Throwback Thursday review: Blooming Dolls

Quick update on me since I went kinda heavy on the self pity a couple'a weeks ago.  I'm still on a walker for the time being, giving my sciatic nerve a chance to finally get its head on straight and heal, and I stopped taking the prescription painkiller because it made me ridiculously sleepy, and when I get sleepy I get cranky and unsociable.  That's no way to behave at work, so after the medicine ran out I didn't get it refilled.  So I'm still on the walker and sans medicine, but I must be doing something right, because my left leg has stopped spazzing and cramping and waking me up multiple times a night, and my overall pain is diminishing.  I'm far from where I was in April of '24, but things are looking up.

Now that that's out of the way, I'm not a big fan of reviewing dolls that I received as gifts, as reviewing them feels like I'm looking a gift horse in the mouth.  I think I've said that once before.  But Treesa suggested that this doll might make good fodder for a Throwback Thursday post, so that's what I'm gonna do.  This is Violet, my Blooming Dolls puppet.  She was once Treesa's beloved friend, and now she's mine.

The Blooming Dolls were cloth dolls with yarn hair, and they folded up into flowerpots or served as hand puppets.  They came in two different sizes and had two different types of eye, and they did NOT have individual names oh yes they do!  I scrounged up an old advertisement for these dolls, and they do indeed have names of their own, though one has to enlarge the picture to read them.  "Violet" is the name that Treesa gave this doll, but from what I can tell this particular doll was named Olivia Orchid.  The flower on Violet/Olivia's head looks like an African violet to me, and I think "Violet" fits her so I kept that.  These dolls were terribly unpopular, so much so that CapToys almost folded.  Indeed, I don't think CapToys was around very long anyway, since Ghost of the Doll only has three entries for them:  Blooming Dolls, Merwees and Sqwish Puppies.  I love obscurities like this!  Soooooo...since Violet has a puppet sleeve that folds I'm gonna whip out the trusty tape measure.  When her sleeve is unfolded she is thirteen inches long, and when it's folded she's fifteen inches long.

Here's how she compares in size to her best friend Gillian Ida, and to her other friend Primrose Jessalyn.  None of these dolls are huge, and please forgive Violet's slouch.  Puppets tend to do that, unless they're part-vinyl like Puppetrina is...and come to think of it, Tam said that Puppetrina's head is floppy too.  Anywho, here's my Pennsylvania trio.  Gillian Ida is a fourteen-inch Cabbage Patch Kid, and Primrose Jessalyn is of a comparable size to Gilly, so that'll give y'all an idea about how big Violet is.

Dominating these dolls' heads are permanent hats with flowers, but I'm gonna save that part for clothes and go straight into Violet's hair.  Violet has yarn hair like a Cabbage Patch Kid, and it's styled in two chunky braids like that of some Cabbage Patch Kids.

She's also got some bangs up front; these like to go all willy-nilly and I'm always having to straighten them.

The braids themselves needed a little tidying when Violet came, but that was no biggie.  Truth be told I actually like dolls with yarn hair because it's easier to style and maintain...but it can get fragile with age.  If y'all have worked with yarn then y'all know how it lose its strength and pull apart as it ages, as it has done with Valencia Rose.  Y'all can't see this, but Violet's got a couple'a broken strands tucked into those pigtails.

I make note of this because Violet's hair appears to be made of more robust yarn...either that or I didn't put her through the washing machine and the drier (I did do that to Val).  Either hypothesis holds water, I s'pose.  Either way Violet's hair is holding up well and I am glad.

Blooming Dolls' faces had two variants, painted eyes and plastic eyes, with Violet being the latter.

These heads are made of a stockinette material similar to the stuff that makes up Cabbage Patch Kid bodies, and thus it can snag or develop runs.  Indeed, Violet's left cheek has one little snag, but no holes or runs.

