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Friday, June 5, 2020

Back Again!

Thanks to posts from Monster Crafts and Jayes Doll Space, I have been inspired to begin blogging again. I can't believe it has been a little over a year since I have posted. While I haven't been actively blogging, I have been actively adding to my doll collection. Plus I have done quite a few reroots to create new characters. And the doll stories have been writing themselves in my head, but I now need to get the down on paper, get the sets built and take the photos to tell the stories. 

As far as life goes, I have been maintaining my weight loss, but I am now trying to lose some more. Because of the weight loss and healthier eating, my health has improved a great deal and I am so happy about that. My eldest daughter graduated from college last May (2019) and has moved back home. This has necessitated moving things around in the house to accommodate the return of her furniture and other items from her apartment! My youngest is still at home and going to a local community college. She was planning on transferring to Michigan State University this fall, but the COVID-19 virus is delaying that plan for her at least one semester. I have also recently been "dating". I met him online and most of our dates and communication have been via text and phone conversations, however, after  a little over a month of communicating this way, we did decide to meet in person and have now been on a couple of dates. Who knows, I may have more to tell on that at a later date!

Since no post would be complete without some dolly pictures, I will share some of my recent reroots with you!

This is a MTM Dancer reroot project. She originally lost her Curvy body to another doll, but I put on a regular MTM Body.  The doll on the right is a spare head that I rerooted in Midnight Blue and put on an Integrity toys body.

Here they are again looking at the hair from a rear view

The girls are joined here by another MTM dancer who head was rebodied to a WWE body and she was given a hair cut.
 
I also rerooted a BMR 1959 doll (Kira mold) I gave her a pipecleaner wave and bangs

The rear view of her hair

The next doll I decided to reroot was the Purple Top MTM doll. You can see her in three styles here

The first doll is on her original body with her hair boil washed and straighted with a flat iron. The middle doll is using Saran hair and she is rebodied to a Curvy MTM pale body. The last girl has a yard reroot and is on the new standard jointed body.

The process of doing a yarn reroot was very interesting for me and actually a bit more involved that a reroot done with dolly hair. Therefore, I am going to share some of the steps. 

The first step is to root the head all over in yarn. because the yarn is so thick, you don't add it to every hole and it is done using a single strand of yarn for each hole using a darning style long needle and pulling it all the way through the head and knotting it at the end.

It ended up looking like this. My hands hurt after completing it.

I then began the process of brushing the yarn with a fine toothed pet brush, and straightening it with a flat iron and trimming it as I went along. The brushing out of the yarn thins out the yarn significantly.

In the end, this is how she looked. I actually think she turned out beautifully, but this process was actually much harder that using dolly hair to reroot! The nice part is you can end up with a wide variety of hair colors and the end result is easy to manipulate.

Well, that is it for now! I hope to begin posting on a regular basis!


32 comments:

  1. Oh Lordy, I'll bet your hands DID hurt after rerooting that one doll! Just looking at that makes my hands hurt! She came out lovely, though; you chose a very becoming shade of red. Blessings and best of luck to you on the dating front!

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    1. Thanks for commenting! I really liked all of the variation of the red yarn and how that turned out.

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  2. You're back! Yay! We've missed you, but sometimes we need a time off, to come back with more energy. I'm glad to be part of what's inspired you to be back, it means I'm doing something right with my blog.

    I love your reroots, specially the midnight blue one. That's the color I would like to dye my hair, but I don't think I would be constant mantaining it. You have a bunch of new dolls, and lots of frankendolly experiments, for what I can see. Hope I can see more in the near future, I'm very intrigued by those joints you got for the vitiligo doll.

    I see that your personal life has kept you busy. I'm glad you found someone and that you are happy with how things are going between the two of you. Too bad that your daughter can't go to college this fall, but that means you can spend more time together.

    I'm so happy to see you're back. Take care and have a nice weekend.

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    1. Good to be back! And you know me, this is just the tip of the iceberg, lol! I have been taking photos, so I will post more soon!

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  3. I like the color variations in the yarn re-root, it turned out great:@)
    http://www.diybarbieblog.com/

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    1. Thank you Lynn, and welcome to my blog. I am following your blog now too!

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  4. Welcome back! Life does take over sometimes. You did a great job with the re-roots. I really like the yarn re-root. Very nice! Glad you are back to posting. I'll be getting the notices so I don't miss anything.

