Doll-A-Day 2023 #129: Teen Talk Barbie

   We were pretty busy today. Ken and I went to the house, and while he shop vac-ed up a bunch of crap out of the floor of the fire room, I sorted out the back of the car. It's been having junk from the house loaded into it, and things were getting out of hand. I tidied up a lot of stuff back there, and looked for my phone, which has been lost for weeks now. I was hoping it would turn up back there, but so far, no luck. I didn't get to finish straightening and sorting the crap in the back of the car, because I got so far, and then switched to loading rescued Lego, and other bits from the fire room, out of the melted drawer units they were in, and into empty cat litter buckets. I got sunburned, but at least this time I wasn't going through the bags of room stuff and getting my arm all scratched up and black stuff up my nose, like last time.

  Then we went to get some dinner, and afterward to the storage unit, where I had to find some things. I was sad to see that some stuff had been put away wet, (and none of it was even a horse!), and had ruined. Some may be rescuable, and some has been tossed for trash already. I rescued World Doll Clark Gable as Rhett Butler just in the nick of time. He was in with the wet, musty smelling mildewed trash, but he was in a plastic bag and survived with only a musty smell. I'm hoping he'll air out and be all right.

  I was pleased about some things though. I found that all my vintage Christmas elves and decorations survived the Room of Water, and were perfectly fine. My Starship Swinetrek set wasn't as bad as I had been lead to believe...I  think. Hard to tell really, until I can take the plastic box front out. There was another thing that didn't survive as well as I had been lead to believe. We'll cover that another day. 

  Anyway, we were there until nearly dark. I finished my digging just in time to grab what I needed and Ken closed the door just before dark.

  So, since it was such a busy day, here's a quick post. I know you've been getting a lot of those lately, and I'm sorry. Hopefully I'll manage to get some done up ahead soon. But we do have a burned and soggy house to clear up, so we can go back home someday , so try to cut me some slack. As I said to Ken again tonight, this was the worst year to have committed to daily posts.

  Today's doll is Teen Talk Barbie, introduced in 1991, the same year as Emma.

This is the doll who got into so much trouble for saying "Math is tough.", and supposedly perpetuating the  idea that girls can't do math. (For the record, Math was my best subject in school...even though I hated it.)

Of course, not all the dols said the  same phrases. Each doll said four phrases, but you didn't know which phrases your doll was going to say.

The 'Math is tough." controversy caused the dolls to stop being made with that phrase. Since nobody knew which doll said that phrase until they bought it, put the batteries in, and tried it out, it made the 'Math is tough' doll, worth some money, with some people paying big dollars for one.

  The Canadian dolls had the batteries already in, and a hole in the back of the box so you could try the dolls out. They also had another difference: they spoke French! We had some of those, and sold. We bought them in Canada and sold them at doll shows here.

  The Teen Talk dolls offered a lot of variety. They came in Caucasian, with blonde, red, or brown hair, in curly or crimped styles. The African American dolls, like you see here, came with black or brown hair, in a curly or crimped style. All the Canadian ones we saw were blonde.

 This doll has black hair and a head full of luscious curls.

  The outfits were all like this one, only in various colours.

The outfit included the hat, short jacket, short top...

...a filmy skirt, stretchy leggings, a cloth purse, a pair of tennis shoes and a pair of heels.

The colour combinations were all over the place, and the patterns were loud. It was 1991, and the 80's still loomed large.

  I think I had a blonde crimped doll. Emma finally laid claim to our open Canadian example doll we put out at shows. She was blonde and crimped too, but while mine had an outfit that was primarily bright red and black, the Canadian doll was all pastel pink and green. The make-up fitted the colour scheme too, so my doll had bright red lips, and the Canadian doll had pink lips.

  That's the doll for today. She was rescued from the Room of Water, completely dry and secure in her plastic tub. She is available and no, she is not $10, as her very old sticker says! See you tomorrow.

Doll-A-Day 2019 #215: Nape Curl Talking Barbie

  You may have seen a different version of today's doll on the blog before. I showed you my red haired Nape Curl Talking Barbie in my post HERE. Today's girl is a brunette.

Talking Barbie first appeared in 1967,with a long braid. (You can see mine HERE.)  The second version,which includes today's doll,had what is referred to as a 'nape curl' hair style. In other words, the hair curls at the nape,or the back, of the neck.
 

