Rambled Opinions, General Snarkiness, and Crafting Creatively: Two Kids of Mid 20th Century Release, A Smackering of Books, and the 1952 Walk-Away Dress for 18" Dolls

A fancy striped dress was not one of the things released. It's one of the things I made.

Me, Jan 2018: 2018 will get me back up on the proverbial AG horse! I'm gonna get back on that blogging wagon! Luciana exists, I will get to do cool things, I will be seeing HAMIL--

Depression: siddown bitch, be humble *kicks me in the solar plexus of my brain*

Me: yes brai--*does not finish sentence because she just puked, curls up, can't move*

And that's where I went for four months, because the brain weasels are shitgibbons and resolve to ruin my world like so many mansplainers going "well actually--" and the very existence of election manipulation because white people were primed to vote stupid or throw shit away because they fell for racist, self-centered bullshit.¹

Have I done stuff since then? Well, yeah. I just haven't been blogging. Which I feel bad about. Let's start over again and don't hold my problems against me. As the song by Rag 'N Bone Man goes, "I'm only human, after all." It's okay to be a sad Neth.

What's happened in four months?  Um, well, a quick gloss. 

Gabbi's still hanging in there, even unto May, even if her bed is gone. Tenney-Sue still stinks. Logan is a No-gan. There was a short leak of the nu!Molly which was then instantly yanked down, but not so quick that I didn't put it on the Wiki. Luciana became part of my gang,² known colloquially as Space Girl Lucci, and enjoys things such as knit sweaters, Houston Town Pride (mine moved, I know more about Houston than Virginia), and Sailor Moon. The end of January had a purple moon--when a blue moon gets eclipsed.

There's the books listed for the GotY for 2019. Toys R Us is shutting down--and it's not dying from WalMart or Amazon or millennials not having enough babies, but because people like Mitt Romney murdered it and are looting the corpse to fund the rich-poor divide.³ And it's ruining the world of toys--AG sales dropped badly last quarter, but I try not to freak out about AG dying. MCM is coming up this year but I have family stuff to attend to at that weekend so I shan't be going. HAMILTON.⁴

I continue to spin yarn. I actually used some and now I'm not scared to use my own yarn. I saw Black Panther, added to the destruction of Titanic in high rankings, and now Wakanda Forever. (Infinity War what now? Nah.) My local AG store no longer has a cafe, because the economy is crap and AG picked the Seattle and Scottsdale stores to get kicked from having a cafe. We had a successful Secret Snarker, but I didn't post about my outfit because of brain weasels so I'll get on that soon. I went to Emerald City Comic Con and I loved it and I want to get a full pass for next year, like three days if I can dig it. I now have four of the AG Craft sets from the 90s. Janelle Monae came out as queer and I am a Dirty Computer but I do not consent to be cleaned.⁵

And such and such. 

Oh, and the part that's in this post: I released a pattern and there was a short AG release that consisted of a handful of Historical stuff and the Bitty stuff I tend to ignore. I did get to get pics in February. February. Ugh, my stupid brain. So this is a short post, since there's not much to yammer about. And at the end of this post, I'm going to be a little more proactive about my Etsy shop. If I can't pimp me, who can?

But on the real, I'm sorry that I made y'all worry about me. I try to let people know I'm alive--if struggling--on Instagram by posting fairly regularly. But these past four months, every time I went to go work on any blog post, my brain screamed "shut up, no one wants to read your garbage words about toys aimed at little girls,⁶ you're an adult, this is stupid, you're stupid, you care too hard, no one cares this hard when they're normal. You're weird and ugly and boring and garbage for being damn near forty and being so ass to the wall about girls' toys. You should be an adult and into things such as homeowner's fees, shot glasses, babies, long form stories about soup on recipe blogs, eating at Applebees and the stock market--you know, things that might matter to people. Or nothing, because caring about things isn't cool, South Park and Family Guy said it so it must be true." And as the span got longer since my last post, I kept feeling more and more like I should just like, give it up and pack it in and stick to silence because no one really cared.

But you know what? No. No, I can talk about what I want on this space of the internet I've chunked out for myself. And what I want to talk about in this chunk is American Girl Dolls and race and gender and sexuality and intersection as a person who lives the intersectional life by the nature of who I am--black, queer, female, and into dolls. At least one person cares, I know they do.

And if there are in fact people who don't like me doing this and wait for every post online I make to go spend their time reading all that I blog and 'gram and tweet, and hover around my e-presence in order to see me say something they think is dumb and run over to their own e-space to go "ah ha ha what a freak" and talk shit about me?

