Rambled Opinions and General Snarkiness: New Tones, Veggie Stands, and No Driving with Cell Phones: The Summer 2018 AG Release Two Months Late

When you go on a trip, you don't blog.

AG's most recent new stuff came out in mid-June. And new stuff is probably going to come out in a few weeks to cover the holiday spreads. Why am I just now getting to the new clutter? Well let's see.

A week or so after my last blog post, I set my online life down and prepped to head out of town for about three weeks in the Lake Michigan area. I spent those three weeks with family, including a full fledged family reunion--and while I do take my laptop with me for long trips and mess with my social media, I don't really blog there because I'm generally either busy enjoying festivals and fairs or just enjoying spending time with family. Look, I have one living grandparent and one living parent, I get all the time with them I can and I actually half unplug from the internet. I got back mid-August, had to handle some other stuff, then after this weekend of getting my brains rebrained I moved the pics I'd taken off my phone and onto the computer to start this opinionation about AG stuffs. And here we are. August is hot, I can't go outside because the air is hazy¹ and so it's a good day to blog.

Before I do, all the AG News that's worth my time and maybe yours: now with opinions from Yours Truly, Me!²

1) That new Molly coming out? She might be a Costco only exclusive; in which case I might end up with a not!Molly just to get that sweet new meet. We'll see. The glasses are apparently plastic. Welcome to the new age.

Adieu, adieu, to yieu and yieu and yieu.

2) The news has gone out about modern collection retirements. At the end of 2018, Tenney-Sue is retiring and taking Nogan with her! Good riddance, you two, I'll get what little I need before year's out.

...and also, Gabriela and Z are retiring. Well. Gabriela I knew would eventually: she got two whole years, she's not been in stores much since Luciana came out, and she was due to leave eventually. Z, on the other hand....Z got boned. Outright screwed over by AG. And I have my personal theories why.

Z is a victim of Tenney's Shadow.

AG was planning for Tenney to be the girl of the year in 2017, quietly extending the line of white and white IDing Girls of the Year out even further than they had (with Lea as a little speedbump of ambiguous brownness). They hyped Melody early in 2016 as the new historical after MaryEllen, getting ready to make a big deal about all the good research they'd done for her time period and all the black people they'd consulted. But then there was public media call out in 2016 on CBS which pointed out both the retirements of Cécile and Ivy and how there had never been a black GotY--in fact, that out of the twenty-odd character dolls created only three had ever been black and none of them had been modern. And the company backpedaled. AG snatched #46 out of the moddie line, made her their new GotY and had her first book written in a few months, and tossed together something quickly to get that Black GotY out.

But there they were with a whole collection's worth of a modern white girl, complete with fancy earrings and a big stage to perform on. The stuff was already being made and had been. They weren't going to just let millions of dollars worth of product catch dust for a year, would they? Hell no. They had stories about songwriting girls from Tennessee to get out while people might still remember that Taylor Swift once sang country. They were not going to take that L on Tenney Grant.

So they created the contemporary line as an excuse to get Tenney released anyways. They had Tenney and Nogan--who we were already getting leaks about as early as summer or so 2016--wait six weeks and then released them under their new line to make it like they had totes planned to just make a new line of modern dolls. They created Z from their online Stop-Motion blogs, and got her together a quickie collection they could release a few months after Tenney--see, we're totally just making a non-limited GotY line! They even kept Gabbi out longer, to make that whole Choose Your Character a big deal--and tossed in Felicity and Nanea as well, to make it very clear that they were going gung-ho with pushing out six characters in only eight months.

But now that Tenney's had her little spotlight and all her stuff and Nogan have been out long enough that they can pretend they weren't going to make her a one-year thing, they're pulling her like they planned. And Z? Well, not only was poor Z the named face³ of the permapanties fiasco, but she had done her job of helping push the illusion that Tenney wasn't just GotY 2017 but held back for six weeks. She's gotta go too, or we can't keep this lie up.