Her hair should be curled tightly at the back of her neck. It's not as tightly curled as it was originally,so the hair isn't as close to her neck.
 

It kind of looks nice fluffy like this, but her side spit curls seem to get lost in the sides of the hair.

Maybe I could just recurl those. Of course, you've been told how bad I am with hair,so you know that's probably not going to happen any time soon.

Her forehead spit curl is still in pretty good shape though.
 

The third version also had a nape curl style,but she had centered eyes. This is the second version, since she has side glance eyes.

They aren't really glancing to the side,but they aren't centered.

Like a lot of Talking Barbies,this lady has an issue with one of her legs. It has fallen off,a common problem for these dolls.

her situation does allow her to do this pose though.

She has rooted eyelashes,which is one of the best things about the Mod Era Barbies.

The outfit she's wearing is called Travel Togethers.

It's a Barbie fashion from 1967.

It consists of the hat, jacket, and skirt...

 

...and red closed toe pumps, which I don't have. As usual,I am sadly lacking in shoes.

  That's today's doll. See you tomorrow for another one.
   

Doll-A-Day 2019 #67:Barbie's '60th' Week: Talking Barbie, Side Ponytail

  Today's Barbie's 60th birthday Week doll is this lovely girl.

And she's very embarrassed about the hole in her stocking. (She was hoping it wouldn't show.) So please don't mention it.

  She's a Talking Barbie, but she's different from the 'Nape Curl' Talking Barbie we looked at the other day.

 

This one is the side ponytail Talking Barbie.

She was the first version of Talking Barbie.

  I thought that tail was a braid, but it's actually just a ponytail with three ribbons.

This version of Talking Barbie came out in 1968.

She's wearing Little Bow Pink from 1969-70.

I am trying to get a little ahead of things, because Sunday is my birthday, and I won't be home. Also,My friend Lori,who you may have read about here,has sold her house,and we'll be taking a trip to Georgia on Wednesday to look at houses. Yes, she's moving away. I don't make friends very easily. I meet few people I like, and even fewer I would spend time with. So I'm really going to miss Lori. She's my only local friend besides my family. We've been friends since High School.

  So anyway, I was trying to get some extra photos done today. It was hard enough because my back,hips, and legs have been bothering me a lot this week, on top of which, I have a lousy cold. Well, of course things can never go easily. During the photo shoot for today's doll,my camera battery died. My batteries don't hold a charge any more,so the one that was already charged was dead already. Ken has done something with my charger, so I couldn't find it. So I had an abbreviated photo shoot.

One thing actually did work out for a change. I started taking her picture yesterday,without doing her hair. This is the way it was when I got her.

She looks very similar to the Hair Fair heads we saw yesterday.

I knew she needed three hot pink hair ribbons, but I didn't think I had any. But I did!

 

 I had a roll of hot pink ribbon. It's not the right kind, but it works. At least something worked out because my week has been crap.

Of course,not everything could possibly work out. How do I get this thing to lay down?!

 So now she has new hair ribbons to go with the new body she had to borrow,because,as a Talking Barbie her legs, and even one arm,had fallen off!
 

She was a torso with one arm. She did still have her pull ring though. Not that she works.

This version of Talking Barbie came as a redhead,a blonde,or a brunette,in various shades of brown hair. She would have looked like this in her box.

 The bathing suit was a two piece with hot pink vinyl bottom and a knitted sweatery top. Who swims in something like that?!

   I was disappointed with my pictures for this post,but my battery died and these were all I got,so cut me a little slack.

  Why is it the dolls with no arms and legs have the best heads, with nice colouring and all their eye lashes and hair?!

Oh! There was one other good thing this week! I actually won something! I never win anything! I'm on a few doll Facebook pages, and one had a contest for best coat photo. There were one hundred entries, and I was one of the ten chosen! I won with this picture of my Patience doll, wearing a coat set by Franklin Mint for their Princess Anastasia doll.

There were ten winners, but only five prizes, so it was first come first served. I chose the modern Terri Lee School Days outfit. Now my repro Terri Lee won't have to be naked anymore. 

  That's it for today.

  Tomorrow,if I can get my battery charged, we'll see another Barbie.