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

More sewing in the sunshine....

Today I made this little knit fabric dress for the Little Darlings.  It's going to America with all the Sasha outfits I finished last week, so my friend will be getting a nice big package soon...I hope she'll like all the outfits.

I used a pair of child's new leggings for the main part of the dress and the back of the pockets are a contrasting fabric from a new child's dress.  The socks are dark pink and white stripes.

Today's model is Gem, my newest Little Darling #2 sculpt, handpainted in 2010 by Dianna Effner.  She worked very  hard in the sunshine and as a result caught the sun across her nose and cheeks! 

Another package!

It would seem that like buses, packages tend to come all at once, if this week has been anything to go by!

I have been waiting on a package from the US and it was posted on the 10th April.  I'd hoped that it'd take about ten days.....but as I've probably said a million times on here before, Spanish customs, like customs everywhere I'm sure, are a law unto themselves...literally!  So the parcel was finally released from their custody last weekend and I expected the it to arrive with me on Monday, particularly when I saw that the tracking showed the status as "in the delivery system", that usually means delivery is imminent.  So I waited and waited, as we do when anything 'dolly' is involved, but no package arrived.  Spanish tracking remained the same but later in the day I received an update from USPS to say that an attempt had been made to deliver the parcel at 9.16am  and they would try again later in the day.  Well to cut a long story short....so as not to  bore any of my readers with my continuing sagas with parcels from the US, the parcel had indeed been in the delivery system, but in a town hundreds of kilometres away in Miraflores, Madrid!!!!!  This particular town had one number different to ours in their postcode and for some reason the parcel went there!  Luckily it had to be signed for and the mistake was noticed and after a bit of a palavar the parcel finally arrived here at about 5.30pm on Wednesday!!!  Oh, and in case you're wondering, yes I did get caught for customs, but luckily just 24 euros!!!

So my lovely new girlie had arrived!!!!  The girl in question is another Little Darling, this time a number 2 sculpt and painted by Dianna Effner herself.  I was fortunate enough to be asked by a friend in the US if I was interested in adopting her lovely girl and because the price was just so good, I went for it!  Never mind the fact that the doll is just lovely too of course!

So here she is, she came in the black bobbed wig but I've changed it for the Monique Gold Roxie, I think the colour is Brown/Black so it's a little softer than the solid black she was wearing.  I think she looks quite Asian which I'm really happy with as my other two girls who are the same sculpt do not have that same look.   I've not dressed her yet, she is still in the knickers and petticoat that she arrived in but hopefully very soon she'll be going through the clothes box and borrowing something from the girls.....just until I can make her her own outfits.

She is from November 2010, so an older girl and she's really lovely....although I admit that I'm prejudiced!!!

All she now needs is a name........

Thanks for looking!  I hope you all have a lovely weekend!

Springtime for the Little Darlings....

My three Little Darlings by Dianna Effner, have been enjoying the spring sunshine.  I thought I'd share some photos of these lovely girlies....

L to R: Ellie, #1 sculpt painted by Dianna Effner and wearing an outfit made by me, Finn, #2 sculpt painted by Pat Green and also wearing an outfit made my me, and Reece, #2 sculpt factory painted UFDC souvenir Ana, wearing a Betsy McCall dress by Robert Tonner:
All wigs cut and style by me :)

My beautiful Ellie with her newly repainted eyes by Dianna Effner:

Sweet little Finn:

Cousins, Ellie and Finn:

Ellie, Finn and Reece:

I hope you've enjoyed seeing these Little Darlings of mine :)

Especially for Auntie Ronny!

No, sorry Ronny, not a photo of Kara, my Chihuahua, but of Reece, my UFDC Little Darling, wearing her 'special' Volkswagen tee shirt (made by TTYA) for you to see :)  She says she knows it's not a Beetle on the front, but a cute VW van instead!  She hopes you like it!

 

She likes to wear it with her skinny jeans by Becky Colvin.....

 

Her "mummy made" well worn denim jacket......

 

 And her red cable knitted beanie hat by Maisiedoats.....

She thinks she's "Super Cool!"

Sorry for the poor photos, I took them inside with flash today. :/

Introducing Reece.....a UFDC 'Companion' Doll...Photo heavy!!! :)

The UFDC (United Federation of Dolls Clubs) held their annual conference in San Antonio, Texas, back in July and Dianna Effner was spotlighted at the event.   The souvenir doll, along with the 'companion' doll for the event, were both vinyl dolls sculpted by Dianna, however they are not artist painted but painted by the factory in China that produces the blank Little Darlings for Dianna and her artists to make into their gorgeous creations.

At first I wasn't particularly interested in getting my hands on one of the dolls from the event but as they started to appear on Ebay, I was increasingly drawn to the dark haired 'companion' doll, a #2 sculpt called Ana.  Ana was dresses as a little Indian girl and she just looked very cute in the sellers photos, so I decided to go ahead and get one.  However, I was outbid a few times on Ebay, so wasn't going to bother, but then I heard that the UFDC were selling off the 'extra' dolls and decided to go ahead and get one.  I had seen 'real life' photos on the Little Darlings Yahoo group and on Flickr and realised that despite the fact that the doll is not artist painted, she has so much potential....I'm so glad I went for her!!!  She arrived yesterday without any customs fees....that has to be a great start....and she really is as cute as a button. 

The doll herself is exactly the same as the Little Darlings.  The only difference, as I've already mentioned, is she's not handpainted by one of Dianna's trained artists, plus she doesn't have the manicure and pedicure that the artists ones come with.  She does however come fully dressed in well made outfit of tee shirt dress with, funnily enough,  ra-ra frills around the bottom, matching calf length leggings, sandals and a beaded necklace.  The outfit does up at the back with velcro.  Her wig is glued on, it is not bad quality either although mine was shedding a little bit, it has a straight fringe and two little pieces of hair pulled back at the sides into ponytails and these are decorated with long strings with beads on the end.  The wig actually feels like it could be artificial mohair, it's quite soft.  However, it wasn't the style I had in mind for her so I prised it off using the handle of a spoon.  Unfortunately her head underneath was quite stained from the wig, but it doesn't show with a new wig on so I'm not bothered by it.

I have ordered some Judikins Diamond Glaze from Ebay UK, after hearing that this is what Dianna and her artists use to glaze the eyes and give them that beautiful shine.  Hopefully that will be here at the weekend and I can give it a go on this new girl.

In the meantime, I've been having fun trying out wigs on her.....I won't bore you with the photos of all the different wigs, because we've been there, done that, already once this week, I'll just go on to show you the two I chose for her to try out.  She chose the outfit for herself ;)  I thought perhaps I'd finally got a 'girlie' girl to go with Ellie and Finn....until I saw her dirty sneakers!!!  I haven't had time to make her an outfit of her own yet, so she is wearing a mishmash of things that she found in the dolls clothes box!!! 

In the meantime, I cut the below wig shorter (this was the one I first tried on Finn and liked) and now it is a chin length bob....I think this will be Reece's wig for the time being as she looks so cute in it!

And here she is with her two artist painted sisters/friends:

Comparing the two girls of the same sculpt:

Bottom line:  Well the bottom line is, I know that Reece is not a handpainted doll, but quality wise, she is great!  I think she is a very cute doll with so much potential.  All I've done so far is change her wig and I'm sure you'll agree that she fits right in with Ellie and Finn!! 

If you want an alternative to the long wait for an artist painted Little Darling or the high prices on the secondhand market, then I would certainly recommend one of the UFDC Convention cuties.