Here's a better look at those eyes.  They're plastic button eyes with unusual red irises and eyelashes jutting out from the pupils.  Yowza, if you've ever gotten an eyelash stuck in your eye then you know that that's not fun.  She's also got a stitched bubble nose that I think is cute. 

Underneath the eyes and nose Violet has a printed mouth and printed freckles...in green.  Yep, green.  My favorite color. 

Violet has a flower growing out of her head, so it makes sense that her body would have a lot of chlorophyll in it.  For the uninitiated, chlorophyll is the pigment that makes foliage green, and it disappears during Autumn.  Oh yeah, and there's some blush under the freckles.  So a cute face overall.  Nothing vava-va-voom, but it's cute.

Since she's a hand puppet Violet's body is pretty flat.  She's got stubby little arms and stubby little legs.

Fabric puppets don't usually have a lot of sewing detail on their hands, and indeed, Violet has little flippers.  Perfect for fingers to accommodate.  

Violet's legs are not hollow and dangle like a rag doll's legs.  She's got yellow shoes sewn on.

The shoes are made of the same fabric as the puppet sleeve:  thin but soft, buttercup yellow, very basic fabric.  The logo is printed on the bottom front hem, removing all doubt of this doll's identity.

Here's the back, very much the same except for a giant seam that runs down the middle.

Since the upper part of Violet's body is made of the same stockinette as her face, she's developed a few snags here and there.  They're mostly on her back where her dress closes (spoilers, her dress closes with Velcro).

I also found a single loose thread on the back of the sleeve.  Just one, easily trimmed.  Overall I'd say that Violet's body is pretty well-constructed.

Now to clothes, and here's where the boundary between clothes and Violet's body get kinda hazy.  Violet has this flower growing out of her head, complete with pink (pink?) soil.

I can see where the designers wanted it to look like an orchid, but it still looks like an African violet to me.  African violets and orchids are not at all related, by the way.  The petals feel a little like the parachute material that my Puffalump Kid is made from, but the leaves and the soil are soft like Violet's puppet sleeve.

Now...here's where I think this flower could actually be a sewn-on hat:  the crown is green.  If it were dirt it would probably brown, unless it's moss-covered dirt.  Heck, I dunno.  Since Violet's lips and freckles are green I'll just say her flower is growing out of her head and be done with it.

Violet's dress is a simple smocked number, made of thin flowered fabric with a white felt collar.

Here's the collar; it's a little grubby, but that can be fixed.  It's sewn securely to the neckline of the dress, and it's held up significantly better than Hedda Get Bedda's collar (also felt).

The hem is nothing to write home about.  It's got some easily trimmed loose ends.

I love the print.  It's blue-green on sky blue, very like what my Walda doll wears.

The back closes with the aforementioned Velcro, which did a bit of a number on Violet's back and now won't hold shut at all.

Lastly, while fumbling around with Violet's sleeve, I found her tag.  It shows who she is, how she can be tossed in the washing machine (but not the drier), and how she dates to 1987.  In other words, she's my age.  I love it when I can find a doll that dates from 1987...or when one is sent to me, as is the case here.

Oh right, I forgot to show y'all how Violet can fold up!  Blooming Dolls are dolls and puppets rolled into one, but they can also fold up into potted plants, like so.

During the folding up I got my favorite picture of Violet.  She looks so cute peeking up over her flowerpot skirt!

She needs some bows on those braids!  I'm just now catching on.  Y'all know how I love ribbons and bows in doll hair (or my own).  I'm thinkin' green or yellow...

Sooooooo...well, Violet and her Blooming Doll sisters are an interesting concept, that's for sure!  I...I might've thought to create a doll that doubles as a potted plant, but by the time I was a pup in the nineties dolls like that were semi-common (examples here and here).  Violet is a passable little puppet and a cute, soft doll; indeed, she's one of the ones I hug when I get frustrated.  There's just...well, like all rag dolls, there's not much to her.  She's not amazing, not terrible, just average and cute.  I love how she folds up into a flower, I love how she can peek out of her "pot" if I want her to, and I love her green smile.  I guess that in the fickle doll world that was the late eighties Blooming Dolls had no place, and I mean NO PLACE!  She had to compete with the Cabbage Patch Kids, My Child, and mayyyybe Julie...I don't know how big of a seller Julie was.  But either way the Blooming Dolls were a flop and that's kinda a shame, but that also makes them more interesting.

