An Update and some Little Darlings!

As some of you know from reading my blog, I had to sell a lot of my dolls over the last six months and, although I won't bore you with the details, things were not looking good for the rest of them either.  I managed to get rid of 54 dolls and sold all of Brian's trains (from his younger days!) on Ebay aswell...but finally things are looking up for us.  We have just this week sold our house, having signed the contracts on Wednesday night.  The house sale will hopefully be finalised in early September, so we will no longer have a home in Sevilla, but will live permanently on the coast here in Malaga Province.

On the one hand we are really pleased that the house sold so quickly as it's only been on the market for a couple of months, but on the other, so it is a very 'bittersweet' feeling, we have been really happy there and made some fantastic Spanish friends but needs must and we shall look forward to a new chapter of our lives starting from now.

Of course through all this, I've not only had very little time for my dolls, I've also been very lacking in interest....but just recently my interest is slowly coming back and so I decided to take some photos of the dolls who, luckily I was able to keep!!!  So first up are the Little Darlings and my one Boneka girl.  I changed them into summer clothes as it's so hot here and the poor girls were melting in their winter outfits!!  So without further ado.....

Left to Right:

Rory (Lana Dobbs), Reece (UFDC Factory girl enhance by me), Ellie (Dianna Effner), Gem (Dianna Effner), Nikola (Nellie Valentino) 

 The three number 1 sculpts:

 

The two number 2 sculpts:

A few close ups.....

I really love these girls' faces but I find their posing is really very, very limited.  They are elastic strung dolls but unlike the Sasha dolls, who are also strung with elastic, the Little Darlings do not pose very naturally, they are rather 'wooden'....I guess I just put up with it because the do look so sweet!!

I hope you've enjoyed seeing some of the girls who survived my dolly cull, I hope to share some of the others who've stayed really soon.

Have a lovely weekend everyone and thank you for visiting!

Big hugs Sharon xx

 
 

A Little Bit of Sewing....

Just a short post today!

Last week I did a bit of sewing for the Boneka Tuesday's Child sized dolls.  These dolls are designed by Dianna Effner and are all vinyl with five joints.  They are also almost exactly the same size as the Yosd sized BJDs so I have a lot of patterns that I can use!

I made these two outfits for a friend and they are winging their way to the UK as I type.  Sorry for the poor quality photos, they were taken on my iphone.

However, before the outfits left I tried them on my two Fairyland Little Fees, and despite the Little Fees being slightly slimmer in the torso, I think the fit is good on them too :)

The girls actually look a bit sad that I wouldn't let them keep the new clothes, don't they!  I guess I'd better get sewing and make them something new.....as if they haven't got enough clothes already!!!!

Apart from that, a couple of new BJDs are in the pipeline but that's for another post.

I hope you've all had a lovely weekend and that the weather is good where you are, and hope the week ahead is even better!

Big hugs
Sharon xx

Dianna Effner sculpted dolls.....

The weather has been awful for the last week and as a result all the photos that I intended taking, didn't get taken.  So I decided to have a look through my photo 'archives' and post some of my favourites here.  I apologise in advance to those of you who've seen these before, I hope you'll forgive me but I don't want to get behind with my blog posts again and ruin my 'New Years Resolution' of posting more often :)

Starting off with my little Tuesday's Child Daniela by Boneka, sculpted by Dianna Effner.  She is ready to do some modelling for me as I'm going to be making a couple of outfits in this size, hopefully starting this coming week :)  Isn't she a cutie!  I sometimes think her curls are a little bit too large for her face and that I might trim them a bit....then I remember that I'm NOT a hairdresser!!! ;)  The outfit below, I made for my YOSD sized BJDs but it fits her perfectly.

And here she is again in her default outfit, with a straw sunhat that I added to keep the sunshine off her face:

Next we have Ellie, a #1 sculpt, who I'm sure most of you know by now as she has been on here so often!  For those who don't know her though, she is a Little Darling handpainted by Dianna Effner.  Her beautiful eyes, which look like glass, are actually painted layer by layer to achieve this wonderful look.  Ellie arrived in May 2014, the first of my Little Darlings to come and live here.

It's hard to believe that her eyelashes, both upper and lower, are actually painted on too....they look like they must be applied lashes, don't they!

Another of my Little Darlings, this one is a #2 sculpt or 'Asian sculpt' and is also sculpted and handpainted by Dianna Effner.  I call her Gem, she came to me secondhand from an old friend in the US back in April 2015....l love this girl too!!!

Next we have another of my sweet Little Darlings, Nikola, another #1 sculpt, this time handpainted by Nelly Valentino in September 2015.  She had a twin who went to live in Switzerland last year, but I kept Nikola as she was my favourite of the two.

Below we have Rory, another #1 sculpt, who is a tanned Little Darling handpainted by Lana Dobbs....I waited so long for this girl, 26 months, that I thought I'd never warm to her!!  But she is so cute that she is still here, having arrived in June 2016!  Although I've not taken that many photos of her, I've no idea why!  I suppose it's a bit like 'first child' syndrome, the first baby always seems to have loads and loads of photos taken of it....as in the case of Ellie who was my first Little Darling, whilst the others only get their pics taken as an 'afterthought'!!