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    1. Thanks, glad you liked the reroots. I am working on my dios too. Now I understand why it takes so much time to get a story together!

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  5. Welcome back :) You have been busy. Love the colours in the last dolls hair. Wow, that must have been hard work indeed.

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    1. Thanks and glad you stopped by again. Hope to post more soon!

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  6. Witaj Phyllis :-)
    Tak miło Cię widzieć ponownie na blogu! Martwiłam się o Ciebie i zaglądałam, czy nie publikujesz postów...
    Cieszę się, że pokazujesz nowe lalki, reroot i mam nadzieję, że miło dalej spędzisz z nami czas.
    Z nami i nie tylko... jak sądzę :))) Randki są fajne i życzę powodzenia :)))

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    1. So glad to be back and see some of my old friends are still here too. I hope to post at least once a month, maybe more!

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  7. That is an amazing collection of reroots. You've been busy! The yarn one turned out especially lovely.

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    1. Thanks! Glad you are liking my reroots. I have done a few more too. I do love how the yarn one turned out as well, but it was actually the most work!

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  8. Oh Phyllis.... we've missed you! Good to know you've gotten your life back on track and that your family is well and congrats on that new guy in your life!!!!! So very happy to have you back in the dolly universe. I enjoyed this tutorial. Looking forward to more posts! Big hugs!!!

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    1. Hi April, it is good to be back! I am still getting things together, but I plan to post a lot more often!

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  9. Oh wow, it's so great to see you back! I've also been quite bad about keeping up with the blog as well, life is just too busy for me, but I may just have to do a "catch up" post to say hi like you did. :). I always love hearing about how your daughters are doing and what they are up to. It must be nice to have a full house again (or not!);). That is great that you have maintained your weight loss, how wonderful! Also exciting that you have started to date again. I wish you the best of luck in both of those worlds. I think your new dolls are lovely. I love your 3 purple top reroots...who knew they could all look so different! I've always wanted to try a yarn hair reroot...maybe some day! :)

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    1. Thanks Farrah! Glad to see you still out here in the blogging world. Still catching up on other posts in all the various mediums -- Facebook, Blog, Instagram, Flickr . . . so many platforms. How are your girls doing? They much be getting big. I am sure you have your hands full.

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  10. Lovely girls, and such great hair. I didn't realise you could get the yarn hair to look so smooth, it looks really nice.

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    1. The yarn was probably the hardest to do, but there is so much more you can do with the yarn plus so many colors and textures. I hope to try to do some more.

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  11. Thanks, Linda! And so glad you didn't give up on your dolls. I will try to keep you entertained with my dolly antics. I definitely have more dolls to show!

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  12. I would never have the patience for rerooting.

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  13. Hi, Phyllis! Good to hear from you. Glad to hear you are enjoying life.

    Your re-roots look great - especially the yarn-haired purple top MTM. I look forward to seeing your upcoming experiments.

    I'm returning to blogging, too. I've got post ideas wanting OUT, lol. The City Style Barbie I won from you years ago, she's demanding a photo spread. She's such a lovely doll, how can I refuse her?

    Here's to thriving in spite of 2020. Best wishes.

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    1. Yay! Can't wait to see some posts from you!

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  14. Welcome back, Phyllis! Yes, thanks to Monster Crafts for calling us back into the blogging world again :D I actually did want to blog again months ago but my dog passed away and I lost the interest for a while. But I'm back, too! After I think 9 months! And it's so good to see you, one of the blogs I enjoy reading, back here again! Such a lovely feeling..
    And I agree about the yarn rerooting. I've done a few and gave up ahhaha But I think I love the results and I'd probably do some again... but not sure when..
    Again, dear, lovely to see you around again, and hey...dating... even better news! Take good care always, Phyllis! xoxo, shasha

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  15. Looking forward to seeing new posts from you too!

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  16. Great to see you again! :)
    I love all the makeovers you did on dolls but Lea with yarn hair is absolutely my number one. :)

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  19. Bon retour, I am happy to see you again with all your pictures ....

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  20. Hi! I have a question about the MTM Dancer body swap. Which body did you use? is it the yoga floral plants barbie?. I'll appreciate any info about it. Thanks!

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