Doll Scenes

I set up some scenes with my dolls:

Here's Sara, still dressed from Halloween, in a replica of my own little hidey hole. I have my computer desk set up so I can turn around and sew, it's awesome. You can see some shelves in the back.

This is Sonali with all of my doll instruments. You guys are totally jealous of that maraca.

Here's Kirsten's table and chairs with some table stuff I got from Playthings. (I like keeping this stuff out because it's nice, and also much less breakable.)

Here's the bedroom style area. Jess is cleaning it up, it's kind of messy. I hope Kirsten doesn't melt her boots off.

Robecca

I'm so proud of this photo shoot, I'm not gonna lie.

Venus

I like Venus. I'm one of the few, that's okay.

But she takes neat pictures.

I hate this rose bush. I'm glad she's cool with it.

I fight a constant battle with the polk plants in my yard. The colors are more or less right, though.

Costume Swap

My ag over 18 costume swap came! Here's Ivy wearing a new princess costume that chubbybunnie got her. Thank you, it's awesome!

There was a tag sewn in the back, so I did some eDetective work and found out that this dress came from the etsy shop Enchanted Designer. We all love people who do hand work, so go check her out and see if there's any costume there you might need!

Hat Storage!

How do you all store your hats? I used to just stack them, but then they take up shelf space, and some don't even stack! So. I did this: Hang some cork board, and then use push pins to put the hats where you like. Easy!

July Outfits

I love putting Kirsten in this every July: I can't figure out where the red ribbons went, but still, isn't it lovely? Very patriotic. Fourth of July is my favorite holiday, so I'm biased. Something I noticed this time around: Is her hat too small? This is another one I love. (Holy over exposure, Batman!) It was part of the AG Olympics release. I was hoping for more sports stuff this time around for the Olympics, but oh well. I guess I get to enjoy this for four more years. She's shoeless because I can't find her other red sock. Isn't that the most random thing to lose? I'm sure it's somewhere, one does not merely throw out red socks.

Photography Science

Hey! We're still amped for Little Miss Playthings, right?

So, at the Playthings forums, user k8c asked me about taking pictures of dolls with bangs. How do you get rid of the shadow over their eyes?

And my reaction was, "What shadow?" I'd never noticed. I have three different sorts of bangs in my collection: the little tiny bangs, the huge pie bangs, and no bangs. (I'm missing the new bangs, and I love you all, but I wasn't going to buy another doll just for this experiment. I grabbed three test subjects, took them outside, and put them in the sun:

Oh. See Sara, over there on the left? There's a shadow on her eyes. Huh.

Well, I don't know. Maybe different times of day would help? The picture above was taken around 9 AM.

Here we are at noon. Sara's looking better, but this might just be because of how she's positioned -- look at poor Jess and Ivy!

This one was in the late evening ... 8, I think? Actually, everyone's doing pretty well. That might be the trick, waiting until there's less light?

Actually, the best photo I took, I took around the tool shed in my yard.

Aside from the crappy posing, there's no real problem with the facial shadows. Nice! I took it in the shade, not the sun, which is the key.

This has to do with light diffusion -- the way the light is hitting your photography subject. There's plenty of science you can google if you want to read up on it, but mostly, light directly on your doll? Shadows. Light rays shuffled around? Less shadows.

That's probably why Sara doesn't look so bad in the noon photo -- my tomato plant is diffusing light for her. :-P!

If you've ever heard someone say that they like to shoot when the clouds are out? They're using clouds as a diffuser. Which may or may not work fine, depending on your clouds. If you've got a photographer's light, it probably has some sort of diffuser, like an umbrella or a screen. Even if you don't have one of those, as with all things, Google has your hook up.

Actually, the fill flash on your camera is supposed to act something like a light diffuser, but ...

... the flash on your camera sucks.

Happy Birthday, Kirsten!

All right! To amp you up for Little Miss Playthings:

I'm going to (try really hard to) do a ~WEEK OF POSTS!~ here on Le Blog du Stalk. But today, we have some unfinished buisness! Namely, Kirsten's Birthday.

I always bake a cake for Kirsten every year, because I'm really 11 years old. (Oh, fie, you of all people understand.) But, you have to know: I hate cake. That is, unless I make it myself.

