Some Recent Goodwill Hauls and a Bad Back

  I still have one doll to show you from the first doll show in August, and one to show you from the second doll show in August. I don't have either of those photographed though, and my back has been out for the last couple of days, so that's not going to happen right now. 

  My back was sore and stiff, I think, from the hours of driving to see Ivy Sunday night, sleeping in the car, (because I'm not staying in a hotel during Covid), and then hours of driving back home Monday. We went on Sunday because it's such a long drive and if we used up Monday driving we'd miss time with Ivy, who also had work to do on Monday, and it would be super late when we drove back home. I figured if we got there Sunday evening/night, we'd have all Monday free. It worked out well, except for sleeping in the car. Someone in Ivy's dorm had had Covid recently, so we probably wouldn't have been allowed to stay in her room if we'd have wanted to. I was a bit stumpy Tuesday, and then Ken and I had Fun Day on Wednesday, which involved more driving, and a nice car picnic at an arboretum again. That totally finished me off though. Wednesday night there was a lot of screaming going on during my shower. The neighbours probably thought I was having a visit from Norman Bates.

  I spent yesterday resting, but should have rested laying down and letting my back relax. Instead, I sat up all day, and then there was more screaming at bathtime. I was hoping the warm water would help relax my back, but it just wasn't enough, I guess. I got smart and had Ken put some pressure on the painful places before we went to bed, and it did help unbelievably. I am still having pain, and I've been laying down and moving carefully when I do things. I think I'll probably be better tomorrow. Ken will be glad of that, because I haven't braved the stairs for a couple of days, so he's had to bring me food. (I didn't want to get stuck downstairs, unable to move. There's no working bathroom down there at the moment! (However, I did get a nice porcelain sink at a church sale this summer, and I've been waiting for the weather to cool down before braving renovating that tiny bathroom that only has a tiny window.) 

  Anyway, while I'm an invalid, I thought I'd go ahead and post some dolls that I found at a Goodwill a few weeks ago. There were several bags of dolls that day, and the prices were crazy. The bag I bought was only $1.99 though. It contained these.

  There weren't any dolls I was really interested in, but I got really excited when I saw what the girl on the right was wearing. 

They're a bit stretched out from being on her fat feet. (She has molded shoes already.)

  If you read the blog regularly, you'll know that my dolls are notoriously low on shoes. I was excited about these shoes, because they are Betsy McCall shoes! I have two Betsys, the Tiny kind. Not the 11 1/2 inch one like I showed you the other day.

She was an amazing yard sale find, even if she is missing half a leg . You can see her post HERE, and read my Yard Sale Tale.

One dollar at the flea market! You an see her post HERE.

  I actually have a white pair, and a black pair of Betsy shoes, but no red ones, and someday I hope to get that red plaid dress for her.

  The dolls included a Native American Dress Me type girl.

There was a Ginny wanna be. 

  I'm pretty sure she's not a real Ginny. To tell you the truth, I got so excited about the shoes I forgot to look! She looks cheaper than a Ginny though. She's probably a Virga or something.

  Then there is the girl who was wearing the red shoes.

She's a Hollywood doll...

... like the compo (possible) Alice I showed you recently.

  She has kind of an interesting face.

  I suppose if she were wearing a cute dress she'd be kind of cute. Does anybody know who she is? 

  She has some personality.

And a strange little belly scar. Maybe she's had a Caesarean.

   Aside from the shoes, there was also a brush. (Maybe it's a back scrubber brush?")

Does anybody recognize the brush?

  Another Goodwill recently yielded this chair and this mini American Girl doll.

  It's Felicity. She's very yellowed. 

She doesn't smell like cigarettes, so I don't think it's nicotine. Has anybody had one of these dolls that yellowed.? Do they just do that?

  So now I'm off to rest my poor back muscles, See you soon.

Goodwill Girls: My Latest Haul: Journey Girls Meredith and American Girl Saige

  It is with a heavy heart that I inform you of the death of my beloved pear tree. After blooming this Spring, and even growing baby pears, one day we were all sitting out on the patio when one of us looked over and noticed that the poor tree was completely dead. A few years ago I noticed there were ants or something in the tree, hollowing out a portion of the trunk. I think I poured hot water on the spot. In any case, I thought the bugs had gone. Maybe they were the cause, or maybe they were just appreciative of whatever had been killing the tree. I looked at the trunk, and there was a split leading off from the hole where I had seen the bugs.

In another week or so, the split went most of the way along the trunk, and was accompanied by an even more severe split down the other side of the trunk. So it became very important that we take the tree down.

Yes. My yard is weedy and overgrown, okay?!

Once down we saw that the entire tree, including the limbs, had been hollowed out.

