Story: Leaving Is The Hardest Part

    Regina heard Henry's feet clomping around upstairs; amazing how much noise a small child could make early in the morning. She almost smiled, but her face caught on a sudden wave of anxiety. This was the last time she'd be hearing his racket for two weeks! She quickly finished tying on the new swimsuit that she was trying out for the conference/mandatory work retreat.

    A strange object appeared in her doorway, followed by a tiny face and a much less tiny voice.

    "Mom...I brought you my pool noodle. The hotel will have a pool, right?" Henry looked up at her excitedly, "You can play with your friends from work!"

    Regina blinked at him, startled, "Oh...that's...very thoughtful, Henry...but I don't think they will let me bring a pool noodle on the airplane."

   Henry looked crestfallen, so Regina changed the subject, "Okay, dear, maybe they will have pool noodles at the resort? Anyhow, let's get you ready for kindergarten. Remember, you're going to stay with Granny afterward so be sure to pack your toothbrush into the bag I set out."

   "Granny! Yay!" Henry dropped the pool noodle and dashed off, leaving Regina sighing at the long foam tube on the floor, "Henry!" But while she would usually scold him for leaving things lying around, she picked it up herself this time. It really was sweet of him to think of her and wish her to have fun on her trip.

    After chasing down errant shoes and finally getting the correct toothbrush into the correct bag, Regina and Henry made it to kindergarten.

    "Regina, Henry, welcome. Go ahead and join the other children on the playground, Henry. We'll go inside in ten minutes."

    "Miss Frye, guess what? My mom is going to fly!"
    "Wow! Like a bird?"
    "No, like an airplane! And I won't see her again for a really long time!"

"Bye, Mom I love you."

"PLAYGROUND!"

"Hi, Henry! We're playing 'animals'! Want to come slide?"

"Don't worry, Ms. Mills, I'll make sure he is safe at school, and I'm sure he will be quite safe with his Granny."

   Regina nodded, but glanced back, "Of course, but I'm a mother. I'm going to worry anyway."

She watched Henry play with his friends for a moment longer, trying to reassure herself that leaving was perfectly fine. He was so young! But he was in safe hands with Granny and Miss Frye and the rest of her town friends and family. 

    Regina tried not to worry as she finished packing. 

She tried not to text Henry, Granny, and every single person in town as she waited for her flight. 

She tried not to wonder what Henry was doing during the entire 8 hour plane ride...

   ...but of course, that is exactly what she did! 

Costume Shopping

I only have a few dolls out right now, but they wanted to try on some costumes since it's almost Halloween! They managed to find a few that they liked. (be sure to check out my Instagram for more pictures of their adventures!)

Andrea: "That dress is perfect on you Anya!"
Anya: "Thank you! You look amazing as well!"

Melody: "HI LADIES!"

Melody: "Do you like my costume? Saving lives is so sexy! Also this floaty thing has room for candy! The only downside is that I have to run everywhere in slow motion."
Anya: "Oooooh candy!"

Melody: "OH ANYA I LOVE THAT MOVIE sing the song!"
Andrea: Oh no...

Andrea: Now I'll never get it out of my head! At least Anya has a good voice!

Introducing the Twins

     Hi, all! It's been quite a while since I last posted here, I know! I've had to put away all of my dolls this summer due to the heat and losing three air conditioning units in a row (whew, that was bad!). But I found a really sweet pair of dolls recently, and I couldn't resist grabbing a few photos of them with my phone...
    

"Hi, I'm Kasidy, and this is my brother, Avery! He's a genius, and also a doofus."

    Meet Avery and Kasidy! They're twins. Like most siblings, they're quite different, but they love each other just enough to torment each other constantly without really meaning harm. They live together, currently, while Avery works through his first year at architecture school and Kasidy works full-time at a popular amusement park.
    They both had today off, so they decided to take a break from studies and housework and go to the neighborhood park for some much-needed outdoor fun.

"Avery! I wasn't ready for that picture! Gimme that phone!"

"Hey, now I wasn't ready...!"

"Okay, now I'm ready!"

They're currently the only dolls I have out, and I don't have any other doll things (clothes, accessories, rooms, etc) so they may spend a lot of time outside this summer! Hopefully it won't be too long before I can dig their friends out of storage. 

My other news is, I now have an Instagram! I'm lightwavesdolls. I've never had a smartphone before, so this is very exciting!

Happy New Year from the Lightwaves Production Team!

  Even though Lightwaves hasn't officially started shooting, the cast has started to get to know each other during pre-production. Carina organized a New Years Party to help with that, along with a photoshoot.

 

Jennifer: "I feel kinda awkward being the only one here besides the host, Mom.
The photographer keeps following me."
Carina: "Don't worry, other people are going to show up. Have a little faith."
Jennifer: "I hope you're right."

       She was right! Eventually, other guests started trickling in. The photographer quickly snapped pictures, eager to impress these possible future TV stars. First, a complete stranger.

"My name is Felicity. I was told by the casting director to be here...this is the Lightwaves cast party, right?"

     Felicity and Jennifer struck up a conversation by the appetizers. Four more guests arrived, in shimmering, metallic gowns. Carina was delighted, it was the rest of her bar staff from the show, in matching outfits! All aside from Melody, who was dressed all in silver.

Melody: "I hope we're not late! We swung by the Costume department to pick out some evening wear! Those are our new uniforms!"
Carina: "I hope you got permission!"
Sarah: "Of course we did...we did, right?"

     Next, a Cadillac SUV pulled up and these guys piled out, reluctantly shoving each other into line for the photo, laughing and mostly good-natured carrying-on. 

Sam: "So, this is where the party's at, right?"

    Andrea walked in, alone. Melody rushed over to get in the photos with her.

Andrea: "Mel...is that my necklace?"
Melody: "I was keeping it safe for you!"
Andrea: "It was in my jewelry case!"

Melody: "Come on, smile! We look hot tonight!"
Andrea: "We sure do!"

    A blonde woman stepped up to the door in a magnificent ball gown. Sam walked over to help her get the door open, and she walked in. The room fell silent as her skirt billowed across the floor, and then people started to recognize her. It was Celeste, who would be playing the firefighter!

Celeste: "Hi, everyone! Happy New Year!"

    A few more unfamiliar faces showed up. Clearly, the casting director had been busy!

"Just point me to the champagne, darlings!"

"Am I at the right place? I thought Charlene said this was going to be a costume party?"

"I can't find my glasses."

    Carina was kept busy trying to corral everyone into a group photo. She finally gave up on dragging the boys away from the banquet and managed to get some of the women in one place...

    But then Jennifer had an idea. She texted the casting director, who texted everyone else. Within minutes, people started making their way into the main hall. The boys were still nowhere to be seen, but...

Success!

Happy New Year everyone! May 2017 bring you love and lovely doll things!

A Tight Living Arrangement

I bought a Totally Real- Barbie Forever fold up house used on ebay.

Welcome home!

Very few of the original items came with it, but it was in great shape, pretty cheap, and I really wanted it! Words cannot describe how long it has been, this search for a non-pink Barbie house.

Barbara asks "Where's all the pink?"

I mainly was attracted to the use-ability and small fold-down size for storage. I have very little Barbie furniture and no backdrops whatsoever that they can stand up in front of. It may be a while before I can make any, so I thought this was a nice compromise. It's a bit small for six (soon to be many more!) to live in, so...it may be one person's apartment eventually.

Staking out territory in the new place

"We were wondering if that was a bathroom or a closet. Confirmed, it is a bathroom IN a closet."

"Uh, guys, there's only one bed and it's this old futon..."

"Sharing is caring, Celeste! Who's in?"

"Uh, uh. I'm happy right here!"

*knock knock* "Hey, it's the guys! Since you girls have a house, we were wondering if we could come inside instead of sleeping out here with the bears..."

Andrea: "What do you think, should we let 'em in?"
Celeste: "Nah. Girls only."
Guys: "there are bears out here! Did we mention the bears?"

I haven't done much decorating besides setting up a few furnishings, and thinking about how to make a small backyard/garden area. I can't reach back there very well for posing and photos, but it can be viewed through the windows.

The garden bench. I'm thinking of adding some greenery around it.

A view from the bench

More shots of the house

In addition to the new arrival, I had another exciting doll-related thing happen today! My uncle showed up on the doorstep of my trailer with his arms loaded. Three boxes of GI Joes in combat and rescue gear! (and a random Barbie-sized horse). They are on loan to me to join my fast-growing family of dolls. I spent most of the afternoon squeeing over the teeny-tiny helmets, knives, climbing gear, medical kits, and other goodies in the boxes. I didn't even get any pictures, I was too overwhelmed by the sheer volume of awesome doll treasure that had suddenly shown up. The GI Joes themselves are of course, very articulated dolls, though in my admittedly biased opinion, not terrifically handsome. Some of the dolls fairly old, and I'm almost afraid to touch them, let alone pose and "play" with them! It's going to be a lot of fun to integrate them into a story, and I already have many many ideas gelling!

Mysteries and Fate

*tappetytaptapclicktap*

"And so, Mr. Matthews, that is why I did not attend the conference."

"Yeah, Cocoa, I'd fire me, too. Let's hope he doesn't."

"...ugh...I wish I'd never seen that guy."

*knock knock* "What? I'm not expecting any deliveries..."

*gasp* "What if it's him?"

"What if he followed me home?"

"What if he's like, a serial killer, or the Terminator, or something?"

"OH MY GOD I'M THAT GIRL THAT GETS HUNTED DOWN BY THE TERMINATOR."

"GO AWAY, I PROMISE NOT TO SAVE THE WORLD FROM THE MACHINE APOCALYPSE!"

"Oh this is ridiculous. It's probably just some pizza guy with the wrong door."

"But just in case it isn't...HEY, I AM GOING TO OPEN THE DOOR. I'M ARMED, so DO NOT TRY ANYTHING."

"WHOA AH I SURRENDER!"

Jayda: "Whoah. Hello. Who are you?"

"My name is Bradley. I'm looking for someone, and I think you may have seen him. He's about my height, dressed really strangely...he's not...not from around here. He's a foreigner. I really need to find him before he gets...lost."

Jayda: "What makes you think I've seen anyone strange? I just moved here. Everyone is strange."

Bradley: "Call it a hunch."

Jayda: "Well, I'm sorry. I have no idea where your friend is."

Bradley: "Tell you what. I'm going to take you to lunch tomorrow. Say, that place on Baker Street, around 1:30?"

"I don't know, tomorrow's not really good for me..."

"Mr. Bradley? Excuse me? Hello?"

"Okay, what was that all about?"

"Jayda, what have you gotten yourself involved in?"