMoon1987

Cool cat boogie

Mama loves to surprise me, and I love to be surprised.  So when this odd-looking package showed up in her mailbox, she simply handed it to me and said "Open it!"

"Feels like a stuffed animal," I said.

"Oh, you're good!"  Mama replied with a big grin.  She'd gotten me a stuffed Pete the Cat for my workstation.

For the uninitiated, Pete the Cat is an anthropomorphic blue cat and the subject of several children's books.  He likes to dance and sing, and he's usually depicted wearing high top sneakers.  The illustrations in the books are fairly dark, so Pete usually doesn't have much of an expression...but my Pete is smiling.

That is typical cat!  Always chill...unless it's mealtime or three o'clock in the morning.  Then cats are batsh!t.  Anyway, my Pete has his shoes, like all good Pete the Cats do.  One is red and one is blue.

The varying colors are significant to...I think I Love My White Shoes was the first in the series.  Pete goes out in brand-new white high tops, only for them to become red, then blue, then brown, then white but wet in quick succession.  Rather than throwing a fit because he messed up his shoes, Pete rolls with the changes, singing "I love my white shoes" and changing the lyrics as the shoes change.  Simple story, but a cute one.

I love my mama, and I love the little things she does for me!  I wish she were easy to shop for, darn it!  Every birthday or Mother's Day that comes up she says "Oh, don't worry about me," but she always does nice things for me so I want to do SOMETHING.  I gotta put on my thinking cap.

Happy MLB Opening Day,
RagingMoon1987

Sunday randomness: an elephant!

When I was little I was easily frightened, particularly at night when I couldn't see what was going on.  Shortly after my parents put me in my "big girl bed" some idiot across the street decided to leave at three-o'clock in the morning, with radio blaring and lights blazing.  The conversation ensued as follows:

ME (panic-stricken):  DADDY!!!
DADDY (sleepily but patiently):  What is it, baby?
ME:  What's makin' all that noise out there???
DADDY (dramatically):  An elephant!

I later learned that it was our sweet old neighbor's trailer-trash granddaughter going out to do God knows what, but I never forgot Daddy joking with me even though I'd woken him up.  He was a good daddy, and I think about him a lot this time of year, since he died on March 5th, and his birthday was April 15th.  Daddy was an elephant enthusiast, so when I saw these at Wal-Mart recently I thought of him.

His name is Bunny, and he has a carrot theme.  Bunny is a member of a group of brightly colored elephants in the Pop Art Soft collection.  They come in a larger size and in a miniature blind bag size, and true to advertisements they are very soft.  I keep Bunny at my workstation, and one day last week a little kid saw him and wanted one of her own.  I told her that if she did get one I wanted to see it, and a few hours later the child came toddling in with her own elephant.

According to the slip this one's name is Barry, and since he's printed with strawberries that's a fitting name.  He too is one of the blind bags, and he and Bunny look cute together.  They kinda remind me of the stuffed elephant that Melody Ellison has in her collection.

I guess Bunny is more of a girl's name, but after a childhood of making all my favorite toys girls I wanna make up for it a bit.  Either way these are super-cute and might make good little gifts for upcoming Easter baskets.

Cheers and giant steps,
RagingMoon1987

A study in opposites, and a milestone, and a tornado

Ah, March 25th!  If you're a fan of Sir Elton John or Aretha Franklin then the day will be important (the two singers shared a birthday), and for me it's a somewhat humorous anniversary (twelve years ago today I broke my ankle in comical fashion).  But before I go on a music binge, a quick little post.  In the fairly distant future I have reviews planned for this wildly contrasting pair of dolls.

The lanky purple-haired girl is named Mar, and she is a Paola Reina poppet.  The baby in green recently made an appearance on Tam's blog (don't all dolls that I eventually own appear there first?), and she is Little Honeymoon.  Yes, my love affair with Ideal dolls is alive and well, y'all; Baby Honeymoon is my latest...and sadly, she may be my last for quite awhile.  Mama says that with the economy being what it is, we as a family need to focus on necessities and not things like dolls and doll clothes.  That's a bummer, but I know she's right so we made a deal:  if it's unique and affordable, I get it.  If it's not, I don't.  Done deal.  So Mar and Honeymoon may be my last new dolls for awhile, but that will have very little effect on the blog, as I've got plenty of stuff to review.  