Bakery cake is gross. Cake out of a box is slightly less gross, but also still gross. Look into your heart, you know it to be true. Quit eating that stuff! Why eat bad cake when you could eat good cake? Let's make cake from scratch.

Kirsten's cake that comes with her little table and chairs is a yellow cake ... I guess? I don't honestly know enough history to know what it was. We can do better, though. Lemon cake is yellow, and also tastes good. (It's tres summer, too.)

I used this recipe. It's pretty easy, but then, cake isn't actually hard to make. I left out the syrup, though, because ... enh, you'll see in a second.

Kirsten's real cake has little fake fresh strawberries. In real life, though, they bounce right off. We can do better.

Take a pint of strawberries, wash them, quarter them, throw them in a pot. Cover them about 3/4 of the way with water. Put a ... teaspoonesque of sugar in the pot, more or less depending on how sweet the berries you got were. Simmer for around 20 minutes. Oh, look, strawberry syrup! And it's not that weird gelatinous red goo the grocery store sells! Seriously, that stuff is just chemicals. Don't eat that.

To know me is to know that I hate frosting. All of it. Bakery frosting is gross, frosting out of a can is gross. I scrape it off. I make my own frosting that I kind of like, but today, let's just top with syrup.

Like so.

Happy birthday, buddy.

LITTLE. MISS. PLAY. THINGS.

LET'S DO THIS.

Okay, I was totally keeping this secret from you yesterday.

Let's do this!

The plan is to have an LMPT Blog Series to go with LMPT this year. I have some ideas, but if you have requests, holla at.

General Mraaaaa~~

I'm trying to get stuff done, but I'm far too scattered to do any of it. Does that make sense? My rule is that as soon as I close this blog post, I must open up my HTML editor. Which is Notepad. I'm from the old school. Anyway.

I want doll pictures to share, but I am tres lacking in inspiration. It's summer! I want summer photos! But what is there to do besides run through the weeds? Right now, there is, of course, a rain storm, so we can't even do that. My dolls will have to continue to lay in a pile next to my sewing machine, I guess. Their hair's a mess, I shant take a picture.

EDIT: Oh, never mind! I just saw the new Playthings challenge! This is my weekend, don't even laugh at me. Who's in?

Oh, hey, though, Kirsten's birthday is next week! Right on Friday! Hmm, maybe now I have some picture ideas~

I Got Linked To!

Oh, I'm so thrilled! Springfield Dolls included me in their list of 18" inch free doll patterns! It warms my blackened heart, you guys. Seriously. You can check out the post here. Thank you, Springfield Dolls!

Hair Accessories!

I made a list! Here are five doll hair accessories that you'll love. With pictures!

First off, you need a good dog brush. I didn't make a typo. Dog brushes with metal bristles are always nicer and cheaper than what they sell for dolls.

I had no idea they made small hair pins! These are perfect for pulling back hair and doing half up dos for those of us with small heads. I especially like that they come in two colors.

Colored mini hair clips are great for keeping hair out of your doll's face, especially if she doesn't have bangs. Bonus points for coordinating with her outfit.

I'm not a fan of the tiny hair clips, they don't open well and they tend to like to break on me. The next size up does well, though, and the big ones can hold up pigtails and ponytails.

These multipacks are handy. The smaller sizes are for tiny braids, the middle ones do great pony tails and pig tails, and the big ones ... well, those are for you. I like the clear ones. I don't know, something about colored pony tail holders for dolls reads a little goofy to me.

American Girls Photo Project

Hey, did you catch this link?

http://lens.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/04/11/a-mirror-on-growing-up-in-america/

A lady took pictures of girls and their dolls in New York, as a way to look at young girls in America. Pretty neat, worth checking out.

You can see the actual photo project here.

Craft Discussion: The Russian Join

Just as a foot note, for all you yarn folk out there, when you get to the end of your yarn, what do you do? Do you know how to do a Russian join?

It's pretty easy and it saves yarn. It's prolly my favorite trick. Check it out at this link:

Russian Join!

Doll Size Items

I found these at Wal Mart, they were too cute not to share:

Mini Barbies! They look more, err, Barbie than just giving your doll a Skipper. I found them close to the crafts, just a bit off from the cards ... no idea why they weren't with the toys. Maybe because they're pens too?

what you see above are the only varieties my Wal Mart had, let me know if you see more.

