An early birthday present....

I've liked the cuteness of these little dolls for some time, in fact really since seeing them on Barbara's blog,  Dolls Garden  but it wasn't until I recently saw some of them 'in real life' that I decided that I would like to have one.  So when my husband asked me if there was a doll I'd like for my birthday, I asked if maybe I could have one of these.....the doll in question is a Wichtel by Rosemarie Müller.  Of course being the very kind and generous person he is, he said no probs, and told me to go ahead and order what I wanted!!!

So along comes this little sweetie from Villa le Bosquet in France.  She arrived safely on Thursday of last week and being the 'child' I am at heart, ;)  I couldn't wait to open her box.  She was packaged so nicely, her brown box is very 'natural' looking, sort of corregated brown cardboard, and then that box was wrapped in bright lime green paper.  The doll herself was peeping out through the cellophane front and she was safely tied in with strands of natural coloured rafia.  She was dressed in a very well made and pretty outfit, consisting of a check blouse with short puffed sleeves and rounded collar with real little buttons and buttonholes up the back, then she had a  pink fine needlecord pinafore over the top that did up with buttons and metal loops, and was decorated with an applique flower on one side at the bottom.  This too did up at the back with a tiny button.  Her knickers and socks were white and she had pink real leather Mary Jane shoes from the company Wagner in Germany.

These two photos are borrowed from the Villa le Bosquet website:

As you can see she has a blond wig which is styled into two plaits which are then wound up onto the top of her head and then tied with pink ribbons.  Her eyes are handblown glass eyes from the German company Lauscha.  I understand that these are considered to be the very best glass eyes on the market :)  She's such a nice sturdy little doll and stands very well without needing support, I'm very impressed with her!

In anticipation of her arrival, I decided to make her some overalls so that she could go and play as soon as she got here ;)  and so the next photos show her wearing those and the white short sleeved tee shirt that I also made.

The doll herself is one of a kind in that although the facemould is used on other dolls, the eyes/hair/outfit combination is only used the once.  And her given name is Neele.  I think I will keep that name as I am told it is actually a little flower.

I hope Neele will have lots of adventures here at our house and I look forward to sharing them with you here on my blog.

Have a great week everyone and I hope the sun shines where you are!

The new girl gets a dress...

I thought I'd better quickly make my new girlie a dress this morning as, firstly we were going out for lunch and I wanted to take her with me to show my friend who owns the restaurant.  She is another dolly lover, although not a 'collector' and enjoys seeing my dolls.  And secondly, if I didn't make something now, I knew the poor girl would be waiting for ages.

A couple of days ago I bought a little girls dress at Primark, the Irish clothing chain who are also here in Spain.  Their clothes are not always of the best quality, but their children's clothes are often really cute.....and I guess you get what you pay for.  The dress I bought, which is made of a nice blue chambray fabric with 'broiderie anglais' was only five euros and I should be able to get a couple more doll dresses out of it, which is great!

I used part of the dress for the 'skirt' part and I made the simple lined bodice with blue and white gingham.  I added four little white buttons to the bodice for added interest.

 And I took a couple of photos of her with Ellie, who was my first Little Darling.  You can get a much clearer idea of her skin tone in these photos:

And finally, because I just couldn't resist, here are some more of the 'new girl'....who still needs a name, something Spanish I think :)

 I hope you all have a lovely weekend and a great week ahead :)

A Little Darling cometh.....

Some of you may remember me mentioning a Dianna Effner Little Darling, that I've had on order for some time from the artist Lana Dobbs.  I ordered this little girlie back in March 2014 and was beginning to think she would never come home to me.  But lo and behold, some 26 (and a half!) months after I placed my order,  she has finally arrived and she is lovely.  Although I have to say that my photos were taken very quickly a couple of days ago in the middle of the evening, and I rushed to get them taken before I lost the light.....I was so keen to record her arrival on 'film'!

She is a tanned number 1 sculpt and I do believe that Lana is the only one of the artists who still tans the Little Darlings....and I'm not even sure if she still takes orders for tanned ones either.  But I had particularly wanted a tanned girl as I thought she would make the perfect little Spanish child, and I think you'll agree that she does.  Her colour is quite dark but my photos do not show this, even at 9pm at night, the light is bright enough that she looks paler than she actually is.  She has the most beautiful brown handpainted eyes, they have so much depth...I love how Lana creates her eyes, making them look so realistic and as if they are made of glass.  The eyelashes look so full and soft that you'd swear you could touch them with your finger and sweep them across....and yet they too are painted onto the vinyl doll.  Amazing!

Like the cobblers children lacking shoes, my poor girl hasn't a thing to wear as I didn't have time to make something....yes you read that right, 26 months waiting and I didn't get to make her anything in advance of her arrival!  Oh well, she arrived wearing knickers and it's so hot here now that I'm sure she's delighted not to have to wear anything :)

Apologies that the photos are a bit repetitive but I wanted to share how she looks in different light.

Here you can see just how real her eyelashes look, you'd swear they were applied rather than painted on!

 This last photo, taken inside, shows her colour more like it actually is.

Zwernase Art doll Suse

I love Zwergnase dolls, they have such interesting and characterful faces.  I have only ever owned two Juniors but have always enjoyed looking at the art dolls, but their prices have kept me from buying one.  That, plus the fact that I really don't like cloth parts on dolls.  However, I just happened to look on Marja Holstege's website and was smitten by a girl she had for sale on there.  The doll is question is called Suse and she is from 1996.  I decided to order her and she arrived yesterday from the Netherlands.

