Birthday Stuff: Disney Store Doll, World's Smallest, and Mini Brands Toys

   The weather is absolutely crazy. We had some warmish weather last week. (Not this past week.) I went around without a jacket. The snow had melted, except for where it had been snow plowed into piles the size of glaciers. That takes ages to finally melt. We had rain that melted a bit more snow. Then it got really cold again. We had snow Monday! I was freezing all day and I put my electric blanket on again.  Then we had weather in the 50's Fahrenheit again. Friday night it was 38! My daffodils must be so confused.

  Last week, as I said, it was pretty warm, and Ken and I took one of our 'fun day's, and went to a  nice state park to do some walking, since my doctor says I should do 150 minutes of exercise a week. It was really nice, and I had to take my sweater off. But the melting snow had made it so muddy that our shoes were caked with mud. We tried to walk in the woods, and to the sides of the path when we could, but there was still a lot of slipping and sliding going on, and our shoes and ankles were a mess. 

We walked about two miles. I thought I would be sore because I have done so little for quite a while, but I was fine.

  Since it was my 'birthday week' I celebrated a bit and ate a few things my LPR diet doesn't allow. We had the most delicious lasagna and eggplant parmesan, which we shared so we could both try each of them. I hadn't had tomato sauce in so long! It was WONDERFUL!

   As I said, it was my birthday that week. Ken and Emma got their wires crossed and they BOTH made me a cake! They were both good though, so no harm done. There's still some left. Ken, as usual, spoiled me. I got a new lens for my camera, so no more having to focus manually. Thank goodness! And no more blurred pictures, which you will all appreciate! He also got me a couple of DVD sets and a special edition magazine, which I picked out. He hates that. He thinks everything should be a surprise. I'm just glad I get the things I wanted! He had already given me the Katherine Johnson doll, but on my birthday he treated me to a couple of dolls from The Disney store. I collect Alice things, and had been wanting the doll from the Disney Store. Once I was there, and seeing the dolls in person, I wasn't sure I didn't like the Wendy, (From "Peter Pan".), more. They were on sale if you bought two, so he insisted I get both. That's one Alice down. Someday I hope to get the full sized Animator's Collection Alice. (You can see my mini Animator's Alice HERE.)

  Of the other gifts I got, the others that would interest you all would include the World's Smallest Slinky Dog that Emma got me...

... and with the money Fuzz gifted me with I bought a couple of the new-ish Mini Brands Toys balls. I was excited about these when I saw that they existed, at Hot Topic, on my birthday. (Don't buy them there though. They cost twice as much there as they do at Target or Walmart.) The things I wanted most out of the balls were the carded Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles figures and the Turtles mask. I got lucky and got the mask!

  But in retrospect I think I won't buy any more of the balls. Not that there aren't some really cute things in there. 

Here are the other things I got.

I would love to have a lot of the things. If a person had the money to spare and had the urge to make a 1/6 scale toy store, these would be great.

 But they're about $7 per ball, a ball which contains 5 things. Every ball uses one of the spaces to give you a shelf, which is too small for a lot of the toys, or a shopping cart, which is not in scale with the toys. (I guess you could use it as a toy too.) 

The shelf.

The cart.

A lot of the toys are actual plastic toys on card, or in little boxes. Those are nice. But far too often you get stuck with something like the JoJo Siwa hair bow,

... or some of the 'toys' that are just a reproduction box with nothing in it, like the 'Ready to Roll', above. While that was one thing with regular Mini Brands, where you might get a product that was basically an empty cardboard box, but usually it was an empty box you couldn't replicate easily with just a home printer because the package was unique,(like with the Breyer's ice cream), with these I just feel like it's not enough for the price.

  I have a bunch of the three items that are on the display boxes. If anybody wants to trade a carded Ninja Turtle figure or a Fingerling for a Rubik's cube, a Rainbocorns egg, or a box of Crayola crayons, let me know.

  One of my other presents was from my sister. She got me something I've been wanting: a DNA test kit. I am anxious to get it sent in! I'll let you know what the results say when I get them back.

Play Sets: The Heart Family Visits Disneyland Park Dumbo Ride

  This month's play set is one that Emma was obsessed with getting when she was a kid. It's the Heart Family's Dumbo Ride. The Dumbo Ride was originally sold in 1989. Emma wasn't born until 1991,but in the 90's stores did something wonderful they don't do anymore: They held on to merchandise for year sometimes, marking it down repeatedly until it finally sold. The Dumbo Ride,which was made for the Heart Family line of dolls, was still hanging around when Emma was a kid. It was either Toys R Us or Kaybee toys where she saw it. She had to have it. I don't know why she was so obsessed with it. It is cute. But she wanted it so badly. Eventually she bought it for herself with money she had saved.
  The Heart Family, for those of you who haven't heard of them, were a line of dolls that included Mr. and Mrs. Heart,and their two children, a boy and a girl. The Heart Family kids were those stumpy giant babies whose sculpt was also used for the Teacher Barbie set,and the Rosebud Babies. You may have seen a Rosebud Baby that I have HERE,or the Teacher Barbie kids I showed you HERE. The Heart Family were sold from 1985 to 1990,and there were all sorts of sets and accessories sold for them, including a car, a house, a play ground set,sets of accessories for the kids,clothing packs,a camper, and even a dog.
  The Dumbo Ride recreated part of Disneyland,and included the ride, benches, and a refreshment stand,complete with a hamburger, popcorn,an ice cream ,a hotdog, and 'toys to buy'.