In other news, the Mississippi Delta got hit hard by a tornado last night.  As of writing at least 21 are dead, and Rolling Fork and Silver City got all but flattened.  As with the incidents at Joplin and at Mayfield, I'm waiting to hear a rating and a final death toll.  Them folks need prayers and donations if y'all can.  The Mississippi Delta seems to be a magnet for such storms; in 1971 several towns in the area got clobbered and at least one (a little place called Pugh City) got wiped out completely.  Then in 2010 Yazoo City got hit THREE times, once in April and twice in November.  There was an interesting and tragic twist on the 1971 storm; racism was unfortunately still prevalent in the area, and because most of the dead and injured were poor and/or black not much attention was paid by the rest of the country.  Sad, right?  And that wasn't the first time that race played a role in the attention and the aid a stricken area received.  Far from it; examples of that can be found in 1955 at Commerce Landing, and in 1969 at Hazlehurst.  Experts flat out denied that the Commerce Landing tornado was a tornado, despite multiple people seeing the funnel with their own eyes!  In this day and age the Commerce Landing incident would've brought national attention, because most of the fatalities were schoolchildren...but not back then.  Thankfully times have changed, and I predict that the folks in Rolling Fork, Silver City, and the surrounding areas will have help in no time.  Indeed, Ryan Hall had sixty thousand dollars in donations within thirty minutes of opening up his donation tab.  That said, it'll still take a long time to rebuild.  It always does.

Here's to hoping that y'all are weathering the tanking economy and the storms the best you can.  Mama and I have made it through both fine so far, but we're taking precautions for both just the same.  

All of my love,
RagingMoon1987

A potential problem

It feels like a century ago that the Novi Stars were in our lives.  Indeed, I've done very little with Sila Clops and Malie Tasker since I reviewed them (posts HERE and HERE), and I think Sila may be taking umbrage with that.  Oh, she looks fine now...

...but her eye is glowing ON ITS OWN!!!

Y'all will have to take my word for it that Sila's eye is glowing on its own.  Normally I'd have to press on her right earring with a fair amount of force, something I can't do while also punching buttons on my phone's camera.

Houston, we may have a problem with one PO'd purple alien girl.  Can Mulder and Scully handle this, or should I have Luciana page the Doctor?  

Yours nervously,

RagingMoon1987 

A quick one for St. Patrick's Day

I can't remember ATM if I've ever said how much I love St. Patrick's Day, but I do.  After two major holidays that go heavy on the color red, I'm ready for something more veronal, and St. Pat's emphasis on my favorite color fits the bill nicely.  This year I just have one new shirt and jeans set, modelled by Danica Holley...

...one new dress, modeled by Julia Gotz...

...and one T-shirt, modelled by Rita Cheryl Lassiter.  Y'all got a glimpse of Rita Cheryl's shirt back on the sixth, but...well, here it is again.

As usual, Mama supplied Julia's dress, and as usual, it's an Etsy number.  The other outfits are also Etsy getup, though I bought those.  Rita Cheryl's shirt came with a badge that declares her the world's cutest leprechaun, which is all well and good...except that Rita Cheryl doesn't look anymore like a leprechaun than I do!

The cute little decal is unfortunately coming loose, but that's nothing that a little fabric glue can't fix.

Note that all three of my girls are either sleeveless or in short sleeves.  The temperatures hit sixty ONCE this past week, and it hasn't been any warmer than forty-two degrees since.  My mother has taken to joking that whenever I change my dolls' clothes for the season it SHOULD be, the weather immediately reverts back to what it HAD been.  Like when I start dressing my girls in fall stuff and it gets hot again.  Same sorta thing here; my trio is bare-armed (and barefoot in Danica's case), and tonight it's supposed to get below freezing.  Our poor peach trees!

Julia looks and acts like her mind is elsewhere, so I'll wrap things up now.  Oh, and just for the heckuvit I started up a new blog devoted to...guess what?  My post about hair bows proved fairly popular, so I started up a blog about my bows.  Not the most exciting or important subject in the world, but just about all of my hair bows trigger some sort of story or memory, so that'll make things slightly less boring.  If you like colorful stuff and reading my bloviations, go over there and have a looksie.

Happy St. Patrick's Day,
RagingMoon1987

More mushrooms, and Rita Cheryl

Y'all know me, if it's unusual, I want to share it.  I shared magic mushrooms two and a half years ago (one of those looked like a satellite dish!), and I found some last summer but forgot to share here.  NOW...now, or actually yesterday, I found these unusual mushrooms on a tree at Elder-Snider Cemetery (this one is west of my hometown about five miles).  They're leathery to the touch and look a little like the wood they're growing from.  This first one is growing straight out of the tree...

...and these two are growing from a subterranean root.

As was the case last summer, Rita Cheryl had to get a closer look.

I think the mushroom would've been strong enuff for her to sit on, but I didn't want to risk it.

By sheer, dumb luck I was able to find the pictures I forgot to share.  These were taken back on September 17th.  Stokelan Drive is divided in front of the high school, and along the division there are trees.  This mushroom was growing out of a large stump.  Note another, older mushroom beside it.

The mushroom was a very large one, about the size of my fist.  Of course Rita Cheryl wanted to get a closer look.  Notice that it was only September 17th, and yet I already had her in her Halloween dress.  She proceeded to wear the dress through the entirety of October.