Blooming love,
RagingMoon1987

Under the cabbage leaf: fakies and clones

All popular dolls (and a handful of unpopular ones) end up being copied at some point in their lives.  Some of these "clone" dolls are of great quality, some are so-so, and some aren't so great but have character of their own.  This is true with Barbie, with the Bratz, with the Monster High bunch, with older dolls like Dawn, and with lines that eventually tanked, like La Dee Da.  Today's post is for Cabbage Patch Kids again...or rather, for their clones.  Cabbies were so popular and hard to find during parts of the eighties that there was a healthy market for knockoffs, for homemade lookalikes, and for out-and-out counterfeit dolls.  I have a few of these (since I love clones), and some of them...I gotta admit that some of 'em are every bit as nice as the real thing.  I'll start as close to the beginning as I can and go in some sort of rough order.

DOLL BABY

In a way I guess y'all could say that Doll Baby was here before the Cabbage Patch Kids were.  Most Cabbie fans know the dirty little secret that Xavier Roberts didn't actually invent the Cabbage Patch Kids. Rather, he bought a few Martha Nelson Thomas's handmade Doll Babies and had the idea mass-produced!  Ms. Thomas stopped selling him her dolls when she realized what he was up to, but the damage was done.  The whole story gets messy, but it can be read here.  Ms. Thomas sued and eventually settled out of court, suggesting to me that she likely would've won her case if it had reached its conclusion.  What Mr. Roberts did was backhanded, but in all honesty I can't say that I wouldn't have tried a similar stunt if I were smart enuff (I'd have given her the credit, though, I promise!).  So Mr. Roberts made a killing with his Cabbies and is still a wealthy man today, but Ms. Thomas didn't let her Doll Babies die.  When the Cabbage Patch Kids became super-hot commodities she sold her Doll Babies as kits...for a fraction of the price of a regular Cabbie!  The Doll Baby's face is a little different from that of a brand-name Cabbie, but the resemblance is definitely there.  Note the doll above, with his long nose and one dimple on each cheek, and compare him to Matthew Tommie, who also has a long nose and one dimple on each cheek.

Not all Cabbies look like Matt the Brat does, but y'all get my point.  Since these Doll Babies were assembled from kits I presume that their bodies varied wildly in quality, but I need another doll like this like I need a hole in the head so I can't talk too much about that.  I'm just gonna say that Doll Babies are...sort of Martha Nelson Thomas's way of getting the last laugh.  Indeed, Doll Babies aren't as common as Coleco's Cabbage Patch Kids, but they ARE out there and they're not thunderously hard to find, suggesting that Ms. Thomas had some modest success with the kits.

HOMEMADE DOLLS

Of course one didn't have to buy a Doll Baby kit in order to throw together a handmade Cabbie clone.  Some folks took doll-making classes or just winged it, and I presume that Primrose Jessalyn is one of those.  She is very obviously homemade, presumably from a Pennsylvania resident named Diane A. Weisen.  A Google search turned up ZERO information about Ms. Weisen, so Prim is something pretty special, possibly even a one-of-a-kind thing.  What differentiates her from your regular rag doll is her body shape, and the way her arms and legs are attached to her body.  Her arms stick straight out like a Cabbage Patch Kid's arms do, rather than flopping like Raggedy Ann's.