   The Heart Family dolls, sold in Disneyland attire, were sold separately,in sets of one parent and one child.
  I came across the Dumbo Ride,or,at least, the important part of it,in Emma's closet recently. Emma's room still has a lot of her stuff in it,including all but her three favourite dolls and her favourite bunny and his sister. (You'll see some of her dolls next year...maybe). The Dumbo Ride was tucked away in her closet with about a million dolls,including the stuffed 'DollPock Apartments', which is a hanging shoe holder, where many of Emma's second string favourite dolls live. So here's the ride.

Thanks to Ivy for helping out. The ride was a little heavy on one side to stand up because it's missing a Dumbo.

The missing bit is the second Dumbo. There should be two, as well as another pink heart for the other short arm. (Also I didn't find the bench and accessories.)

The Dumbo's have seat belts to hold the dolls in.

The seats fit the Heart Family children. Kelly and Tommy dolls also fit nicely. In this case, Gareth World,who has a bend leg body from a Kelly friend with swivel arm joints,is showing you how well he fits.

The ride is a wind up toy. Winding it up makes the Dumbo's go around. The piece at the top, with Dumbo's mouse friend Timothy on it, is the part that's wound.

Timothy is even two sided.

The arms travel along on an un-level circle. The difference in the height of the circle causes the arms to move up and down as they go around.

The ring at the center is higher on one side,and gradually gets lower.

 Ivy thought I should somehow show you the ride in action. The only thing I could do was take a series of pictures of the ride in motion. Click through them quickly and you'll get a feeling of motion!

 The base on the ride is decorated with many different pictures of Dumbo.
 

   Additional sets were sold to be used with the Dumbo ride,or as individual rides. They were called Heart Family (Visits Disneyland) Kids on Parade. The sets included a doll,(also made from the Heart Family kid sculpt), and a ride vehicle which could be attached to the other arms of the Dumbo Ride,or rolled along loose,and hooked together, to be a parade.

The Dumbo ride also came with those yellow thingies to hook the Dumbos together.

  To attach the  Kids on Parade vehicles,you had to remove the hearts from the short arms of the Dumbo Ride and replace them with the Kids' vehicles.

  The Dumbo vehicles can also be used off the ride itself,as they have wheels  that really turn.
  In researching the ride for this post I found a picture of something I had never heard of before:

I don't know if this piece was sold in the U.S. or not. The only picture I found is of one that has French and German writing on the package too. This piece is musical and is just one Dumbo that rocks back and forth.
  Dumbo himself is really cute.

His ears and tail are separate pieces,that look like they might move. They don't,but flapping ears would have been pretty cool.

  The bench that comes with the set is purple,with white legs that look like upside down hearts. 
  You can watch an unboxing video of the set HERE.
That's the play set for this month. Don't forget to check back in a couple of days for the next Doll Book of the Month Club entry.

Doll-A-Day 2019 #361: Disney Animator's Collection Anna

  Today's doll is one I got for Christmas the other day. She's this little girl.

Of course, she's Anna,from Frozen.

She's the current Disney Animator's Collection Anna. There have been a couple of others at least. You may have seen my other one,which is the very first Animator's Anna.

 

You can see her post HERE. There are slight differences between her face and the face on the new girl.

The new one has brown eye shadow and her lips look a little more natural.

And obviously the hair is different.

There were a couple of slightly different versions of the first dress,I think. The dress on this new girl is the same dress as an earlier gift set with Ann and Elsa,only a little shorter,and with a different collar.

Notice how the corners of her mouth paint aren't in the corners that are molded.

She has painted on undies.

Her shoes are pale green with a printed design.
 

Her little Olaf toy is different than the original too.
 

Like the other Animator's dolls little toys, her toy Olaf can hang on her wrist by the clear plastic band attached to him.
 

When the first version of the Anna doll came out,there were a lot of complaints that her ponytails were too high. Collector's redid her hair to make it more movie accurate. This new one has low ponytails.

And she still has a plastic tie in her head!

She's jointed at the neck,shoulders,and hips.

Her arms can move out to the sides a little bit.

Her head can not only turn side to side, but she can look up a bit.

But she can look downward much better.

I like her blushy cheeks and cute little freckles.

  I had a terrible time getting Anna out of her box! The insert wouldn't slide out of the box for one thing. I had to fight with that.Eventually I had to open the bottom of the box too and push the insert out the top. Then there were a million plastic ties holding her to the box. There were way too many,way more than were necessary. I would hate to have been a kid fighting with that on Christmas morning.

  That's today's doll. Tomorrow we'll see the other doll I got for Christmas, and some of my other gifts.