Alas poor Z. You were done so wrong.

3) AG opened a new outlet store! It's in Hershey, PA and thus the air smells like Deth Food. AG would put their outlet in the one city I would probably puke my guts out in. Then again, when will I ever be in PA? They sell some old stuff, some exclusives that may show up oneBay or online or something--I only like a shirt or two--and moddie dolls! For full price. Hah you thought outlet stores were cheap always? Nope.

4) There has been some noted changes in production in recent dolls. The most noticable, if you notice doll eyes a lot, is that the eyes have changed their design since Luciana's release. Instead of the large metal weights in the back and a slight hollow behind the eyes, and clear plastic as the base, the eyes are now a different weight style and made of solid white so the white pegs can be visible. The change in weight leads to some dolls having a downcast, off center eye look, more visible eye whites at the sides and when the eyes are closed, and trouble when eye swaps are done. I've only gotten one new doll since the change⁴--Luciana, who I had to really have the eye whites pointed out to me recently, and had to look in with a flashlight to see the white pegs. So I have no first hand knowledge of the new eyes. I have seen some images of a wig swap gone wrong with vinyl peeled up, with and cracked and "squished" vinyl accompanied with hands pushing so hard the white person's fingertips are white from pressure, so I'm leaning away from that.

Has the production design changed? Yeah. Could parts of it be improved? From sources I know well and trust enough not to throw a fit: sure could. Would I like this to be looked into? Sure.

Is blowing up every IG post with the same four words helping? Hell naw. Cause this is what AG's comments on the official IG account  have looked like for about a month:

AG Official IG account: This month our monthly book is one of Gabby's! Read along with us!
Twenty people in the comments: bring back the quality!!

AG: It's Friendship Day, Tag a friend you're happy to have! 
The same twenty people in the comments: my friend says bring back the quality!!

AG: It's Campfire Day with Maryell--
Those Same twenty people in the comments again: bRiNg BaCk ThE qUaLiTy!!!!!11!!!!eleventy! WE HATE YOU FIX THE QUALITY BRING BACK THE QUALITY QUALITY WE HAVE SIGNED A PETITION TO ADDRESS OUR GRIEVANCES EMAIL THIS TO THE CEO HERSELF 

Hey, kids and kidlike adults? You're not helping. One bit. Take it from someone who used to work for a large corporation who got a lot of correspondence insisting their feedback go right to the CEO: The CEO is not looking at these comments on IG.⁵ You can scream "we will be HEARD" in the comments until you've basically tripped the spam filters, but Marketing isn't even reading those comments. You're spamming the mentions of a Customer Service rep who, after about the fifteenth comment she's read while trying to ask about National Brownie Day to make her 10 bucks an hour, is wondering if she really can't ask IG for a mute function like Twitter has.

Y'all will not get heavy weighted eyes back this way, even if they do come back. You're just being a ass.⁶ Customer service can take your feedback, and forward it on, and like the permapanties I suspect that enough complaints are likely to get things fixed on some form even if it's not back to what it was like before. But flooding the IG comments won't change things faster. Send your data once, be clear and polite and articulate your exact problems, then let it be. CS can't change the eyes themselves. They won't port your e-mails or comments to the CEO. They just can forward your feedback and hope that it gets up the chain so they can stop hearing about it and get back to the other parts of the job.

And yes, I know what the complaints about permapanties did to change the lines. I also know that those got a ton of noted media attention. The permapanty controversy made People's website. A change in eye weights and the vinyl being squishier haven't so far. Maybe you should try sounding less like a nine year old who just discovered they could copy paste comments on social media.

Onto the shiny things, with their wonky eyeballs and all. And enjoy long pics until I get a better digital camera. I'm not changing the aspect ratio on my phone for my general blather.

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: Nanea and The Historicals, or Four Months Late Ain't Shit When History Is Far Away

Aloha, Nanea!