The big eyes, the big head, and the floppy yarn pigtails also bring a Cabbie to mind.  And yet Prim, like all handmade dolls, has a character and an appearance that's strictly her own.  She fits in okay in my Cabbage Patch, but she's also her own self.  I love that about homemade dolls; they take away with them a piece of their creator and become little individuals themselves.  Of course Prim isn't representative of all homemade Cabbie clones; some are better even than she is and some are worse, but they're all Cabbie clones, meant to be loved.

MY DREAM BABY

Now we're getting into mass-produced territory.  Autumn Leah is a My Dream Baby, and My Dream Baby had...well, she had something to do with a company that utilized the letters B.B., or rather b.b., lowercase.  She's got those letters on her neck.

My Dream Baby was created in Spain, and they have many similarities to Cabbage Patch Kids, namely the chubby faces, yarn hair, and soft, thick bodies.  They also have freckles, I suspect to make them look like Jesmar Kids, who were also produced in Spain and usually have freckles.  However, Autumn Leah has plenty of attributes that Cabbies of the eighties do not.  Her eyes sleep, and as far as I know no Cabbie had that feature back then.

She also has vinyl arms and legs that are molded to look like fabric.  Again, no Cabbie had that in the eighties.

Since Autumn Leah has more vinyl parts she's significantly heavier than a Cabbie, and I thought she'd be bigger than one as well.  But lookie-lookie, Autumn Leah and Kitrick Randolph Fergus are very close in size!

My Dream Baby also came in a smaller size like Preemie Kids, and they're funny because their tufts of hair grow out the side of their head, not the top like a tufted Cabbie.  The first three full-sized Dream Babies I saw had orange pigtails, or bright yellow pigtails, or a deep red ponytail like my doll's.  This reminded me of autumn leaves, hence my doll's name.  After talking to some Failbook friends I also learned that these dolls can have pale blue or light pink hair as well, kinda like cotton candy.  So this is a fun bunch of dolls.  I like how my Autumn has a nice weight, but she's not a tremendous handful like some of my other dolls.  I have to carry Geneva/Real Baby in both arms, for example, but that's not necessary with Autumn.  One drawback is that Autumn is very, VERY top-heavy, a problem that she does share with Geneva.

Clio Teresa and Primrose Jessalyn don't have that issue.  We'll get to Clio Teresa in a bit; she's VERY unique.

THE PUMPKINS

I finally found my Pumpkin!  These dolls are also sometimes called Pumpkin Patch Kids, but their faces and postures remind me more of My Dream Baby.  

The Pumpkins consist of Penny, Patty, and Peggy, and a baby named Li'l Pumpkin.  Penny has a snarky look on her face, while Patty and Peggy look incredibly smug.  My doll has a slightly wider smile, so even though she was labelled "Penny" on her eBay listing, I think she is in fact Peggy.

Regarding size, Peggy has a smaller body than Candela Laura (Jesmar) and Cleopatra Chantale (late Coleco), but her legs are longer.

Overall Peggy feels lower quality than Candela Laura and Cleopatra Chantale.  Her body is lighter, and her vinyl is softer and thinner.  This body is made of fleece, and Peggy has a hole under one arm that needs mending.

She has vinyl hands like Autumn Leah does, but not legs.

Peggy's hair was loose when she arrived and I had to tie it back up.  The yarn is only rooted along the hairline and the part, but when your hair is yarn that kind of root job is more than enuff.

Sometimes I call Peggy my little Papillion, because her pigtails remind me of a papillon's perky ears.  The Pumpkins could have blonde, sandy, red, brunette, or no hair, with my doll's hair being sandy.  I like sandy-haired Cabbies, by the way.  They don't seem to get the love that redheads or lemon blondes do.  

Overall I love these Pumpkins, mainly for their expressions, though Peggy is also soft and has nice hair.  I don't think her body can take a lot of rough treatment like a Cabbie's body can, but if not abused these dolls should hold up okay.  I had a moderately difficult time finding an affordable Pumpkin, by the way, so I wonder how common these are.  

