Even though my heritage is mostly German and Italian, I love St. Patrick's Day. December, January, and February all go very heavy on the color red. Now, red is awesome. I love how it brightens up the colorless winter months, but by March I'm ready for a change. By pure coincidence, the month of March is dominated by my favorite color, and my library troupe is ready! For some strange reason American Girl doesn't seem too keen on releasing outfits that are specifically themed for St. Pat's, but there's no need to fear because Etsy is here. Bet y'all thought I was going to say Underdog!
XENIA
With her trippy, faded eyes and heart-shaped shades Xenia has established herself as my goofy girl, so I gave her the goofiest outfit I had. It is the only one of my outfits to include a hat, and the hat feels like one of those plastic party favor hats. It has a few dents in it already from storage, so I'll have to be careful with it.
Xenia's blouse is a green cotton peasant blouse with red rick-rack trimming on the neck and sleeves. The necklace is a Mardi Gras necklace (we all are probably familiar with those), and on Xenia's left chest is this cute little button.
At first I wondered "Why a ladybug??? They're not green." But then I remembered that ladybugs are commonly considered lucky. I don't know if ladybugs really are lucky, but I'm quite fond of them and was tickled with this little addition, green or no. Plus, the ladybug on Xenia's blouse helps tie the blouse to the skirt. The skirt also appears to be cotton, and is printed with the aforementioned ladybugs, plus shamrocks, rainbows, and a number of other things that are either stereotypically Irish or stereotypically lucky. Each item is labelled.
Sort of reminds me of the music video for "
No More Lies," goofy font and all. LOL, I notice that the Irish flag is slightly miscolored, by the way. Irish flags are
light green, white and orange, but this flag looks more
dark green, white, and red like the Italian flag. Just thought I'd throw that out there. I love the Italians (hell, some of my ancestors were Italian), but
their month is October, in honor of Columbus Day. Hmmm...both
Oktoberfest and Italian-American Heritage and Culture Month are in October...oh, that's a good month for a girl of German and Italian decent to be born <winks slyly>.
FOCUS, MOON GIRL!!! This outfit didn't come with shoes, and I hate for my dolls to go barefoot when fully dressed so I supplied those.
Rainbow shoes!!! These shoes came from
Doll of a Kind and they light up when gently tapped against a hard surface, although I was unable to capture this feature with my camera. This feature delighted two young girls who came into the library around the beginning of the month, especially when I pointed out that the younger girl was also wearing light-up shoes! I looked for shamrock-shaped glasses to round out Xenia's look completely, but there were none to be found on Etsy so Xenia is stuck in her hearts for now. She always wore those anyway, so no biggie.
SADIE
Sadie has proved to be my little girly girl, so she gets something frilly...or semi-frilly. Mama got this outfit for me, but I stumbled across
the listing for it on
My Girl Clothing Co. It has lace trim on the skirt so I guess this would classify as frilly.
This dress didn't come with bloomers, shoes, or socks like the teddy bear dress did, so I had to provide the shamrock tights (also from My Girl Clothing Co.) and the shoes (from
Doll Clothes by Katie). They turned out to be a nice match.
The dress did come with a nice ribbon, though. I tied it around Sadie's head.
When I was asking Mama how I should tie the ribbon, she suggested that I weave it into her braids. That would've been a splendid idea...but I've only got one ribbon. Next year I may have to remedy that, because I love ribbons woven into braids. This getup came with a necklace, by the way...but I don't know what happened to it! One minute I saw it, and the next minute it was gone. I figure it slipped under my bed where pillow stuffing and dropped candy wrappers lie.
SILVER BIRD
My beloved Silver Bird is casual for the most part. I never would've dreamed of picking this outfit as it looks too much like a jogging suit, but Mama thought it was cute and bought it. I must say that I'm very glad she did, though I do wish I had a green scrunchie for Silver Bird's hair. It does come with a necklace though, and the shirt is a separate piece.
I make note of the shirt being a separate piece because the outfit Silver Bird wore for Valentine's Day looked layered but was all one piece. The ensemble also includes a necklace, but this is a much nicer one than Xenia's, with a bejeweled/enameled pendant.
The back of the outer blouse also has a big nice hood.
Silver Bird could wear this hood up if she/I were not in the habit of styling her hair in a side ponytail. Overall this is a cute outfit, complete with puffed sleeves (and elastic bands on the sleeves), but it is a little tight for Silver Bird's chubby Pleasant Company frame. The waist of her jacket is elasticized, and I'm glad of it because it had to stretch to accommodate her waist! I may have to remove a little stuffing from her body someday.