  I'll really miss our pear tree. It may not have provided any pears for the last few years, but when it did I canned mass quantities of pears, gave pears away, and made pear cake, pear pancakes, and pear syrup, which we eat on ice cream. If you want to try the recipe for the cake I made out of my pears, you can find it in my post HERE. It's actually an apple cake recipe, but it was great made with pears. The tree also provided beauty in our yard,(Even if it did smell like fish when it was in bloom!)

As it did in the photo for this review of Ashton Drake's Alice, by Dianna Effner.

 I am going to plant another fruit tree, but I am notoriously bad with plants.
I hadn't been to Goodwill, or any thrift store, for ages. I've still only been twice since the virus became a thing. A few weeks ago Ivy, who is doing most of the driving these days to get practice to get her license, and I, dropped Ken off at work. Since we were in the shopping center where Goodwill is, I decided to make a quick scan of the aisles. I had only been there one other time lately, as I said, and found nothing. I did a little better on this day. I found these two girls.  **Update: I forgot to mention that the Journey Girl is Meredith, and a reader  tells me the American girl is Saige, which is one of the AG dolls I would have picked to own!** Further update below.

  The American Girl was wearing these cute homemade monkey pajamas and slippers. But the Journey Girl was wearing a nice homemade Christmas outfit and American Girl boots.

Whoops. Left out the boots.

  I think they've both had haircuts. But if they have, they look really good.

These naked pictures are before I washed them.

I wondered if they had really had haircuts, or just had short hair, because the short hair is curly. At least, it's curly enough to look like a real hairdo, and not just a chop job.

  The test was if the curl would wash out when I washed the dolls. You know I have to wash them. I always have to wash second hand dolls if at all possible. (You can read about how I wash my dolls in my posts HERE and HERE.) These guys were washable, so I washed them.  When they dried, their hair was still curly. So, did they come with short hair? I don't know of any Journey Girl who comes with short hair. As for the American Girl, I thought she might be one of the dolls you can choose with your own attributes. But I researched that, and it looks like they only offered options of skin tone and hair and eye colour, and freckles. All the dolls seem to have come with long hair. Now that they're washed, I can see that they do definitely have haircuts.

They both have a few long hairs that somehow got missed by the scissors. The AG's hair is a little longer on one side. She has tremendous flip though.

Ivy says she looks like Mary Tyler Moore on The Dick Van Dyke Show. Then it occurred to her that with the Journey Girl being blonde, she could be Rose Marie on The Dick Van Dyke Show.

Ivy thought I should put little Rose Marie bows in the Journey Girl's hair.

I pointed out to her that no modern kid would have dolls of people from The Dick Van Dyke Show...except her. She would have.
  I have two other American Girls. One is the Samantha I got at a yard salea few years ago.

You can see her Doll-A-Day post HERE.

One is a Kirsten I got at a flea market.

I think I like this AG better than either of those two. I like her reddish hair and her freckles.

  I have a couple of Journey Girls. You might have seen my review of Journey Girl Kelsey HERE.

I also have another one with a haircut. I'm not sure which one she is. I had another Kelsey, but I'm not sure if I still have her. She might have gone on Ebay with her post-mate, Lotus Kayumi. You might have seen their post HERE.
  These two girls are most certainly staying though. I love their faces. Despite the haircuts, they don't seem to have had much play. They have very tight limbs, and no scuffing.

  **FURTHER UPDATE** For those of you who are curious as to how much these ladies cost me: They were priced at $3.99 each, but I got the Old People discount! I only paid $7 something for the both of them, including tax!
  Soon we'll be going review crazy. I have three sponsored reviews, plus one amazing gift I recently received. I'll be going to Lori's before the end of the month to help her move. If you're wondering why I haven't done that yet, it's because the original sale of her house fell through. She had to cancel her house purchase, since no one was buying her house. Then her house sold again. Of course, by that time, the house she was originally buying was no longer available. So she had to find another house. She's not really happy with it, but she didn't have much of a choice. Hopefully she can make it into what she will be happy with. At least she'll be closer to where she works.
  I'll see you all soon!

Breyers Classic Pet Groomer

  I'm working on a post on my birthday goodies. Until then I thought I'd show you this little lady I got for 50 cents at my favourite Goodwill the other week.

 She has a translucent 'skin',but kind of intense eyes.
 

She's a Breyers lady.
 

She originally came in a Breyers Classics set 'Pet Groomer',which came with a  Corgi dog, Siamese cat, palomino foal, shampoo bottle, bucket and a water trough.
 

She can be used with a small Breyers horse,so she has some good articulation for sitting on the horse.

She's described as being 6" tall,but I measured her at 6 1/2" tall. She's slightly tall for my dollhouse, but she has gone to live there for the time being anyway.

Her shirt and jeans are nice, but her shoes are really cheap and thin. The toes were caving in and they were moving around and sitting on her feet at weird angles. I might just steal her clothes for a doll I already have and redonate her. I kind of like her though.