*Gets up* 
*Gets back on horse* 
*Horse is dusty* 
*Gets off horse* 
*Gives horse a dusting* 
*Gets back on horse*

Okay. This is what I'm going to try to do, my loves and adorables, to get things back into a steady pace. I haven't done any rambled opinions on the old shit, we've got like two weeks before a whole slew of new shit comes out, and I really should get the old shit yammered about in some form before that.

Today, we do Nanea and The Historicals. Wednesday, we do the Contemporaries and the Wellies. Friday, we do the Moddie Shit. Giftmas, I'll just do a big damn post of All the Shit That's Fit To Blog About covering everything cool and good that has happened in My Dolly World since then. Then next Wednesday, we can talk about news and things that I've missed, in prep for the new shit.

S'all right? S'all right.

To Nanea and the Historicals. I've made you wait too long.

Rambled Opinions and General Snarkiness: The BeForever Activations, Moddies on Parade, And Those Two Damn White Kids Again

Dump Tenney, Buy Gabby.

So last weekend, I hauled my buns to AG Seattle, got pictures of everything, and then spent the week listening to Talking Simpsons podcasts and working on replacing my braids. Because I really really don't like Tenney-Sue and Nogan. The new Historical stuff? The new moddie stuff? That I'm excite for, even Julie's Potty and Accoutrements in a way. But I really just look at those two white kids and roll all two of my eyes and the inner one too and make retching sounds in a way I did for Wonderbread. I swear to fuck. Le Sigh. Anyways, I am going to behave and get this done so that I can stop having it hovering over my head like so much miasma.

This release includes some BeForever, Truly Me stuff, Wellie Wishers, Bitty Baby Shit that I don't fux with, and Those Two Damn White Kids. And if you don't like me calling them Those Two Damn White Kids, then you are on the wrong fucking blog, not even sorry to tell you the exit is available for you to go through. This place is for my opinions, and my opinions involve hating Them Two, and the fact that I manage to edit even a single fact about Nogan The Face And Spotlight Thief on the AG Wiki without leaving "reason for edit" as "FUCK YOU AND THE DRUM SET YOU RODE IN ON" is a testament to my goddamn professionalism on that project, heaux and foes. So you will give me this or you will eat unpleasant ham and catch a butt boil right at the top of the crack of your ass. I'm that bitchy woman your momma warned you about.¹

Take the cut.

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---

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: '15 Summer Launch with BF Bedtime, Grace by Space, and Modern Comforts

Just because we don't get along doesn't mean I can't frame you well, Samantha Parkington.

It took me a bit to handle the new shit. The weekend right after the new launch I went to the mall that has my comic books but not AG stuff as well as a festival, and since the Bae does the driving we can go to one mall a weekend if they're in opposite directions from each other, and they are. Look, I don't argue with the conservation of gas. Save the Planet. So instead I went to AG on the 3rd, spent the 4th burning things in the name of AMERICA, and the 5th complaining that it's too damned hot to type. It's still too damned hot. I think I brought the Texas Weather back with me to the PNW. But I'm at least in a position to get my blog on for you, the eager consumers of my content and happy audience--and if you're here to be a hater, then hate on, I don't give a fuck sweetie.

AG is getting fairly good about their social media presence, even if I'm still unable to interact wholly with their FB page.¹ Not only was the Spring Fling given leaks on Pinterest (which I hate to deal with) and Instagram (which I like dealing with), so was this Summer launch, giving us eager buyers and collectors an idea what was up and coming. Even if I pretty much knew a huge amount from scoop fairies and unethical eBay sellers selling factory seconds that folk be finding, that doesn't mean that everyone does, and I like to see how AG pushes their own hype. Which is why I hate hate hate comments on posts like AG, Monster High, and Ever After High media posts that are all "we already know this is on the way and the name of that character and her monster parent and blah blah blah give us something new."² Companies have their own way of announcing things and building up marketing for their products, and it's not by you finding leaks of shit on line and spreading it among your little small media circles to the point you're bored already when they start talking. Not everyone knows everything already from leaks and dig ups and is in the loop like that. Don't be a fucking killjoy about new stuff to people that maybe haven't seen it. It's arrogant, rude, and dickish. Don't be a dick.