Okay. Fine. Let them. If these people really do enjoy spending their precious free time looking at me or anyone else doing shit openly and complaining that people are living, when they themselves could be using that time to do literally anything else in this span of life they have to themselves? I hope it's fulfilling to them. I'm too old for that shit. I been too old for that shit since the days of Cloak Girl and Barefoot Jimmy. Dolls and race and being queer and shipping characters and social justice are fulfilling to me, and I'm gonna do what I can to be a happy person.

Are you hate reading me? Did you stumble across my space, sneer, and decide this is fucking stupid? Okay. "Enjoy" this post and all the posts I've made and will make after it. You could spent that time watching Netflix, reading a book, editing TV Tropes, playing D&D, carving swords, spending time with people in your life that love you, or doing anything in the world to add to your skillset as a human, but instead you're spending it with me in my room in the internet for some reason I don't understand and frankly don't want to. You do you, boo-boo. It's your life to do with as you will. I'm going to keep blogging.

Are you reading me for joy? Did you stumble across my space, smile, and decide you want more? Are you one of the people who, for whatever reason, like and enjoy reading what I have to say or think or anything about dolls made for 8-12 year old girls? Do you understand that just because a toy is aimed at preteen girls, the company has been around thirty-plus years and like anything it has people who have grown up with them, found love or peace in them, and who have made bonds with others over doll collecting? Do you like seeing people find affection for things instead of only derision? Am I kinda cool? Did you miss me? Then hey. I'm back, and I'll do what I can to get back to the rhythm.

Go under the cut and read on.

Rambled Opinions and General Snarkiness: Sing a Song of Civil Rights: Meet Melody Ellison of the 1960s (PS: Some Other New Things)

Come See About Melody!

Me: AHHHHHH---AHHHHHHHHHHHHH MELODY IS OUT MELODY IS OUT MELODY IS OUT TIME TO MELODY STUFF--

Logical Side: Neth, that can't be the opening to your blog post, you have to be articulate and poised and--

Me: *Shoves Logic Side into a wall and beelines for the front door of AG* you're not my momma you can't tell me what to do! I've been itching for since 2015 when AG made a one line Facebook post about a black historical for next year and then her books came out and I've been hyped since last December or longer so if I want the entire opening to be nothing but me screaming my head off like an idiot and singing every early Motown song that ever came out, then I can do that--

Logic Side: ...Neth, there's more that came out than Melody. Also you have to bitch about things for a short point.

Me: ...Damn you, logic side. *kicks dirt*

Well, you heard my Logic Side. As much as I'd like my entire opening to be me screaming so loud about DeeDee that they hear me in Hawaii before the cut, I gotta talk about stuff a little properly. So. On the 25th of August in the Year of our Documentation Twenty-Sixteen, the culmination of books and designs and items and Black history and work came together finally to manifest and release as the cutest American Girl historical released in the last four years,¹ Melody "DeeDee" Ellison. Sorry Ellie, I love you so much--but you knew DeeDee was going to bump you when she got here and you understood that. We major? We major.

It's not like y'all didn't expect this of me, I've been hype for DeeDee ever since they showed her first book cover. I snapped up all her books as they came out, on February I declared my entire wallet dead in lieu of seeing her and Edith realized she was queer, and as soon as I could preorder her I did that without regrets.² And on Friday the 26th, my close AG friend and I went to the store midday to go to Melody's Block Party so we could get tiny doll shirts, poke tiny doll things, talk shit about people there and back cause that's hella fun, actually run into people from IG out of nowhere who recognized us, and buy dolly stuffs as soon as possible. I might have had DeeDee in the gang since the 14th, but I still had to go squeal and dance over her stuff. Melody means a million things to me, as a child of black children who grew up in the 1960s, and who represents me and my history. When AG launched, the grandparents were of the World War II generation³ and about ten when there were victory gardens and rationing and Damn War. But those kids grew up, several had kids in the 60s, and that's the new throwback for grandparents.

Why didn't I write about things sooner, even though I was there Friday midday? Saturday I was exhausted--I'm an ambivert, so sometimes social interaction can be draining for people like me. So I slept until the evening and then pissed around on the internet, making sure all the articles were on the AG Wiki. On Sunday I went out on errands, and Monday I had to go to the dentist because gotta keep my teeth their prettiest. Once again, some of the new stuff wasn't there and others I missed in the walkthrough, because there were a lot of people there to see about DeeDee and her stuff. (The Lea section was being half abandoned. I may have had the schadenfreude.) So I'll have to use the Wiki images until I can go back and take shots, which might be in a few weeks into September. And I'm taking a break from redoing my braids to get my squeal out, because squeal! Not only was there stuff for DeeDee, but some bursts for other Historicals, the Moddie End of Year Release, and a bit of WellieWishers Stuff.