The AG Playthings Forum has also been buzzing about doll size Apples to Apples games that Wendy's is apparently giving out. Man, they have good chicken nuggets, too.

I Did It!

Last Friday, I told myself that I HAD to take doll pictures. It had been to long. And then! I did it!

First off, I did the Playthings Earth Day challenge. (Vote for me!)

It's not the most original picture, but growing food is important to me. It's another way to fight the man. Runs in the family, too.

Then, I got a few of Draculaura and Frankie:

"Is for girls!" said Chloe, our cat. "Is thing I knows, because car has a dolls, and also has a gray." Cats can't see color. She meant pink.

It took me for-frickin'-ever to get everybody stuffed in the roaster. I never had a Barbie car.

Hey! HEY. You use your turn signal, little missy! I'm not having my insurance go up because of you!

I got a few of Operetta with my bass, too.

Then, Stica and I took our Puddle pictures. (Check out Puddle! Vote for me!)

Weekend Plans

You guys, I need to take doll photos this weekend.

For one, I have to get my Earth Day photo done for Playthings. You all are entering too, right? I think I know what I'm doing, I just hope it's ... Earth Day-ey enough. I thought about taking a picture around our recycle bin, but eww. Our garbage is pretty gross.

Although I'm not going, I do want to get a photo in for Puddle. They hold a pullip photo contest every year, and this year, I actually have an idea!

And, Monster High. Because general. Everybody ought to take more MH photos.

I'm thinking I'm going to make myself take some special time this afternoon. What are your weekend plans?

General Flickr Doll Groups

Here's some Flickr groups that cater to all dolls, since I know there's lots of you that collect more than one kind:

Dolls.FM: Pullip, Blythe, Dollfie and Other Dolls
"Plastic People" or Mannequins, Dolls and More -- they allow you to post 50 pictures per month. I try to hit my limit every month, but I haven't done it yet! :O
Doll Collections
Doll Circus

Let's Talk Velcro!

Let's talk velcro, shall we?

Some people are going to only put their doll clothes together with snaps, or buttons, or hooks and eyes, or fairy wishes and moon dust, and that's fine, but for you and me, we velcro our stuff together. Having the right kind is important. Let's discuss what is the right kind.

Anything labeled "sticky back" is NOT. the right kind. For one, don't get fooled, it won't stick permanently to doll clothes. For two, you can't sew it. The glue on the back makes this stuff thick and impossible to sew. I've tried ... even with pliers, it's way too hard. Don't run it in a machine. The glue will get into your machine cogs and ... no. Just no.

Watch out, because sticky back velcro hides in the wild!

Look really close. This is sticky back velcro.

First of all, you don't want to be associated with anything "fusion." You're sewing. You sew. Get that fusing web out of your head. Second of all? Sticky back.

THIS is the correct stuff. It's thinner than normal velcro, very similar to the kind AG uses. It'll run through a machine. Perfect!

They changed the label on it, though. I know it says it's for cables, but they meant doll clothes. Trust me. This used to be branded as thin velcro for sewing. I guess it sells better this way?

Organizing

I get bitten every so often to organize ALL THE THINGS. Not a bad thing to do.

This is what I just installed next to my sewing machine: two cork boards and one of those ... file ... thingies. One cork board, as you can see, is holding all my important doll patterns. I have no idea why I have two sleeve patterns and two bodice patterns, but I do. That pant pattern is folded like it is to do double duty as a legging pattern.

What am I going to use the other board for? No idea. I'll tell you if I figure it out.

I ~think?~ I might use the metal file ... doohickey for pattern storage. I have a drawer, but the fit is getting tight if you're picking up what I'm putting down. I don't even own that many patterns! But it'll be nice to stash my patterns that I don't use quite as often. (I mean, I love my homemade doll qipao pattern, but how often does that come up?)

By the way, over there on the left edge? The light in my sewing space sucks big time. That's one of those Aero Gardens. It grows bunny food for me AND doubles as a sewing light. When you use them for double duty, they are a total steal.

Playground

I took these at a local playground back in January. Hope you dig them: