Doll-A-Day 2023 #196: Another Temu Haul and Articulated Doll!

   Remember what happened with my last Temu purchase? If not, let me recap: I made a Temu purchase. I got an email telling me they thought my order had been lost in transit, so they were refunding my money. If it did show up, I was free to keep the items, and the money. Then it showed up. They were apologetic about it being late, so they gave me $5! So, since my order had ended up being free, plus I got paid $5 for ordering it, I figured it was an opportunity to treat myself. Normally I wouldn't have ordered anything over $3. I have been trying to keep it cheap. But considering the circumstances, I took the chance to buy some higher priced things I had seen and liked. So, for one thing, I bought this little guy.

We'll look at him in more detail in a minute. But first, I want to show you what else I got. Let's start with these.

They even have lenses.

  This pair of glasses was listed as a ring! They do fit on a finger, and stay there. Pinches a bit where the legs end. Maybe it's for smaller fingers.

I thought they would make great glasses for a dollhouse sized doll, or for just laying on a table in a dollhouse. they were 88 cents.

I also got these glasses.

I wanted the black ones, but they were sold out. I'm very impressed by these though. They have clear lenses and real folding legs. 

They were only $1.99. I wasn't sure who they were going to fit though. I hoped they'd be Tammy World's size.  They aren't, but look who they almost fit.

They look great from the front, if a little large, but from the side you can see that they are way too big.

  They fit his head width though, so I don't know who they'll fit.

I have so many dolls without shoes. I bought a pair of black boots. I figured they'd fit somebody. But when they arrived, they weren't a 'they'. They were an 'it'. There was only one. I don't know what happened. It was in a ziplock bag, and the outer shipping bag hadn't been opened. No idea what went on there. But Temu were really good about refunding my $3.48. So now I have that to spend. I don't know if I'll buy the boots again, or something else.

But my favourites, besides those green glasses I guess, were these last two things. First of all, this chess set!

The board is metal and quite heavy. All the little chess pieces are real metal too. It's not magnetic though, which would have been handy with such small pieces.

And no, I don't know how to set up a chess board. I've only played three times, and that was because the condition of buying the Muppet chess set was that I would finally allow Ken to teach me how to play chess, and play it with him. So I have played Ken twice, and Fuzz once. I beat them both. They claim it was a fluke.

The chess set was $5.28, which is more than I like to spend, but hey, it was free plus!

The last item I bought was a whole $7.48, but you get a lot with it and the table is real wood. (And, again, free plus.) It's a Lego table with pieces.

I thought it was going to be plastic. The table is all wood, and the wooden legs fit in the holes.

I was a little disappointed in the Lego trim on the table. It's paper and a bit cheap looking.

And the Legos are upside down.

And my sticker is peeled up.

But you do get quite a bunch of tiny Legos, including four coloured thingies that make up the table top.. 

I remember paying a lot for the little bag of tiny Legos I got at Disneyworld when we went in 2019. Of course, that was Disneyworld. Everything is more expensive there. 

  There are a lot of different colours, and they do hook together well.

 

  The set also comes with a piece that is supposed to act as a shoot to wipe the Legos off the table and into a container. I think it may also double as one of those things to separate your Legos.

In any case, it doesn't work for either, because the holes in the back where you fit it to the Lego bumps, are too small. You can't hook them together. 

  Now to our little model here. He has a sweet little face, and big brown eyes.

And painted hair with molded details.

He posed with a nice bee who was partaking of our blooming leeks.

He's a nice quality for the money. (He was $4.48.) 

He also posed with the tasteless wild strawberries that have proliferated in our yard, while the good ones, that I paid money for, died.

And he can do a lot of posing. He's jointed at the neck, shoulders, elbows, wrists, hips, knees, and ankles.

He's a whole six inches tall.

And his arms and legs can move outward, as well as back and forth.

His joints hold a pose tightly. 

He has no waist joint, but he can do drastic things, like touch his face, the side of his head, or his stomach. The  disappointment is that he can't tilt his head at all, only turn it.

His clothes are a little confusing. His shirt closes in the back with Velcro.

But it's the front of his shirt that's confusing. There's picture, and underneath the picture it says Shiba Inu. Okay. I looked it up. A shiba inu is a breed of dog. But under that, I swear it says, 'tagline goes here'!

  He has white plastic shoes that are molded to look like lace ups.

His shorts have elastic in the waist, but it looks like it might tear loose if his shorts are scooted on and off too much.

By the way, he even has a little belly button.

  I'm considering using my boot money to instead, buy clothes that will fit him, and also a naked, but shoed, doll his size that Ken bought me a while back. I tried to find that doll at the house last week, but I couldn't remember where I put him.

  So I am very happy with what I got from Temu this time. The boot being missing was a disappointment, but they quickly refunded my money. I still recommend Temu.

  See you tomorrow.