But with DeeDee already, there's a not at all small contingent of people who are out there that are already being racist shitwads. Y'all out there showing your pale chicken cutlet asses and it hasn't even been a month. Y'all think it's okay to take DeeDee's things for your white stank 60s girls from England, disregard her love of Motown⁴ and the rich sounds thereof to have her like only the boring ass Beatles because you're scared of the "race" music like it's the 1920s and the loud Jazz might give you accidental melanin and teach you to spice your food, talk shit about her hair being too rough because you fucking can't get over the idea of silky White Hair being better and you have European Dominance Poisoning and are going to try to straighten already straightened hair and end up with tangled rat nests that even braid spray can't save the soul of, and continue to barf all over Instagram and other locations that her clothes aren't part of Black History (Black folk didn't dress 100% like the whitebread faves) so you want to feel justified in slapping them on your stupid wonderbread brats and then try to come at me like I won't hex your dry overcooked chicken-with-cheese-as-seasoning ass.

I hope y'all get booty rash you can't scratch in public that runs all the way up to your shoulders, the elastic in your dolls breaks at the most inopportune time with restringing nowhere near convenient, your fave customs get unexpected ink stains on their face, you get a bad haircut you have to let grow out for six months, you realize your wallet isn't in your purse after you've already made a custom order at Starbucks that the barista didn't wanna make anyways, and a cat leaves dead things in your house you can't find and suck up with the vacuum attachments. Play me if you want. I'm Too Witches to be challenged.⁵ I will hurt all your little feelings and even some you didn't know you had til I hurt them.

Ahem. *brushes that dirt off her shoulders*

Also two bits of Historical news. First of all, Addy was out of her display box, cut down to almost nothing at the store and a lot of the stuff being online only. I suspect soon they will announce her retirement, which means I need to get one for my mom along with some of her stuff, and her new bed, for me. How do I feel about this? That Addy's had a good long run and that, while it's hella problematic to remove her and only leave one Black Historical again when there's so many white dolls in the historical line that are out and about oh my god Samantha go back in the damn vault already, she is the oldest one out other than Second Release Samantha so it is her turn to go into the Vault and take a break. (Also, maybe now people can stop bitch-barfing in badly written articles that the only black doll is a slave!!1!11!!)

Ah, yes, the Vault. Let's touch on that, because it's come out recently that there's three BeForever books due out in early 2017:  A Stand for Independence, Love and Loyalty, and Gunpowder and Tea Cakes. I don't know about y'all but that sounds like Revolutionary Revolutions to me. So is Felicity coming back out? This is a strong hint. They're at least rereleasing her stories, which means I have to buy yet another copy of them. What can I say, I'm a book crazy kid, and I like having AG books of all my faves. I already have four versions of Sam's books.

Me: *looks at Logic side* Have I said enough proper talk now? Are you pleased?

Logical Side: ...g'won. I can't stop you any longer.

Me: EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE---

Off Brand Reviews: Carpatina's Vintage Pink Party Dress and Sophia's Ankle Strap Dress Shoes

Ellie: Pretty in Pink.

So here we are in February, and I'm both in a great mood about some things, "seriously? seriously?" about others, and in a "at this rate I will burn it down and leave no trace" about others. The stitches are out of my knee, but the other day I tumbled over a chair and bruised my upper arm on a table and can't really lay on that side when sleeping--which happens to be the side I want to sleep on. So we're at neutral. I made a cute quick fleece blanket and some AG clothes for the gang, and plan to cut out and make more and try to sew more often. AGC's Secret Snarker is underway, and I've finished mine for my giftee--I hope they¹ adore it. There was a short release on Thursday the 11th. I'll try to get it tomorrow, likely--it's a very short release. All Moddie and Bitty Shit, and y'all know how I feel about Bitty Shit. There's some good dates on when Melody will be out, and I'm still saving up for her and her stuff in my tip jar. So excited!

But first, a quickish review.

This likely isn't news to most people, but not everything in my AG collection is by American Girl, LLC. There's some people who are strict AG purists and won't buy anything that doesn't have an AG tag in it, but I ain't ever been one of those people and I ain't ever gonna be. If I can find cute things for my gang--or even new members of the Gang--outside of American Girl proper, I'm going to go for it if I think it can work with them. Hell, a lot of people do. Etsy thrives on it. I've been working on a blogger post about saving money when collecting AG with tips on what I've been doing. Alas, it's been something of a plod. I will finish it sometime, but even without finishing it I can start to talk about some of the other companies with good stuff.