Recent 1/6 Scale Dolls and Goodies From Goodwill

  Having health problems recently means I haven't been out much. I have been very few places,and haven't even stopped at my favourite Goodwill most of the times I have happened to be near it. I have stopped a few times, especially lately,since I have been feeling better. I have made two hauls in the past week or so,and only just brought one in from the van that has been sitting in there ever since before  I started feeling so awful! So, to start with some of the latest 1/6 scale finds, here's what I was lucky enough to get the last couple of times I stopped at my favourite Goodwill.
  Any time you're lucky enough to find fully dressed dolls at Goodwill,especially with their shoes, it's a good day! These girls were waiting for me. 

The bigger girls were $1 each,and the Strawberry Shortcake Lemon Meringue was 50 cents.

Disney Descendants  Signature Evie Isle of the Lost doll,complete with her shoes.

Disney Descendants Signature  Mal Isle of the Lost doll. She's wearing her complete outfit too.

Ever After High Ashlynne Ella. 

 

This is the one from the set that came with the Hunter Huntsman doll I got at the flea market last fall. She was shoeless when I found her, but I found this one shoe floating around loose in the tub of dolls she was in, and put it on her, just because. It turned out to be hers! I didn't see the other one, but the tub was pretty full of dolls. Maybe it will turn up at some point. She does have a mark on her face I need to clean off, but it doesn't look like it will be a problem.

Ever After High Apple White. I have another one of these,which I showed you before,but this one is complete, including her bolero jacket,tights, and shoes.

This means I can use the other one to experiment with repainting a doll. Wednesday night Ken and I stopped at the same Goodwill on our way to Valentine's day dinner, and Ken spotted this for me!

It's Apple White's bed!
 

Plus it had some stuff in the drawer.

There was the little mirror that attaches to the bed in the drawer too.

I also got another Ever After High doll, Raven Queen.

This one is Getting Fairest. I'm amazed she still had her shoes,considering they are mules, and have no rubber bands on them.
  This little Strawberry Shortcake friend,Lemon Meringue even has her hair do dad.

And I got yet another Tinkerbell! And she's different from any of my others! How many millions of these things have they made?!

This Chelsea friend is technically dressed, but her clothes are painted on. She even has her shoes though.

Speaking of shoes,remember I got a few Project MC2 dolls,but they had no shoes? Well somebody I brought home from Goodwill the other day ended up wearing these MC2 shoes...

I dropped one bringing the stuff to where I was photographing it,but I did get two.

 I did get a few naked dolls too, that were too pretty to pass up. This Mulan is one.

This Mystery Squad Drew. (I already have one, so she won't be staying.) She needs some stuff removed from her face.

This tall Fashionista. I don't like the dress she comes in anyway. I do have to find her something to wear now though.

This especially pretty Disney Store Belle.

This Elsa. Which one is she?

This Barbie Swan Lake Fairy Queen doll with the Teresa head sculpt.

 

I have a couple, but this one still had her headband. When I got home I noticed part of it is broken off!
This Liv doll.

The jointy body is always handy.
I did pass up a Happy Family era Midge that was especially pretty,because I think I already have that one,and she had a chewed hand. Afterward I thought that I could have rebodied her and tried customizing her. Oh well...

When we were there Wednesday evening I found this Disney Store singing Coronation Anna.

She's pretty, but her song is really annoying.

I buy most Anna,Merida, and,to a lesser extent, most Tangled Rapunzel dolls I see. I wish Anna had had her clothes, but maybe I'll find them some day too.
I also found some really cool 1/6 scale accessories. For one thing, I saw this Barbie Smasheroo jacket laying on the shelf on the other side of the doll aisle!

It's the real vintage one, not the repro! I love this outfit. I have the repro doll and outfit, but the vintage one is so plush. This one has a small brown spot on the left shoulder, but I think I can probably clean that off. Other than that it's minty!
  I got this owl picture frame,this electronic violin,and this Pirates of the Caribbean chest too.

I'm pretty sure this is just like the electronic violin I got for Emma when she was a kid. Emma plays the violin,and I bought it for her Emma the Doll.

It runs on batteries,and plays when the bow touches the strings.

 I also got these three Melissa and Doug mini crates. They are slightly big for 1/6 scale, because they are about 6" wide,but still could be useful.

The top one has a board missing, but I'm thinking I will probably make something 1/6 scale out of them anyway. I'm not sure what yet, but I'm thinking. I could always fix the one with a popsicle stick too.
  Way back when I was feeling really bad I was out to go to the doctor one day and felt the need to actually do something, since it had been so long since I had. One of the things we did was stop at Salvation Army. I found this mini plant pot and this wooden shelf.

The plant pot is definitely  1/6 scale, but the shelf could be 1/6 or 1/12. As a bonus,I already have one that matches it!
  Those are my 1/6 scale goodies. Next time we'll look at some larger dolls I also got.