Happy Thanksgiving!

I'm dreaming of some pumpkin pie,
wishing on a star-blue sky.
Wish I may, wish that I might
not count any more calories tonight.
On gravy, on pudding, on jelly and jam:
slather my turkey and spiral sliced ham.
Oh green beans, cabbage and pretty yams,
skip my hips and pass my gams.
Fluffy rolls, brown rolls, yeast and more,
will I ever again fit through the door?
Jello salad, pea salad, pickles and cheese,
pass the relish tray and the margarine please!
Mashed potatoes, smashed potatoes, who gives a rip?
I'm on a delirious, delicious carbohydrate trip,
and when I'm done, maybe I'll run a lap....
after my L-tryptophan-induced, heavenly nap!

Happy Halloween!

Now answer the door!

Halloween and other costumes

From the top down: Mallory, Polly, Bunny, Brigette, Lilly, Sofia, Cady, Cookie, Poppy, Daisy.

Cookie, Cakes and Halloween Eye Candy

That's Cookie, singular, (middle photo), of course! My "afro" girl got all faced-up by Aunt Maggie, and look how adorable she turned out! Cookie is an SBL that I bought in parts: faceplate, backplate, eye mech, body, wig -- all separate. She never did have a dome. Maggie gave her a new face, new eyes and made her hair permanent. She "Georgia Peach-ified" her as I like to say, after Maggie's own original afro girl, Georgia Peach.
Now if I could just get a decent picture. It seems all my pix are out of focus lately, and while it could definitely be operator error, I'd like to blame it on my cheap camera. Why? Because I'd rather buy a new, cool camera than admit to shaking hands and bad eyesight!
The hands and eyes come, er, go at the expense of another birthday. The girls (top) helped me celebrate. They look pretty sober, don't they? Don't know why. I gave them 'real' treats.
Mallory snagged onto the Halloween dress first. I finished embroidering it this summer and have been waiting for someone to put it on. Headband and treat bag by Pistachio Libby! Mallory's got the Halloween Medusa Hair goin' on!

Mademoiselle Blythe Features Moi!

The girls and I are so lucky to have been chosen by the talented and popular blogger Mademoiselle Blythe (her header shown) a.k.a. Fanny Zara. She recently featured some of my dollhouses for Blythe and others on her blog here or click the headline of this post. Her feature begins an interior designer series in which she will also be profiling some of my besties, Angela and Lindsay.
Even luckier still, I got to meet the lovely Fanny in person at Blythecon 2011 in Portland, after having followed her blog and her Flickr, and occasionally purchasing from her on Blythe Kingdom. And Fanny has exquisite fashion taste, let me add!

So, I decided to revisit some pictures of my first dollhouse, Blythe Manor I, which no longer exists. Gosh! I had forgotten about all the itty bitty pieces and parts in here. You can see Blythe Manor II, The Leesburg Hotel and my Petite Princess three-quarter scale dollhouse on Fanny's blog.

Mutiny narrowly avoided; girls get out of boxes finally.

Notice all the grumpy faces? In fact, everyone looks grumpy, even in their new outfits. The girls haven't been homeless, but they've still been living in boxes for the past month. I told them it was better than living under a rock, but they were pretty humorless.
At top Brigette and Polly get together. Polly has a dress loaned to us by Aunt Maggie, whom we miss terribly! The next three grouchbags are Poppy, Pixie and Cady. Pixie has a dress specially made for us by Pistachio Libby. Same for Daisy, below them, left. Next to Daisy is (we think) Mallory and then Sally.
Bottom, from left, are Charlotte and Sofia, both in Pistachio Libby, and then Lilly and Bunny.
The girls were glad to get some fresh air. They can't wait to see some of their old friends again soon, and Blythe sister Cookie will be back from her overhaul at Aunt Maggie's. Meanwhile, after a trip to Maryland for work and to see some dolly friends, I'm going to 'Aunt Libby's' around my birthday to get a sewing lesson. Fun!

Yumeko meets Ruiko

Yumeko meets Ruiko, a photo by Gina2424 on Flickr.

A big Blythe mail surprise arrived last week from dear Rui in Japan: a Petite she had customized some time ago, which matched the full-size Blythe she had also customized.
I bought the large one from Obvious Zebra, having always wanted a girl with a brown bob haircut, especially the one I missed when she was first for sale on Ebay by Neroli!
Then, Rui suprised me by sending the Petite!
Blythe friends are so dear!
H Loves R full size dress with MSR collar and Takara boots.

Meet Sofia Sylvia Sylvana Gina Maria Melacaccio!