And an extra photo of Rory in the rain because she's been so neglected!!!

Finally we have Reece who is the only one of my Little Darlings that isn't handpainted by  Dianna or one of her artists.  She is factory painted but I enhanced her a little by adding some finishing touches to her face.  Despite her not being an 'artist' doll, I still love her as much as the other four :)   She is a #2 sculpt and came here in September 2014, my second Little Darling to arrive if I remember rightly. 

 
I hope you've enjoyed seeing my Dianna Effner sculpted dolls again, and apologies that these photos aren't new, but I thought 'old' was better than nothing at all :)   I will try to get more photos of my dolls once the weather improves :)

I hope you all have a great week ahead and that if you're having problems with your weather too, it soon improves :)

Big hugs Sharon x

Little Boneka girl....

I just took some photos of my sweet little Tuesday's Child doll, Daniela, who is sculpted by Dianna Effner and handpainted and released by Boneka. 

I made this outfit some years ago and just thought I'd try it on her, I think she looks very cute in it and it fits perfectly.  The only thing missing are the socks, which I couldn't fit on with these trainers/sneakers.

A close up of her sweet little face :)

Thank you for visiting!  I hope everyone has a great weekend and that the week ahead is good for you too!

Pretty Maids all in a row....my Dianna Effner family

I just realised that I forgot to post these photos that I took the other day of my Little Darlings and my little Boneka Tuesday Child.  I took them especially for my blog, and then put them elsewhere and that was it!

So here are some photos showing all the girls together and some showing the same sculpts together.  I have to say that I was glad no-one had a camera on me when I was taking these photos.  I put some artificial grass down on the deck next to the fence, then I put an old sheet on the ground to lie on.  So far so good.  But my dogs decided that the artificial grass was for them, so they go and sit on it.  Right in front of where I wanted to pose my dolls.  I got down on the ground and started lining the dolls up.  Lucy decides that she wants to get between them and the camera, then she wants to lay on her back and push her chest into my face for tickles.  Then three of the Chihuahuas decided to run up my back, Choco started to dig into my hair, Yoda went up the back of my skirt and in the process pulled my skirt right up over my waist so revealing my 'not so sexy' knickers to the world.  And then the dolls started to fall like dominoes!

Honestly the lengths we go to to take photos of our dolls....thank goodness we're not overlooked is all I can say!

All the girls together, left to right:

Gem (#2 sculpt by Dianna Effner), Daniela (Boneka Tuesday's Child), Antonia (#1 sculpt by Nelly Valentino), Nikola (#1 sculpt by Nelly Valentino), Ellie (#1 sculpt by Dianna Effner), Reece (#2 sculpt UFDC factory painted) and Finn (#2 sculpt by Pat Green)

A closer look at the line up:

The #1 sculpt girls: 

The #2 sculpt girls:

And finally some photos of Antonia in her new outfit that came from a French seamstress in Germany!  The outfit consists of the dress which is half knitted and then a fabric 'skirt' attached and the hat.  I added the apple green spotted socks myself, to go with the green flowers on the skirt fabric.

Thank you for looking, I hope you all have a lovely week :)

Just like buses...

Well we've all used the expression "just like buses" in the dolly world and sure enough now it's my turn.  I don't usually like receiving new dolls one after the other with just a few days between their arrivals but sometimes even with the best of planning, it can happen.

The Iplehouse doll I showed yesterday, as I mentioned then, was held up a month in Spanish Customs (boo, hiss) but this little doll who arrived here on Saturday I've actually been hoping to nab for about 8 months or so.  The little doll in question is a Tuesday's Child doll by Boneka, sculpted by Dianna Effner.  I'd wanted one as a little sister for my Little Darlings but each time one came up on ebay so they either went very high or they were being sold in the US and I would prefer to buy within the EU.  Anyway, about 6 months ago I spoke with the owner of a doll store in France who told me that they were waiting on an order from Boneka which was due in 'later in the summer' so I decided to wait.  And lo and behold, last week I received their newsletter to say that the dolls had arrived!!!! 

I was really fortunate to nab one quickly as the store only received about 20 or so of them, and they were sold out in little over an hour!  And I'd just like to mention that this particular doll store, Un Bonheur de Colibri are brilliant, so helpful and their customer service is second to none!  They shipped the following day and the doll arrived really quickly from France!

So here she is, her name is Daniela and she is number 2 of a limited edition of 2.  She has handpainted features, with blue/green eyes and pale pinky lips.  Her wig is human hair.  She is about 25cm tall and has the same joints as the Little Darlings, (neck, shoulders and hips).  She's so cute with her little chubby cheeks and pretty blond curls, and I really do think she looks like a little sister to my bigger girls!  This is the outfit by Boneka that she came in, including socks and shoes.

Daniela borrowed her big sisters sunhat as it's been very hot here and she didn't want to burn her head! ;)

With her big sisters and cousins, Ellie, Finn, Gem and Reece:

 With her sisters, Finn and Reece:

I think she'll fit in really well here, I have a ton of patterns in this smaller size and she's already asking for more summer clothes...I can see myself being busy when I get a break from sewing my commission work!

Thanks for looking and for welcoming little Daniela!