Tree stumps are wonderful settings for dolly pics, and I had hoped to return to this stump for future images.  Alas, it was not to be; a little over a week later I drove by and saw naught but a bare patch of dirt.  My stump had been pulled up, mushrooms and all.  Sad face.

I'm no mycocologist, so I never identified the white mushroom growing out of the tree stump, nor did I identify the mushrooms I found in 2020.  As for the brown shelf mushroom, online sources suggest that it's a species called Ganoderma applanatum, though I have my doubts because...well, because I don't know Bo Diddley from Bing Crosby about mushrooms!  If I'm right, the mushroom is not edible, but can be used for medicinal purposes.  Hmmm, inedible but medicinal...who'd have thunk?  Either way the presence of those mushrooms do not bode well for the tree.  Fungi tend to like dead stuff, and that suggests to me that at least part of that tree is either sick or already dead even though it has leaves growing.  

St. Patrick's Day post is in the works, so stay tuned!

Beware the Ides of March,
RagingMoon1987

The next level of madness

I drive my mother nuts on a regular basis by carrying around a full-sized American Girl doll...oh, just about everywhere I go.  Why?  For anxiety reasons (Rita Cheryl helps chill me out, if y'all can believe that), and in case a good photo op comes up for the blog.  But lately I've had someone else following me like a shadow.  I guess you could say that my new dolly tumor is a step down from American Girl since she's plush, but then again both kids and adults seem to like these.  Y'all probably know her from Beauty and the Beast.

If I could've cherry-picked a character I'd have picked Tiana or Elsa, but Belle was what eBay had, so I took her in.  Belle is a nuiMOs, a little plush toy that...oh, I'd say these are kinda, sorta Disney's answer to Build-a-Bear.  They come in multiple characters, they all appear to be about seven inches tall, and there are all sorts of outfits and accessories available for them.  For example, I tend to like dressing my princess dolls in "civilian clothes," as Sailor Moon fans call street duds, so Belle is currently wearing this.  The package said it's from Fashion Collection #5.

Looks a bit more comfortable than that yellow ballgown, though I'll admit that Belle looks great in yellow.  Indeed, of all the dresses the various Disney princesses wear, Belle's is...well, it ties with Tiana's green dress as my favorite, because green, that's why.  I also got a Dumbo nightgown, and some things for Valentine's Day and St. Patrick's Day and Easter.  Here's the nightgown, since I love Dumbo.

I once said that 101 Dalmatians was my favorite Disney movie, but Dumbo is quickly rising to second (it still has to battle Sleeping Beauty for second, but it's high on my list).  When I was a little kid I used to strut around singing "When I See an Elephant Fly" in a Louis Armstrong-style voice, which in itself isn't that funny...except that Satchmo was a grown man with a low, rumbly voice.  I was...oh, about eight, and I still had a little kid voice.  But anyway, I'd sing it in a Satchmo voice, and my dad would die laughing.  There are other reasons why Dumbo is special to me, largely because Dumbo is an elephant and my dad loved elephants, but I digress as usual.  Belle's new nightie came with a teddy bear, but she can't hold it.  I have to prop it up beside her like so, or with a little bamboozling I can get Belle to hug him.

nuiMOs have magnets in their hands, so Belle can hold some small odds and ends if said odds and ends have a magnet.  The teddy bear does NOT have a magnet, but the taiyaki in her right hand does.

For the uninitiated, taiyaki are Japanese cakes that are shaped like fish.  They're usually filled with something red bean paste, though other sweet or savory fillings are used too.  These are often seen being consumed by anime characters (the perpetually-hungry Kiyouko Sakura is always the one I remember).  I've never had taiyaki myself, but if they're full of sweetened bean paste they're bound to be good.  That's the only way I'll willingly eat beans, by the way; my favorite Chinese food is full of sweetened bean paste.  Granted, jian dui are Chinese and taiyaki are Japanese, but both foodstuffs are full of beans.  The jian dui I ate tasted vaguely like chocolate.  But ANYWAY, Belle can hold small items if they have magnets.  She also has wires in her arms and legs, so she can hold a few simple poses like walking and waving.

Etsy has harnesses available for nuiMOs that allow them to ride on the strap of one's backpack or purse (or suspenders, but I think my dad was the last of the suspenders wearers).  I wouldn't make note of this...except that Belle's shoes are removable.  I was initially concerned that Belle might lose her shoes if I hung her on my purse, but then I saw this.

These bad boys Velcro closed in back, so the fit is nice and tight.  It is possible to pull Belle's shoes off without undoing the Velcro, but it takes a good, strong pull to do it.  To my relief, it doesn't look like Belle's shoes will be going anywhere.  This is good, because as I said above Belle likes to ride on my purse.