FLOWER KIDS

These are such obvious Cabbie mimics that I'm surprised Xavier Roberts didn't sue.  Ironic, rather, that he stole the idea for Cabbage Patch Kids and then threw a fit over the Garbage Pail Kids.  Anyway, these dolls are sometimes called Blue Box dolls, as Blue Box is the name of their holding company...but not all Blue Box dolls are Flower Kids!  Some of these dolls took things a step further with foreign-themed dolls named International Flower Kids, which are a lot like Coleco's World Travelers.  The dolls mostly represented European countries, with the exceptions being the U.S. and Mexico.  Scotland is my favorite of the International Flower Kids.

POPCORN KIDS

When I dig around on eBay for popcorn Cabbies, I inevitably find at least one Popcorn Kid.  I've seen both Techni-Max and Q-Q Toys listed as the makers of these dolls, and I know absolutely nothing about either company.  These are cute little dolls, though.  They come in black and white, male and female, and like several entries on this list there's not a lot of information and not a lot of dolls available for looking.  The ones I do see for sale are cheap, so I guess there's not a lot of demand for these knockoffs like there kinda is for My Dream Baby and the Pumpkins.  That's too bad, because they're cute.  Now...I can't tell too much since this doll isn't mine, but I can say that these dolls have vinyl hands like My Dream Baby does.  As I said above, no Cabbage Patch Kid before 1990 had that feature that I know of.  The yarn hair, though...most of my Cabbies are yarnies, so Popcorn Kids got that part right.  I don't know a lot about Popcorn Kids since I don't have one and am trying not to buy anything, but I do like their sweet little faces.

KUDDLE LOVE KIDS 

I was unaware of this line until Setsu-P sent me this one back in March/April (it was right at the end of March and the post didn't go up until April).  Like most of these other lookalikes the Kuddle Love Kids have personalities of their own, but it's still obvious who they're imitating.  I don't know the full size range of these dolls, but Clive Elliot here is about the size as my bean-butt Kid, Esmond Brant.  They can share clothes.

Kuddle Love Kids came in both genders and at least two races, some of 'em had fiber hair like the Cornsilk Kids.  Some of 'em are even dressed up as teddy bears, like so.

I don't think the head mold varied much though; all of the dolls I've seen look like Clive Elliot does.

Eye colors varied, but they all had the same angled, slightly soulful shape.  Would these classify as kaleidoscope eyes?

If so, I've got Clive Elliot with his kaleidoscope eyes, Emily with her eclipse eyes, and Bopsy with her poison eyes.

Tangent for music fans:  who did "Lucy In the Sky With Diamonds" better, the Beatles or Sir Elton John?  Cast your votes.  For me it's hard to beat the original, but Sir Elt's version is trippier.

RICE PADDY BABIES

Then there's the controversial ones.  I usually love a controversial doll, but I'd forgotten about the Rice Paddy Babies until Treesa reminded me.  Rice Paddy Babies were based out of Hong Kong in the final years before Hong Kong became part of China, and instead of adoption papers they have passports with a specific date:  1997.  March 1st, 1997 was the date that the British handed Hong Kong over to China, and the dolls' passports reflect the concerns of some citizens about that.  Immigration fees for the dolls were STEEP, at $199.70 in 1997 dollars; as of writing that would equal about $395.26.  For comparison 1997 the Cabbage Patch Kids were still going for about twenty-five to thirty bucks (fifty to sixty bucks today).  Despite the price tag and the racial aspect, the Rice Paddy Babies proved to be a boom for Hong Kong's toy industry.  While the Reddit thread I found discussing these dismissed the Rice Paddy Babies as racist, folks who owned them as kids seem to have fond memories of the dolls, and from what I can tell the names are authentic.  Not like THESE names.  The example that I've found above does have eyes like those of my Asian Cabbies, so the resemblance is there...

...but some of these dolls also look like the puppets on The Puzzle Place.  So their resemblance to Cabbage Patch Kids is hit-and-miss, but the overall idea is highly similar, as is the name of the line.