Doll-A-Day 2023 #179: Temu Haul and an Articulated Doll

   Well, I did it again. I ordered some stuff from Temu. The weird thing is, I ended up getting paid to buy it! I ordered it, and a few days later I got an email that said my order may have been lost, so they were refunding my money. It also said that if my order did happen to turn up, that I could keep it, and the money. A day or so after that I got an email saying my order was on it's way, but they were sending me $5 because it was late! So I ended up getting paid $5 for ordering from Temu! So they are showing real care and responsibility for orders. I just hope their generosity doesn't drive them out of business!

  The whole haul only cost about $18 anyway, and the shipping was free. I also have to say that these pictures were taken with Ken's camera, which he has set weirdly or something. I apologize for some of the pictures being bright enough to burn your retinas out, and others being absolutely dim or out of focus.

 So, here's my haul. I got two 1/12 scale door handles. They came as left or right handles, and were sold in singles. I was thinking French doors, so I got both.

 They came with a tiny key. It really does fit in the keyhole, but it doesn't stay in when you let go. I hoped it would. You know, sometimes doors like that have the key left in, so you can lock the door when it's closed, and unlock it to open it, for doors that are left open a lot.

Keeping with the 1/12 scale theme, and doors, I got some tiny hinges. That's so I can make some French doors for those handles, and attach them to my house.

  I also got a sword letter opener... because, sword. It makes a great 1/6 scale sword. 

It looks a little Lord of the Rings Elves-y.

Next is a pad of little art prints. It also has a few print pages. 

They're mostly Alphonse Mucha... 

...but a few pages look like they aren't.

Plus there's a print page, as I said.

 Most of them would make good 1/12 scale framed art or posters, and 1/6 scale art. There's even a little blank Mucha menu.

  Along similar lines, I got these tiny maps.

Look at these two pictures. See what I mean about one extreme or the other?

I told Ken that these would have been great when the kids' dolls were going on trips and bringing back souvenirs.

  They're only a couple of inches wide, and they would look great in a 1/12 scale dollhouse.

Next is this little organizer. Again, sorry about the picture. It was the only one with Tammy for size comparison that even partially came out.

I think it could be used  for 1/12 or 1/6, depending on what you want to do with it.

  Before we get to the doll I ordered, here is probably my favourite thing from this order. Mini gummi bears! 

Are these not the cutest things ever?! 

They as a bag of 12.

  And finally, here's the doll I bought. She was really cheap. like, a couple of dollars. So I decided to go ahead and order her, and see what the quality is like. The doll came in several hair colours, but no red head. So, instead of the colour I was born with, I chose the colour I always wanted: black.

She came with her head off for some reason. I had to put it on myself. I took a little cramming to get it past the neck rim so it would stay on, but it wasn't hard.

 She has a pretty face.

And a very pronounced clavicle.

She can only turn her head. It can't tilt at all.

Her hair is not a terrible quality. I've seen much worse. 

It's quite long.

It's fairly silky and fully rooted on most of her head.

The rooting pattern is a bit wide spaced in places. But if you don't try to do a hair style on her, and let it hang as it is, it doesn't show.

Pulled to the side.

It is the kind of hair that looks a little greasy though.

But what about that articulation, eh?

Well, she's got a lot of it. Other than her neck, she has joints at her shoulders, upper arms, elbows, wrists. waist. hips. and knees.

Her joints are similar to Made to Move Barbie's. 

I meant to bring Made to Move from the house yesterday so we could compare. I forgot.

No ankle joints, unfortunately. She has those weirdly pointy legs/feet.

That waist joint doesn't really allow her to turn/twist very much.

This is it.

 She has a swivel joint at her hips, so she can sit in quite a few poses.

Sorry about the cat hairs. Cowboy pretty much lives in this room now.

She can't cross her legs though.

She has a lot more range in her arms. This is helped by the swiveling ball joint in her shoulders, and the turning joint in her upper arms, and the swiveling joints in her elbows. She can salute.

She can cover her mouth.

She can almost cross her arms.

But not quite.

She can even pat her head and rub her belly at the same time.

She looks graceful.

I was having a much easier time posing her right arm than her left. The left one just didn't seem to have the same flexibility. That's when I noticed that her upper arm joint was loose on the left arm. (You can see that above,)  It went back in place, but then, in checking it out, I found that her arm comes apart like a Monster High doll's.

I'm not sure if it is supposed to, but it does. It goes back just as easily though.

  So I like the stuff I got. The 'sword' looks a little cheap, but the other stuff is really nice. I love those gummi bears! The doll is worth the $2 something I paid for her, I'm not sure how much she would hold up to a child's play, but she's at least better quality than the fashion dolls that are sometimes available at Dollar Tree. And she is okay for an adult posing a doll for display or photos. 

  So that's it for today. See you tomorrow for some vintage goodness.