Suse is 65cm tall and is number 60 of 300 dolls made.  She has a human hair wig and blue hand painted eyes.  The art dolls nowadays come with German glass eyes but Suse, being from back in 1996 has painted eyes.  She is mostly vinyl but has cloth from just below her chest down to mid thigh and then there are small parts of cloth on her upper arms. 

Her default outfit consists of a grey knit short sleeved dress with another flowered knit dress with string shoulder straps over the top.  She has white knickers, black socks and the 'famous' Zwergnase black real suede boots.  She also has a small silver handbag but I've not taken that out of the packet yet.  She is signed by the artist on her 'stomach' and her release number is also handwritten there.

What I really fell in love with was her face though, she has the most goofy look about her which I liked instantly I saw her.  I know she won't be everyone's 'cup of tea' but I guess it would be a pretty boring world if we all liked the same, wouldn't it!!

Like a lot of the Zwergnase dolls, people say that 'this one' or 'that one' remind them of someone....and this girl is no exception.  As soon as I saw her out of her box she reminded me of someone I know and I was tempted to name her after that person, but have decided against it because I don't want to cause offence.  So for now I'm still thinking of a name for her.

Here are some quick photos I took yesterday when I removed her from her box:

A close up of her handpainted eyes:

I have since put her hair into two plaits and have been measuring her up to make patterns for her clothes.  I will take more photos once she has 'settled in' :)

Thank you for visiting, I hope you've enjoyed seeing  Suse and hope you are all having a great weekend :)

How did you get here?

I realised yesterday that somehow I had 10 of my Sasha family down here at the coast with me!  Now how did that happen?  I'm sure I only brought a few down here when we loaded the car to come to the coast for the summer.  I am assuming they must have made their own way down here by bus or maybe by the high speed Ave train! ;)

Anyway, here they all are, they wanted to show you their new outfits too, so I thought I'd take photos of them all, even those who aren't wearing anything new!

Here is a group shot:

L to R: Gabrielle, Eden, Willow, Skye, Wren, Teddy (in front), Devlin, Nuria, Stella and Bailey (trying another new wig)
 

I love how, despite having the same face sculpt, they all look so different because of how they have been painted.

I know that readers of my blog will have seen most of these kids before, but I thought I'd still share some closeups. 

Gabrielle is a late 70s Sasha Pink Dress but her eyes have been repainted by Shelly of Sasha Dolls UK and I added freckles and blush.  Her wig is by Mary Madeco Smith and is made of Tibetan Lambswool.
Her outfit is made by me and her shoes are by Marti Sanders Murphy.

Next up is Eden who recently joined us here in Spain from her previous home in the US.  She is a Sasha Gingham from 1970 and is wearing an outfit I made last year, plus boots by Ruth of Ruthsdolls:

Next we have a little newbie who slipped in last week having come to live here from her previous home in the UK.  Her name is Willow and she is from 1969.  She is wearing a lovely new smocked dress by Marilyn Hotchkiss, socks by me and shoes by Marti Sanders Murphy.  I have since changed her socks for white ones as I don't think these striped ones go well with this dress:

Next up is Skye, she is a 1969 Blond Sasha and is wearing another new outfit also made by Marilyn Hotchkiss.  The outfit is made up of a blouse, shorts and this lovely biscuit coloured pinafore over the top, so in effect could be two outfits :)  The socks are by me and shoes are again by the lovely  Marti Sanders Murphy and were a Christmas gift from my dear friend Louise who knew that I really liked mustardy yellow shoes :)   Although you can't see it very well in these photos, the blouse and shorts fabric has orange and yellow owls on it, so the shoes are a perfect match :)

Next we have Wren who is a 1969 Sasha Kilt.  She is wearing yet another new outfit, again by Marilyn, consisting of white shorts, blue and white 'angel' top and sun hat!  I love Wren in blue as it really brings out the colour of her eyes.  Her socks are by me and her shoes are by the late great Jean Jensen.

Next we have Wren's twin brother, Devlin.  Devlin is a 1969 Blond Pyjamas Gregor and poor lad doesn't have anything new to wear.....but I struggle to take off his blue hoodie as it matches his eyes perfectly!!!  His tee shirt, hoodie and denim cap were made by me, his brown cord trousers are Dollydoodles I believe and his shoes are by Boneka.

Squeezed in here is little Teddy!  Teddy is a Gotz Toddler Erik from 2001.  He is wearing striped dungarees and matching cap plus lemon knit tee shirt, all recently made by me especially for him and his shoes are by Lisa Hartley. 

My little redhead Nuria is up next and she is a Ballerina Sasha from 1968.  She is wearing an outfit that I made especially for her last week, consisting of bubble shorts and top.  The shorts are made from a lovely soft fine needle cord which I got from Finland.  I also used the fabric for decorating the top.  Her socks are also made by me and her boots are by Ruthsdolls.

Alongside Nuria we have Stella, the second little brunette girlie who arrived a couple of weeks ago from the US.  I think Stella is from late in 1969 but not completely sure on that.  Regardless, she is a little sweetie and is wearing a pretty three piece set by Passion for Sasha with yellow socks by me and leather shoes by Noreen Walters.

And last but by no means least is Bailey.  Bailey is my wigged ex Brunette Sasha from 1971.  Today she's trying out yet another wig  but will probably go back to one of her others tomorrow.  I am not overkeen on this look for her!   She is wearing white dungarees and navy and white gingham blouse and socks all made by me and her shoes are again by Jean Jensen.

Finally, some photos of groups together:

The boys, Teddy and Devlin:  (Cute teddy bear being held by Teddy, was a gift from the lovely Ginger!)

The Blonds:

Skye, Wren and Devlin:

 

Thanks so much for visiting with me and the Sasha gang.....I hope you've enjoyed seeing them all and hope you have a great 'rest of the week'!