This summer release comes right on the very heels of  the Truly Me Revamp--only about a month later, in fact. This is because, come August, Caroline sails away to the big Archival Vault and Maryellen pops out and that is going to be the thing to sit in the spotlight and the book set I'll buy immediately. Ah, I remember when Addy was launched and she only got her first three books and the rest came in the next spring and there was nothing to be done but wait on the entire second half of her story. Be glad you little cheeky baubles get things much more upfront now.

To the shiny things!

Rambled Opinions and General Snarkiness: '15 BeForever Spring Fling with Modern Add Ons

Addy forever slaying these ButterCream and Wonderbread Heaux.

All right, it's the American Girl Spring Fling Release! Some leaks came out a few days ago on Pintrest, which I saw and had early squeal. I only have a Pintrest account because there's no damned way to get links to interesting things without one. I still use my bookmarks, I know, what. (Ignore they need to be cleaned as much as my damn non-virtual bookshelves.) I went up to AG Seattle last weekend--tea with friends if you've seen my Instagram account--so I won't get to go back until next week at probably the earliest. Official shots it is. Also, gods bless the other admin of the AG Wiki, Akaikaze, who swoops in and gets all the new stuff up fresh and hot while I'm still having mini fits over doll scissors and chickens. This release was a lot of BeForever and some Spring stuff for the Moddies. With some Bitty shit but lol Bitty Shit, I ain't here for that, my Polar Bear not withstanding. 

Since I probably won't post tomorrow, I want to announce this as well: Tomorrow is the one-year anniversary of the opening of American Girl Collectors. What a year it's been! I thought when I started this blog that my time in a huge fandom space was behind me, and the board launch would ultimately be tiny space dwarfed by the looming power of AG Playthings and their chaos. Now we have almost 350 members and a bunch of active ones, and together we've build a beautiful, safe, exciting community of people with open minds and lots of full discussion. We've talked about everything from the launch of BeForever to the still lingering remnants of WonderBread; instructions on rewigging and body fixes to how to pop the eyes out of a head; we're bringing back DollerDay, and of course there the heartwarming tale of The AGC Cousins, Lightning in a Bottle. Boom, Starzz, and I couldn't have done this alone without the people there that keep us a community. If you haven't joined already and you're of age, what's keeping you? Run on and join the lovely chaos.¹

To the new stuff. Some of these images are the larger Pintrest shots because no need in double saving images.

Rambled Opinions and General Snarkiness: BeForever: Dropping It Like It's Hot

Bring in the new noise, bring in the funk!¹

It's been a wild ride for the AG fandom in 2014 regarding the Historical line. We've heard since February that Samantha Parkington, the Pretty Princess of American Girl, was on her way out of the AG Vault like a Disney animated flick. We've heard of the end of the Best Friends Line and the way it screwed Marie-Grace, Cécile, and Ivy over. (Oh and Ruthie. But eh, whatever.) We've seen people whine about the historical accuracy of items and cite the 1940s and black and white pictures to say that color wasn't invented before 1970 like they're Calvin's daddy--you know who you are--and the terribleness of them without actually seeing the stuff out and mewl that Addy's skin is lighter--hat tip it's not any lighter than it was on August 27th. (ETA: Proof from someone who got Addy and BF Addy a day apart can be seen here at Lissie and Lilly: BeForever Addy vs Original Addy Comparison ) We've had happy squeal, new book covers and book rebundling, mini spoilers, eBay leaks, and videos on the official AG Youtube leaking images to us and revving us up for the new looks. We've seen the hype and smelled the haterade. And now, we have the official Launch of BeForever. *trumpets and confetti* Whoo, BeForever!

