Happy New Year

Normally this is the time where I'd beller "HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!" and pull the string on one of those loud party poppers (my grandpa HATED those), but 2024 is Election Year, and oh my Lordy, do I hate Election Year.  Both sides will be sniping back and forth at each other, and inevitably both parties will be throwing a lot of mud at their own candidates as well.  American politics is dirty, kids.  With this being a doll blog I'm gonna try to keep it as apolitical as possible.  Sure, I'll voice my opinions here and there, and y'all are welcome to as well provided you keep it civil, but for the most part I wanna just...stick my head in the sand.  Dollies are what we all like, right?  Right!  So lemme see...2024.  No milestone birthday for me or for anyone I love (I'll be 37 when that finally comes, and October is a long way off).  The legion of Whovians had their milestone last month, Girl of the Year 2024 is meh, no Barbie movie to look forward to (indeed, I haven't seen the first one)...oh yes, the eclipse!  There's a total solar eclipse in April, the path of totality is coming RIGHT OVER MALDEN, and I'm off work that day unless something strange happens.  I'm EXCITED!!!

Before I begin, I want to apologize to my blogging buddy Tam for sounding like such an ingrate for the gifts in the past two posts.  I griped so soundly about poor Velvet's new clothes not fitting that SHE apologized for sending Velvet nude.  I'M the one who's sorry for looking a gift horse in the mouth!  Velvet is awesome, as are the two Cloes and Mary or whoever that brunette doll is.  I'm particularly happy to have a Velvet with eyes that are clean and intact, as both my girls are sick with mold and have eyes that are now falling apart.  Oh, and Nekkid Cloe wants to send her love...and show off her new threads.  I got her the little hippie dress, since her long hair made me think of myself when I was a teenager and kinda hippie-ish.

I love ya, Tam, and I do thank you for the gift and the card.  I have something for you, but I've been incredibly lazy and haven't sent it yet.  It's small, but I know it's something you'll like.

Now...to ring in my least-favorite month and a year that I've been dreading, I present my Christmas haul.  I said that I only wanted a floor lamp, but that kinda, sorta turned out to be a lie.  And don't worry about storage, as all of them fit into a single box.

Kinda a motley bunch there, a mix of old and new.  In the back I've got two Fidgie Friends, Boba Bubbles and Fairie Garden, and Aurora is between them (Aurora is a Spectra and the Shimmerons knockoff, reviewed HERE).  Then in the front are Snap 'n' Play Barbie, a Creatable World doll, and on Snap's lap, Kelly's "li'l friend" Becky.

Boba Bubbles arrived on the twentieth, the same day that I griped about Velvet's tight jeans.  On that particular day a number of small but annoying things happened at work, and that made the day about as much fun as passing a kidney stone.  Fondling Boba's tail did indeed help me blow off some steam.

LOL, maybe "fondling" wasn't the best term, but it's what I did.  The dictionary says fondling need not be of a sexual nature (and since I'm ace it never is), so the term works.  By the way, I wonder if these water beads are similar in any way to the ones that are now banned from sale?  Okay, they're not all the way banned, but Amazon and Wally World are refraining from marketing water beads as toys.  Other sellers are dropping the brightly colored orbs altogether.  Hmmm...does that mean that Boba will soon be a black market entity too???  Time will tell, I s'pose.  

In other news, Barbie and Becky were a reminder of how much packaging has had to change in years past.  I deboxed them both without taking pictures...

...but take my word for it:  easiest box-openings ever.  The tops were lightly glued together, and the dolls themselves were lashed to their backings with three or four bits of plastic-coated wire.  Y'know, like those twisty ties on bags of bread, only nicer.  But y'all know damn good and well that nowadays that's not enuff to keep some thieving little brat from tearing the package open at the store and nicking Barbie's clothes or shoes or the whole stinkin' doll.  So now we have to contend with waaaaaay too much glue, waaaaaay too much tape, and those hateful little plastic tacks holding the dress and the accessories and the doll's very head to the backing.  Oh, how Barbie and Becky made me long for the simpler days!  Miss Emily says that Lustra and Spectra were easy to unbox too, but my Aurora was loose so I didn't have to contend with a box.

Spoiler alert:  Aurora loves to dance.  Now for the record, Boba and Fairie were NOT shackled to their boxes with every fastening available.  They were relatively easy to unbox, though not as much so as Barbie and Becky. 

The Creatable World doll (I've named them "Joie") was also relatively easy to debox.  Indeed, their box can be reused if need be.  Joie decided to use it as a chair.

Because I love asides, it was fun to read the tracking on all of these dolls and find out where they came from:
*Boba Bubbles came from Orlando, Florida
*Her friend Fairie Garden came from Canton, Mississippi
*Aurora is from St. Albans, Vermont and is my only Etsy purchase in the group
*Snap 'n' Play Barbie hails from Sterling, Colorado
*Joie is from Hatboro, Pennsylvania
*Becky is also from Pennsylvania, from Clairton

Aurora and Barbie had their pick from the lovely handbags that Setsu-P sent in October.

Joie looked them over too, but decided that they'd rather carry a backpack.

If I were choosing, I'd pick the raspberry one.

So that was my Christmas gift to meself.  As for other presents...well, I didn't get the floor lamp that I wanted, but I did get a full set of Percy Jackson books, plus three books on Joplin, Missouri's butterfly people.  Yes, the butterfly people.  After the 2011 tornado about eighty kids came forward, talking about how they'd been saved by these gloriously beautiful people with butterfly wings.  Y'all can do with that information what you like, but I believe very strongly that it was a fleet of angels sent to protect some of those kids.  Why some children died and some lived is anyone's guess; God had a reason for it.  But anyway, that was my Christmas.  Quiet, but nice for the most part.  Today we're sleeping in and doing next to nothing, and tomorrow it'll be back to the old grind, the holiday season over.  Nothing to look forward to for awhile, but I'll make do.  I always do, LOL.

Happy New Year,
RagingMoon1987