Flowers and Mother's Day Gifts

  Boy, blogging is weird. The internet is weird. Here I am blogging along quietly,viewership way down since I stopped posting daily,when all of a sudden the views  shoot up to more than seven times what they were the day before! What makes the difference? Why did thousands of people suddenly decide to view the blog? And where the heck are those views going,because they aren't on the most recent posts? (When I was posting every day I was getting big numbers, but they weren't going on the daily posts either. So why did not posting every day make a difference? I know. It has something to do with showing up in searches. But then what happened that day?)
  Anyway, on to other things. My lovely lilacs are in full bloom now.

I keep moving the self starts around. There are more bushes at the back door,and in the side yard.

I'm on my second vase full in the house,and enjoying the wonderful smell. Ivy likes to eat them! 

  I also have loads of iris' this year.

As you can see,I have not tidied my flower beds. So sue me. I did mow the grass today.

 Tuesday night I worked on one of my unfinished things. It's not quite done yet, but it's really close. When it is done I'll show you.
  I also said I'd show you my Mother's day gifts. Well first I should show you one of my birthday gifts that I forget to show you! It arrived a bit after my birthday because Ken ordered it for me and it took a while. I thought I was getting one,(I found it online and put it in my watching!),but when it arrived there were two mini decks of cards.

They had to be punched out and the boxes had to be folded together.

They aren't 52 card decks,so maybe that's why they give you two. I like there to be complete decks,(and mini books should have readable pages.). But mini decks of cards are always unrealistically thick when there are 52 cards,because the cards can't be realistically thin enough to be to scale without being like tissue paper,and nobody wants tissue paper cards.

  So these little guys are thin, but not tissue paper thin. They look good,even if it is hard to close the lids all the way because the cards are so tightly in there.
  For Mother's Day I got some lilac lotion from Ivy. I have said before how much I love the smell of lilacs. They sell lilac lotion at a few places, but the girls always shop for cruelty free,which is harder to find. Emma gave me a Hallmark Princess Leia ornament, and a pretty "Mom,I love you with all my heart" picture frame with a picture of the two of us in it. Ken gave me edibles,including some Tunnock's tea cakes. They are sort of like those marshmallow Wagon Wheel thingies,with coconut,the difference being that the marshmallow in the Tunnock's is vegetarian.  (Your regular marshmallows are made with 'animal skin, connective tissue, and bone',usually hooves and things! Bleh.)
  Emma also gave me these little goodies.

They are various scales. Most of the pieces are 1/6 scale or thereabouts.

  Ken also gave me a non edible gift. He's so crazy. He hates to buy me anything if I know I'm getting it. So if I'm with him and I find something I want as a gift, he'll refuse to get it for me because, "You'll know you're getting it and I can't surprise you." Usually that means I don't get it at all because he can't find it again, or forgets, or can't remember where we saw it or which thing it was. In 2018 I found this doll at Walmart.

Sorry about the dark picture. There was a lighter one,but it was out of focus.
 

Looks like a whole different doll.

I said I wanted her, and when I looked through them, this one had a particular smirky grin. 

There was just a slight difference in her face paint compared to all the others that made her better than all the others. I insisted I wanted that particular one.
 

  There was some back and forth about how he couldn't surprise me if he bought it then,versus  better to not be surprised and get the one I wanted. He finally bought her. But then I didn't get her that Christmas. He said he forgot where he hid her. Then my birthday came. And then Mother's day. Then another Christmas! I still hadn't gotten her. He still claimed he couldn't find her. How even a slob like Ken could lose something that big was...

Although I know for a fact there's still a yard decoration of a girl in the foyer somewhere,(Ken's 'office' is in there.), that he bought for me and hid years ago. I came across it once,but put it back so he could surprise me with it. It's had to be in there at least 10 years now.
  So my birthday came this year, and now Mother's Day,and I finally got her! He won't tell me how long he's known where she was!
  So,that's it for this post. See you soon.

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.

Doll-A-Day 2017 #152:Disney Girls:Anna,Elsa,Aurora,and Cinderella

   Yay! Last day of the Goodwill dolls. I'm glad, because I'm getting tired of talking about it! Today we're looking at some Disney dolls I got in The Hauls.First up, a quick look at these two.

These are some simple Frozen Elsa and Anna dolls.Unfortunately Elsa has molded clothing on her torso. Her sheer over thingy was on somebody else,but I got it!Poor Anna is completely naked though.She doesn't even have molded on clothes.

I hate to ruin complete and mint dolls, but since these girls are essentially naked, I'm thinking about trying a repaint on one or both of them.
  On to the other dolls. These two were naked, but these dresses, which suit them fairly well,were in the bag of clothes I got.

Aurora,from Sleeping Beauty, and Cinderella, are both Disney Store Classic dolls.

Stupid camera wouldn't focus on both of them at the same time. That's what happens when I have to hold them and photograph them by myself, and,like most people,I only have two hands.

That means they have nicely articulated arms...

...weird soft click kneed legs, and bodies that don't fit Barbie dresses very well.

That bodice is a little baggy.

Cinderella didn't have enough chest for her dress,and Aurora's dress wouldn't close in the back all the way.

Their articulated arms are very graceful,but a bit thin.

Both are beautiful dolls,but of the two I think Aurora wins.

 

She also reminds me of Morgan Fairchild.

She has more detail in her eyes than Cinderella.

Plus her sideglance eyes give her alot more personality.
The hair on these girls isn't the greatest though.

 
The hair on both of them is crispy,even their bangs.I've seen dolls have hair that gets crispy on the ends. But why is hair as short as bangs,which have probably never even been combed,just as crispy?

It's been said many times, but it's still true: Disney Store dolls have awful legs! Better that they keep them covered in these long dresses.

And that's it for the dolls I got in one week,(three trips,) to a single Goodwill. Shew! That took a while. I was excited about them when I got them, but once I started doing the posts on them,there were so many other dolls I wanted to feature,and I couldn't until they were finished. So I am relieved to finish them up and move onto the dolls that have been waiting in the wings.Tomorrow will be a random doll I may or may not have gotten at a thrift store at some point! Come back and see what it is!