What's BeForever? Have you been under a damn rock for the past several months? Oh, no, you're new to AG fandom somehow. All right, I'll play nice for a sec. Basically, BeForever is a rebranding of the Historical line to make the characters of the past appeal to the hip youth of today--what with their touch tablets and Internets and cell phones and iPods and hip hop and Wonderbread Girls of the Year. Out go best friends--Cécile and Marie Grace included, alas we hardly knew ye--and in place returns Samantha as the backbone of support for this new launch, since AG has relied on her for the launch of new things. The Historical characters all got new meet outfits except two: Kaya--who really can't get much of a change in wardrobe since her era is pretty stuck in the past; and Caroline, but she's only been out for two years so we're letting it slide. There's outfits inspired by the meet outfits--both loosely and pretty close--and new items, and the books have adapted into a new form. And many things changed--but many stayed the same. Sort of like the line is advertising again.

Yesterday, the whole thing dropped. After seeing things online at 10 pm my time--two hour diff from AG's headquarters--and losing half my shit at AGC, a buddy of mine and I went to AG Seattle and squealed the hell out and I lost the other half of my shit. I snapped a bunch of pictures and then got several things to bring home. I wondered in June if my body was ready and OH NO IT WAS NOT. There's so many new things and if I were a rich girl with a house large enough for everything I would have gotten the world of stuff. As it is, I came home with a decent amount, and will be doing reviews on the newness later.

This post is about all the shiny good-good and new hotness--including the All New and Semi-Improved Samantha. Pics are all my own pictures taken at the store--some of mine are off center, I was too busy jumping around in excite. I'm already excite about something else in AG fandom (if you're part of AGC you'll know what) and so the last week and change has been an utter crazy whirlwind of ups and downs and swings and swirls. I tend to have a lot more feels on historical things than moddy stuff, so this is a long ass post. I had to start the post, go to sleep, wake up, finish it, and then back time it. There will also be handfuls of animated gifs so if those bother you, take that into account. I know photo sensitivity since I have it, and warnings are appreciated.

Before I start into this all new Historical minty freshness and the new hotness in the streets for the young jeezies, a mini rant. We already have a stupid split between PC stuff and Mattel stuff hovering around and stinking up the place like spoiled Similac formula. It's irritating and annoying and people should slip into the sea for it. We don't need another split. The first split is terrible and I really can't stop it except to hiss at people. But we can prevent prefixes on titles right now.  Don't do it. Don't do it. I swear to the gods, fandom, if you make "pre-BeForever" a thing like "pre-Mattel" I'll find ways to make you hurt like I rammed glass and Legos in the soles of your feet. I will curse you to never find the last item you need in your Molly collection in a sensible price range and for your first edition Kirsten to develop silver eye and you to never find a person to do an eye swap to keep her soft lashes and for your favorite girl to get a mysterious stain on her cheek that won't come off without a full head replacement. Consider this my preemptive strike against your stupid smelly failure. Also the old stuff isn't coming back, BeForever is the way things are from now on. You can't have the old looks, the NOLA girls are gone, Pleasant Rowland wasn't the Lord Goddess of Historical accuracy by a long shot, and there's not going to be any return to the past of how you want AG to be or plaid dresses for Samantha no matter how many likes your ill punctuated mewling little wet pants baby rants on the AG Facebook page and Instagram filtered Samantha selfies get. Stop being an irritating little buttboil on Facebook and move on. I have worked customer service and the people having to reply to these things are both sighing in irritation and laughing at you. You're now in the file of "stupid jackass customer." Ahem.

We're starting with Addy, of course. She's my first girl--and the best.

Historical Clothes Reviews: Rebecca's Hanukkah Dress and LE Mini Doll

Marisol doesn't celebrate Hanukkah, but she does celebrate nice clothes.