St. Louis Cardinals for the win!  Belle's shoes won't be going anywhere (when she does wear shoes), but I advise against letting one's nuiMOs ride while holding something in their hand.  Belle's taiyaki adheres to her hand magnets as advertised, but the grip is not a tight one.

Both Etsy and the Disney Store are full to bursting with accessories for nuiMOs, and while some of the accessories are pricey (Loungefly backpacks!), the clothes and handheld items are pretty reasonable.  My American Girls may have a run for their money now with Belle around!

Cheers and sparkles,
RagingMoon1987

More than one way

They always say that there's more than one way to skin the cat, right?  Well in my case there's more than one way to break the rules.  I'm not supposed to have my dolls at work (I used to use them as decorations), but I sneak Rita Cheryl in when I know there'll be a lot of children around.  Don't tell anyone, LOL.  Today I obtained a new way to break rules...a way that I didn't think of until I saw this on Etsy.

Some of y'all may remember that I like to wear hair bows, the bigger and goofier the better, and this one fits that criteria nicely.  It's not the biggest bow I own, but it IS one of the loudest, and look who's attached to it!

April Sunsplash, one of my favorite Lalaloopsy dolls.  I never had her in big form, and for some dumb reason it never occurred to me to get her in mini form either, even though one of my American Girls collects Lalaloopsy dolls.  Oh well, now she rides my ponytail!  April's accessories are also present...

...as is her pet.  

This bad boy will be fun to wear during high winds, by the way!  The wind catches the streamers and blows them around like mad, which I love.  Anyway, if you're nuts like me and like to wear hair bows, or if you have/know little ones who like hair bows, the shop is named AMWBowtique...or it was.  Click on the link now and you get a dead link for reasons I don't know.  And that's just within the past day or so; last Saturday the shop was alive and kicking.  But either way the shop made over-the-top hair bows in a wide array of sizes, colors, and themes, ranging from Minnie Mouse and Little Miss Sunshine to orange Fanta to Pennywise!  Before the shop disappeared from Etsy there were two other Lalaloopsy bows available, one sporting my old buddy Pix E. Flutters and the other emblazoned with Confetti Carnivale.  The bows were a little pricey, but you got what you pay for (the bows I have are made of vegan leather and are very sturdy), and the shop offered coupons as thank yous to return buyers.  I bought four bows from this shop in all, and each time I got a little clip as a freebie (one time I even got a BIG clip).  

The proprietor's decision to utilize Lalaloopsy dolls in her bows reminds me of a post Miss Emily did once.  Emily apparently wondered more than once what happens to blind bag toys when their usefulness has ended, and...well, I wondered the same thing!  The last thing the world needs is more plastic in landfills!  In Miss Emily's case, she found someone on Instagram called Mischa's Toy Jewels, whom I probably need to hit up in the future because why the heck not?  Emily's post is HERE, and Mischa's Instagram page is HERE.  Mischa was in turn inspired by a lady named Asha, whose Instagram page is HERE.  It's good to see other Etsy stores doing something similar with small toys, and I hope that maybe AMWBowtique will reappear and do more of these doll-themed bows.  Maybe some with those miniature L.O.L. Surprises, like Mischa's has done, or those little Care Bear figurines, or Shopkins?  Just a thought.  And if the store doesn't come back I've got four bows that I can enjoy.  One of 'em has the Saggy Baggy Elephant on it; anything that is Little Golden Book-themed is a win with me.

As a last little addendum, I found a box while mining for doll clothes, and the box contained several bows that I'd forgotten about.  Among them was this one, emblazoned with a headshot of Pillow Featherbed.  Several of her friends are also along. 

I had a Lalaloopsy bow all along and didn't know it!  Now that I think about it, I remember buying it, being disappointed that it wasn't huge, and casting it aside.  The size doesn't bother me now, LOL!  Granted, it doesn't have a repurposed Lalaloopsy doll on it, but it's still a perfectly fine bow.  Such happy colors are perfect for the oncoming spring.

Love and hair baubles,
RagingMoon1987

EDIT, 3/9/23:  Per Michelle Bogart's request, here are the other three bows.  The bee bow was the first one; the bee in the center is squishy. 

Here's the Saggy Baggy Elephant bow.  Being a librarian, I look forward to wearing this one.

And lastly, here's the ice cream bow.  It has streamers like the Lalaloopsy bow does, and as I predicted they're fun when the wind gets high.

That's the lot!  I'm hoping the shop will open up again, because I want an orange Fanta bow!!!

Just for the heckuvit...

Rita Cheryl and Imani are chilling on a nice early spring night at Grandma's.  First Uncle is home for a visit.

It'll soon be too warm for Imani to wear her cap and cardigan.

Love,
RagingMoon1987