LINDSEY
Yep, that's Lindsey Bergman, better known as the first Girl of the Year. I got her back in January, when I was all but incapacitated by an anxiety wave and couldn't make myself care about a review. Anyway, Lindsey is Jewish, so I was a little leery of having her celebrate this particular holiday. St. Patrick's Day has the word "saint" in it, and saints are normally recognized by a handful of Christian denominations rather than the Jewish contingent, thus why I was a little hesitant to put Lindsey in this outfit. Luckily for Lindsey and me, St. Patrick's Day is an acceptable holiday for the Jews to celebrate, even though Lindsey has no Irish blood that I know of (or any blood at all, being a doll, LOL). This article notes
the similarity of St. Pat's Day to Purim, and
this rather poignant article discusses why St. Pat's was/is special to the author and his family. So it's largely a personal decision for a Jewish person, just like it's a personal decision for me, a woman of German and Italian decent with very little Irish blood who happens to love beer and the color green. Based on that, Lindsey is celebrating the day with her friends. She likes to dress for comfort and is thus wearing a cute new blouse and leggings. The shamrock on her blouse is sparkly!
For those of y'all concerned about glitter and microplastics and the environment and all that, relax. This glitter is soundly attached to that blouse and likely will be staying that way. I wasn't sure how this bit was supposed to go, so I draped it around Lindsey's head.
The effect isn't great since Lindsey has a bob (Silver Bird's full head of hair would've filled it out better), but it keeps her asymmetrical hairstyle out of her face so I'm happy. Unfortunately I had to piecemeal Lindsey's overall look together, as I liked her meet outfit so much I wasn't sure if I wanted to change her out of it. As a result the shoes are late arrivals to the party. I think I did pretty good though, with silver high tops (from
paternoldies).
As an added bonus, these shoes can be worn with anything else I choose. Silver is nice like that. It's a blank slate just like neutral colors are.
Z
Of the five outfits that I've got, this one is the only one that I bought myself. Z just looks like the type that lives in leggings, even when she's wearing a dress, so I picked out a dress with leggings! This one came from
Sewing Exclusives, and it can be for an American Girl or a Bitty Baby. The dress can be worn with or without the leggings, though I prefer it with. The bodice is a little off-kilter, nothing major. Such hiccups are to be expected with handmade items, just like with my Little Miss Revlon doll's
uneven skirt.
Z's shoes came from Doll Clothes by Katie, just like Sadie's shoes did. They're pleather shoes with sateen bows and green rhinestone hearts.
These have an interesting story behind them, one that will be related below in Camille's section.
DENISE
Denise is Jewish too, as I've established
ad nauseam, but I didn't feel as conflicted as her outfit as I did Lindsey's because it's not specifically for St. Pat's. It's an old dress that Denise has worn before, and it has ladybugs on it.
This was one of the first American Girl outfits that Mama got for me. She saw Denise in the too-tight ballerina outfit that she was then wearing and said "We'll have to fix that!" So y'all could say that this was the dress that started it all. There was another one that had bumblebees on it, but I preferred the ladybugs because the red was so striking. The shoes are also red, and are your typical patent leather Hobby Lobby flats.
Can't beat red shoes!
CAMILLE
Usually I don't change a new doll out of her outfit so soon after getting her, but Camille has a new St. Patrick's Day outfit too so...she's wearing it! This one came from
The Dolls Clothesline (where the best dressed dolls shop, the tagline says), and I can definitely say that this outfit lives up to that tagline. It's a simple little outfit with a smocked top and a pair of white capris, and I added in these cute little shoes.
She's also got a white pair, but I'm not a huge fan of white shoes as they dirty easily. These are the shoes that I mentioned earlier when I discussed Z. Mama didn't like the shoes Z currently has when they first got here, so she ordered these little felt slippers. Unfortunately she didn't look too closely at labels, and the label on these shoes specifically said "for Wellie Wishers." There's no way these shoes would fit Z's big American Girl feet.
Even though I have two other dolls who can wear these shoes (Mosi and Abigail), I bought Camille anyway...just so she could wear the shoes. LOL, yep, that's why I bought a Wellie Wisher! I was looking for an excuse anyway.
FLAXIE
Bet y'all forgot about Flaxie, didn't you! I didn't get around to ordering a Christmas outfit for her, so she spent the winter in her Thanksgiving garb (a pair of blue jeans, a pair of red bows, and a hoodie that says "NOT A TURKEY"). But now she's got something new for spring. Granted, it's only a new bow and a new T-shirt, but it's still a nice change from the Thanksgiving getup. The bow proved to be a smarter purchase than I initially thought, because the sequins flip. When I have them all turned over, the bow is silver and will match a few more things.
Well, maybe it will and maybe it won't, because that rainbow coloring shows even when the silver is facing downwards. Oh well, I like it better when the rainbow colors show anyway. Who doesn't love rainbows???
Now...now I get to sit back, relax, and threaten to punch anyone who pinches me for not wearing green (I only have one green shirt, and it's in the laundry). LOL, I promise I'll only threaten; I haven't punched anyone since high school...for pinching me on St. Patrick's Day because I didn't wear green. No lie. Green is my favorite color, and yet I've owned very few items of clothing during my life that were green.
Happy St. Patrick's Day,
RagingMoon1987