One of those is Sophia's Doll Clothes, a manufacturer of quite a few AG basics--shoes, socks, generic outfits, tights, the like--and various outfits and furniture components. I don't order from them directly so much as I order off of Amazon. They sell both directly to consumers and to wholesalers, so you can likely find someone selling their items on places like eBay, or with handmade outfits as extras. I've got some pieces here and there--mostly shoes, and notably a very nice doll hairbrush.

Another company--and one I simply adore and could gush about forever if I wanted--is Carpatina. Carpatina is probably my favorite outright non-AG seller of fine American Girl and Other Gang Member clothing. The company and brand has been around since 1998, and started to offer dolls in 2002, designed by some of the designers that helped make Stardust Classics.² Not only do they sell clothes for AG sized dolls under their Girlfriends Collection, they also sell clothes sized for their 18" Slim dolls--sizes such as Magic Attic, of which I have a few--and have recently branched into offering patterns in both sizes. While I've yet to buy a doll from them specifically (Julia is my most likely bet when I do pull the trigger, unless they come out with a beautiful dark skinned doll) I have gotten some outfits from them, and I plan to go back.

This December, Boom and I were doing what we do best--chattering about doll stuffs between Hamilton squee--when she got super squee over Carpatina's Vintage Pink Party Dress.³ This was as an alternative to Ellie's birthday dress, which we have both declared Too Hideous to Get. Look, authentic or not, it looks like a tulle nightmare and I won't fucking do it, even if it's in the books. Ellie, when she almost doesn't get to wear the Green Nightmare at her birthday performance, almost wears one of her older sister's pink prom dresses in is place. And well, this is a pink party dress. So it's even slightly canon. After picking out some nice shoes--namely, the Sophia's Ankle Strap Dress Shoes in pink to match--we both ordered sets and I got mine as a post-New Years gift on Amazon. Well, it arrived on the 31st, but my office was closed and the package delivery guy decided that dropping my package at my door was clearly dumb, and making me wait two days was the smart thing to do. Because Reasons. Anyways. The dress was $12.95 and the shoes $6.95, for a total of 19.90 plus tax.⁴ Good deal, considering most AG Direct sets go for $25+ nowadays.

Ellie gets two reviews in a row. It happens. I wanted to do something pink for Valentine's Day. I also didn't do a second body shot of the dress. Alas, it happens.

Also, congrats American Girl Collectors on two years of successful boarding! The members there have in many ways restored my lost faith in AG collecting communities. Love y'all~

Pajama Jammy Jams and Historical Clothes Reviews/Historical Accessories Reviews: Maryellen's Pajamas and Hairstyling Set

Jamming for bed, the 1950s way.

Don't you love it when things conspire to make sure you get fuck all done? I sure don't. So there I was on this past Friday, planning to take some shots of Addy in her Sunday Best Set and Maryellen in her meet set, after getting the mail. Addy so I could compare her to the tiny LE mini, and Ellie to show her in something before her PJs. This was planned after getting my package from the office.

...And then I had a random encounter with a curb. I rolled for dexterity to save my balance, hit a two out of twenty, tripped hard, fell even harder, and both scraped my palm and felt shooting pain in my leg. I caught my breath, got my package and went back home, and inspected the damage. And wow that was a lot of blood and a wide ass cut. A temp patch up and a painkiller later, I waited for the Bae to get home from work and hoped it maybe wasn't as bad as I thought it was. I was wrong. He took one look at the cut and put me in the car and made me go to the urgent care center. This is where the doctors looked at my cut and made faces at it before injecting me and poking and flushing things out with others and three hours of my Friday evening was spent in the urgent care center, including a book reading. All that is to say that there are probably six to twelve stitches in my left knee,¹ it hurts like a son of a motherfucker to walk anywhere or flex my leg too much, and I'm not going to be doing any kneeling for pictures for at least two weeks. Fuck you too, gravity, you whore.

But I did have some older pictures I took beforehand, even if I wasn't planning this review to be Ellie's debut. So Ellie will just have to accept that her debut on the blog is going to be her in her pajamas. She's cool with this, considering she came with me to the Urgent Care center. If anyone understands healthcare needs, it's Ellie.