A couple things happened at Blythecon. That's another way of saying a funny thing happened on the way to the forum....
I saw several beautiful, customized Prima Dolly Paris Blythes. And, as some of you know, I won two dark-haired girls with this same haircut, and came home to a third. At least two of them were a base of Punkaholic People, which is very similar to Paris, except different face mold and dark hair.
While still at Blythecon, I started imagining a Paris for myself. And I had a chance to meet the lovely, lovely Sylvia of S. Coladolls, formerly known as Sylviecoladolls. She was rooming with my dear friends, Maggie and Angela. I was rooming with glam Lindsay, and we all hung out.
I had seen her work on many of Maggie's dolls. Sylvia is humble, quiet, unassuming, and verrrry talented! So, I decided I would buy a base Paris doll and send her to Sylvia for a faceup. This happened quite literally. As Sylvia is moving very soon, we ended up just swapping faceplates and eye mechanisms, so she could finish more quickly and get on with packing up her studio.
Meanwhile, at Blythecon, I met another Gina of G*Baby on Flickr. I bought a beautiful set of pink eye chips for Yumeko from her and wished I would have bought more. So I contacted her and ordered four pairs: blue, green, lavender and brown.
Then, in another coincidence, the talented eye chip artist Amy, known as Zaloa27, El Duende or Melacaccia contacted me to buy one of my three brown bob girls, the Punkholic People, and we worked out a partial trade to include two sets of her chips, the pink and the grey now seen on Paris.
Patience not being a virtue of mine at all, I was thrilled when everything came within a day or two of each other in mail from all points west, and base doll from Singapore! I quickly put her together with a little help from Maggie, and voila! Exactly as I had envisioned.
Next up: A BIG Petite suprise in the mail!

Her name was Mallory

And what should it be now?! Squee!! You know what that means.....

My recent faves- got a Paris Blythe thing going on

See this mosaic on my Flickr for links to the photographers' photostreams for all these beautiful pictures.

We don't care if it's 100F outside! We're always cool.

Frog welcomes some special guests

Frog welcomes some special guests, a photo by Gina2424 on Flickr.

My FROG was delighted to have Francine, Buttercup and Penelope over for a visit. It was a working playdate with Aunt Maggie.

Charlotte's Big Bang Theory

Happy 4th of July!

Happy 4th of July holiday weekend!

Blythecon: Real Friends and Real Plastic Friends Meet

The girlz left for Blythecon like this, and had to make quite a bit more room on the way home! I was lucky enough to win not one, but two Blythe dolls plus a Petite Blythe and two outfits: Atelier Blythe and MinkiDynamite. If that weren't shocking enough, my tickets for the two dolls were drawn one right after the other! I was weirdly lucky!
The Portland Roller Girl Ruby Blythe was created by Lynne Rutherford from Texas, a.k.a. Happibug. She has an incredible face-up, chips, pull rings, outfit, hat and tattoo. On top of that, I won a NRFB Punkaholic People.Both of these girls have brunette bobs. Then I came home to Yumeko in the mail from Scotland, a custom by RuiRui/Neroli, and also a brunette bob. And Bunny Velvet with her wig is a, say it with me, brunette bob.
It is only by coincidence that my earliest Blythe friend, Linda J and her PE Ebony, Molli, have brunette bobs! Heck, I didn't even know what Linda looked like until Blythecon! As you can see above, she looks a lot like her MiniMe, Molly. Linda also has a darling real-life mini me now.
That's Molli's sister Zelda, a Star Dancer custom by Kyle, hanging out with my Star D Lilly. Molli and Zelda sent Lilly and me our first-ever Blythe gifts and Blythe swaps about four years ago-- back when I still had SO much to learn. I remember asking Linda to explain Re-ment to me! Seems so funny now.

More Blythecon Pics!

I think I'll be able to actually write about it after I post more pics. However, that is moi in the white jean jacket in the top photo (I hate getting my picture taken!). I'm sitting with in-person and some first-time in-person friends to my right--Lindsay (Ellewoods) my roommate for BC; Angela (Gemini Angel's Art & Dolls); Ruth (EuroTrash), Blythe Banner (?), and Phillaine. At the foreward table from left: Stacy (Tunibug); Sylvia (SylvieCola Dolls); Maggie (Momoko_girl_1/Blythe_Stole_My_Heart). Maggie has got to shorten that name!
Below that is Pommepomme's vendor table with Shershe (Sherry of Indiana) to the left. In the 3rd photo Keelie of Marmalade Forest in OR sells her "Hello My Name Is" nametags on the left and Rag Bag Designs (Sglahe and her mom) are on the left. I think I bought 5 dresses from them!
Below them, from left are GBaby (Gina), MinkiDynamite and Dolly Rockers vending clothes and eyechips. Last photo is just one of the many tables of participants' dolls- these dressed in vintage Skipper. You can see the outstanding centerpieces, too.