THE BOOTLEG

Now we go from controversial to downright illegal...illegal to make and sell, I think.  As far as I know it's safe to own this doll without the authorities banging on your door.  The full saga of my bootleg Cabbie is related here, but in a nutshell, Clio Teresa was made by Greek toy company El Greco, and she is...well, she's exactly what I called her!  She's an illegal copy of a Cabbage Patch Kid, and since a lot of these copies were hunted down and destroyed shortly after production there aren't a lot of them around now.  Clio has some issues with quality, namely mismatched vinyl pieces and eyes that aren't painted straight, but the weirdest thing about her is that she burns one's skin when her fabric gets wet.  I learned that the hard way, LOL.  I wasn't seriously burned, but I'm glad I learned that before I tossed her in the washing machine, the way I usually treat Cabbies that are very groady.  This ability to burn skin has earned Clio Teresa the nicknames "Toxic Dolly" and "Poison Priscilla."

The thing is, I've read stories about bootleg Cabbage Patch Kids pulling such shenanigans, but the dolls in question looked exactly like the real thing.  Clio Teresa kinda looks like the real thing, but she's got enuff differences for one to be able to tell she's a fake.  Her body is all an unnatural color (yellow), she's got vinyl hands (eighties Cabbies do not), and her hair is pink (eighties Cabbies don't have pink hair unless they've been customized).  Here's how Clio Teresa visually compares to the real thing.

Clio is also lightweight, even more so than Elisabeth Clara is (Elisabeth is small for a Cabbie), and her face, a clear copy of Coleco's #1 head, has freckles.  The #1 head only has freckles if its a Jesmar doll or if it's a custom job.

Since Clio was produced in Greece I figure that she is indeed an imitation of a Jesmar.  For all of her hiccups in production and the slight hazard in owning her, Clio Teresa has her own charm and charisma, and is very loved.  And very unique; I said this in November of '24 but I'll say it again:  I've yet to find a Cabbie clone even remotely like her.  I won't say that Clio Teresa is necessarily one-of-a-kind, but I'd have to look a long, long time before I could find another one like her.  I daresay that she's one of my few dolls that's irreplaceable, thus why she was the one I carried during the tornado scare in March.  

?????????

Tabitha Renee here is a woman of mystery, even more so than Clio Teresa is.  She bears similarities to My Dream Baby and to the Pumpkins, but she's not either one of them.  

The Etsy seller says she's similar to Magic Ice Cream Dolls, but Magic Ice Cream Dolls look like little clowns.  Cute, mind y'all, but not like Tabitha Renee.  Tabby has pink hair like Clio Teresa does, and her hands are vinyl like Clio's, but Tabby isn't a bootleg either as far as I know.

Her neck is marked "Ocean Toys," but that information was no help.
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By the way, I think I've finally found a doll that's paler than I am.  

I don't know if Tabby is faded or if she was always this pale, but she looks like she's got tuberculosis or some other illness that causes pallor.  She's paler than my fairest Cabbie, who happens to be Elisabeth Clara.  I suspect that Elisabeth Clara is one of those who turned greenish with age.

She's also a small doll, smaller than Elisabeth Clara and about the size of my Splash 'n' Tan Kid, Gillian Ida.

I find it interesting that of all the dolls listed here, the only holding company I'm familiar with is Coleco, the one that did the real things.  The others are companies that I've never heard of and/or could find little information.  Also, with the possible exception of Kuddle Love Kids, none of these appear to have sold well, because pickin's on eBay and Etsy are pretty slim.  Too bad too, because dolls like Clio Teresa and Tabitha Renee have their own special character, just like the brand-name Cabbies do.  So to my Cabbie fans out there, what say you about clones?  Do you have any of your own?  Do you know of any that I forgot?  Discuss.

Cabbage blossoms,
RagingMoon1987