Ellie--Maryellen Larkin, but around here she much prefers to go by her nickname--wasn't initially going to be a Historical Character I cared for. The 1950s are the most overhyped nostalgia era ever for obnoxious white Baby Boomers, who want to remember the time of their childhood as a wholesome, perfect era of American Greatness when people didn't think about segregation, sexism, racism, or oppression and they didn't have to think about others at all. The Fifties get overly wrought down to the surface aesthetics: poodle skirts, records, jukeboxes, bobby soxers, roller skating diners, television spread, drive in movies, ponytails, white rock and roll, families with father knowing best and mother in pearls and heels, etc. Basically all the fluffy feel-good times with none of the understanding or discussion about the sociopolitial issues that plagued the time. But like Caroline and Kit before her,² Ellie's stories endeared her to me--she likes comics, science, does art, and supports vaccinations (having been disabled by polio). I basically went through a set of Five Stages with her:

1.) Denial: "Damn the 50s! And damn her! She's hazel eyed, she's white, she's got the classic mold, her name is meh--there is nothing special about her. I'm not getting her."
2.) Bargaining. "That outfit's nice. And that one. I'll just get a few of her things for Edith. Edith can wear her clothes. Dorothy too. I don't need Maryellen."
3.) Anger: "I've read the books and why is she such a charming character?"
4.) Sadness. "eeeen I wasn't supposed to like you eeenn i am cry eeeeen"
5.) Acceptance. "Come on, Ellie-jelly. You're the newest member of the Gang. Meet Edith and Dorothy and be friends."

So I ended up getting her as my 35th birthday gift to myself along with some of her clothes, making her the fastest from "I hate you" to "let us snuggle and be friends" since Kit. This included her Pajamas at the standard cost of $24: a top, bottoms, and flat style slippers. A later trip I picked up her Hairstyling Set for $20: a set of twelve rollers, instruction card, storage bag, and sleeping bonnet. The eBay costs are not even being considered on this post. Go to AG, Go Directly to AG, do not pass eBay, do not spend $50. Seriously, it's been five months. Girls' variations on the pajamas exist for those that can fit into them; I am not one of those people.

Hairstyling set first because Ellie had her bonnet on and I took her curls down as I was taking the pictures.

Rambled Opinions and General Snarkiness: Bring On the 50's With Maryellen Larken! (and Oh Yeah, Some Modern Stuff)

I wasn't supposed to like you!

We've gotten leaks. We've gotten peeks. We've gotten books summaries and book titles and color schemes and debate about eye color and frustration over another Classic mold girl and pinned down eras and all that is good-good regarding the previously upcoming Historical. And now, we officially have her to buy and get--Maryellen Larkin, the first ever fully BeForever Historical Character. She's from the 1950s--an era overly characterized by the baby boomer children, housemakers in perfect dresses and pearls, and the start of widespread TV in the post WW2 Era. And the public rise of civil rights, which was not just limited to the 60s contrary to popular historical misinterpretation. After all, Brown vs. Board of Education was decided May 17, 1954--a touch before the books start.

I was not supposed to like her, you know. I really get so tired of white focused history that ignores PoC and other cultures to stick to the whitebread story. But as more came out about her character and how she actually swipes the veneer off the perfect plastic 1950s, I liked her more and more and, well....shit. I want her. Like, as a full character to be part of the gang. I don't have her just yet--I still need to decide if I'm going to get Grace directly to steal the wig and meet set from or if I want to wait until after the year is over and get a secondhand Grace. But I will probably be getting Maryellen eventually. Just not yet. Let's see what the holidays give me.

Maryellen's launch was the big deal this weekend, but AG, not wanting to have to wait til October for the moddie holiday launch got that shit out too, and I grabbed shots of it. And while I normally don't give a shit about Bitty Baby shit, I'm tossing this out for the record so folks can be knowing: the line got a full revamp, resulting in them removing most of the dolls available that had been released during the first revamp, releasing one new doll with red hair and hazel eyes,¹ changing the meet to offer three different meet sleepers, offering downloads, as well as slightly cheaper accessories. Bitty Baby is trying to stay hanging on and reasonable for people. 

My pictures have yellow tint all over, sorry. I may need to replace my digital camera. That or the AG lighting.

Rambled Opinions and General Snarkiness: Out With the Old, In With the Tru(ly Me)

AG but not Seattle.

Another new release of AG stuff, this past Thursday. Tiny in items--only about ten or so overall--but big in impact. Not to mention two other big BeForever Announcements that came through but, since I don't do short dinky posts I'll just bring them up here. Blog smarter, not harder.

Normally, I would haul buns to AG Seattle and take copious pictures of everything, and then blog crazy about it with said pictures. But I actually happen to be out of town, so I can't go to my local AG place. So I had to do the next best thing: go to AG Houston. I've been there a fair few times since it opened in 2012 since my mom and sister live nearby. So when I take my yearly trip to visit them, I go out there. My mom likes AG, and it's a nice trip for us. I went and took pictures, got a few things, and am ready to add my own opinions since y'all are here for that and I'm pretty good at it.

Jump below the cuts for hellos, good byes, and buttercream bookie goodness.¹