Yesterday was Yule--which is my religious holiday as an eclectic pagan. The Winter Solstice is the longest night of the year, and many pagans celebrate with bonfires, holly and ivy, keeping the lights on, and reminding ourselves that though the darkness seems long and endless, from this day on the circle gets brighter and the days get longer. Celebrate the reason for the season--Our Lady of Darkness Persephone spending the winter with her husband and lover, Hades, in the Underworld.¹

Among my gang of AG girls, I have a major pagan and her younger sister, a faithful Roman Catholic, several nominal Christians, A gang member who feels Episcopalian, and some that really don't give a shit about Christianity beyond the cultural influence. However, I don't have any Jewish or Muslim girls. I have a mild fascination with Judaism the same way I have one with Islam or Catholicism, in that I like to study and learn about faiths not my own. I already know enough about Protestant/Non-denominational Christianity, being raised in it partially, and eventually chose to make a deconversion in my 20s. I own a copy of the Tanakh and read it in college, and will probably read it again, especially if I eventually have a Jewish gang member. But I don't purport to know everything about the faith.

American Girl was pretty lackluster on the Jewish front for some time. At first all they had was a Hannukah outfit and accessories which, despite a reformation at one point, have hung on through the years--and been misused by many people.² Then there was Lindsey Bergman, Girl of the Year 2001-2002 who had one book which mentions that her older brother is having his bar mitzvah. Her traits are more like what TV Tropes calls Informed Judaism: a marker here and there but nothing really Jewish, more Jewish in opposition to Christianity. Then in 2009 after the removal of Pretty Princess 'Mantha, we got her replacement: Rebecca Rubin, a Russian-Jewish girl living in post-Titanic era New York City. Rebecca wasn't just nominally Jewish: her family keep the traditions and so does she and while she is only one example of living Jewish in Eastern Immigrant America era, she does it in a lovely way. I did pick up "Rebecca" soon after she came out, but only to customize into another historical I had planned as she was the perfect look for the job. And since Marisol Luna--my pretty Latina dancer--had started to find a love of early 1900s clothes, I gave her Rebecca's meet wear and started getting Rebecca's clothes for her here and there. Rebecca feels a major level of awkwardness in the US and the pressure to assimilate to the dominant faith by her peers. One of Rebecca's books that best show her discomfort is Candlelight for Rebecca, where she and her classmate Rose try to explain to the teacher that they don't want to participate in making Christmas decorations, but are told by the teacher that since Christmas is a national holiday, everyone celebrates it, and thus pushed into doing things that don't make her feel right or comfortable.³ Rebecca's grandparents assure her that she is free to feel discomfort and not want to do Christmas things, because Christmas is a Christian holiday, and tell the signifigance of and celebrating it in America freely, and it all works out for her.

For Hanukkah, Rebecca has a dress she loves wearing for the holidays, and it is quite relevant to her stories. Rebecca's Hanukkah Dress consists of a a purple striped dress with white sleeves and collar, a woven embroidered hairbow, cream tights, and cream shoes; the set was released the September after her release and just in time for the holidays. The current cost is $32 direct from AG--it was $28 when it came out, but costs rising and all. It's on eBay, and most of the prices are not a good one. Why are you on eBay for this? Just buy it from AG. I paid Gift for it--that is, in a holiday swap this was gifted to me.

Since I don't have Rebecca, Marisol Luna will be modeling Rebecca's wear for you, but they share face molds so it works. Marisol would have had three clothes changes, but Tara and I came to an understanding. My Marisol is a lot like book!Marisol, with the noted traits here of being a little ditzy, a touch snippy, allergic to chocolate, in love with Disney princesses, and beautiful with languages. And also being Felicity's first crush here, because she looks like a Latina version of Felicity's Dear Elizabeth. Like the others, this review contains LE Mini Rebecca.