Doll Room Tour on YouTube 2016 and Doll Rooms From the Past

Hey everyone! It's been a while since I've done a room tour, so I thought I'd post one on YouTube to share how my collection displays have changed. I also thought I'd post some pictures here for those of you who aren't interested in long videos. ;)

As I mention on YouTube, I'm planning on repainting my room this summer, so I'll be changing my displays and trying to downsize pretty majorly. (I think. Let's see how strong I can be in my resolve.) ;) I have some pictures I'd like to hang up, and at this point, I have almost no wall space left. Plus, after six years of collecting, I'm just flat running out of room. I want to reevaluate my collection, get rid of some of the things that aren't as special to me, and try to be a little more proactive in planning what else I purchase.

Besides feeling the need to downsize, I have several things I'm saving up for, including a possible trip to Arizona this fall to visit my best friend around my birthday. I also need to start saving for Mount Hermon next year and our church's Ladies Retreat. Oh, and I recently found out that one of my story locations in Trinidad, California is actually a rental house 200 feet away from the beach. I thought it would be super fun to save up and stay there some weekend. ;)

There are other things, like windows for our house, paying off some debts, swimming lessons for the girls, and more. And I'll admit it, I'm thinking about saving up for one of the Limited Edition Disney Store dolls that will hopefully be released for the live action version of Beauty and the Beast next year. I've never been able to afford a Disney Store LE doll yet. It would be so great if it worked out this time around. :D Of course, at this point I have no room for a LE doll...yet another reason for downsizing. ;)

If Hubby gets more hours in his new position this summer, that will help tremendously with some of these things, but I'd love to do what I can to help. I have so much. I don't really need it all.

So, here are a few pics from my room as it is currently.

My doll rooms with lights. :)

My toy and book shelves on our dresser.

Zelfs, Lalaloopsies, jewelry, and my favorite picture of me and Hubby.

Plush friends on the bed.

My Beauty and the Beast curio.

My little white shelf with extra books and my live action Cinderella collection.

My Frozen and Tangled shelves. 

This picture was taken by accident. (My phone often takes pictures without telling me.) I thought it looked kind of cool, though. My daughters and I decided it looked like a magical portal in my room. Who knew there was one there all along? ;)

So if you'd like more detail on any of these spots, feel free to stop by my YouTube channel and check out my room tour videos. You can see Part One HERE and Part Two HERE.

As I was working on these videos, I was curious about some of my previous displays, so I found some old blog posts with pictures and videos of my doll rooms/displays and how they've changed over the years. If you're interested in sharing my trip down memory lane, you can check out the following links. ;)

My Dolls (August 4th, 2010) ~ This was back at the very beginning of my doll collecting and blogging, in 2010. Here are the original girls from my 18" collection and their displays. This post also has my original "personality profiles" for each doll. ;) 

Thrift Store Find and a Rearranged Doll Room (September 23rd, 2010) ~ This was the first of many rearranging projects, about a month after the previous post. ;) It was a fun time to collect. I had almost nothing, so it was easy to find things for my dolls. Everything remotely doll-sized ended up coming home with me. ;) Thrift stores and garage sales were treasure troves and scavenger hunts in which I always found success. I can't even tell you how many things I now pass by that I would have snatched up in a second at this stage of my collecting.

My Updated Doll Rooms (September 1st, 2011) ~ The next post I found was a year later. In that amount of time, my doll accessories and collections had grown enormously. This was also my "computer desk as a doll room" stage. It was a great way to repurpose, especially since the computer desk was a free hand-me-down from a friend. Although at this time my focus was still primarily on my 18 inchers, I was starting to branch out into other doll lines. This was also when Belle's Bulletins was starting to gain momentum. 

Rearranging My Doll Rooms (January 9th, 2012) ~ This was the stage when my 18" doll rooms pretty much made up 90% of our room. ;) I had displays on both dressers and one in my newest repurposed doll room: our old entertainment center. You can't see it as much in this post, but it's more visible in the next one.

Hayden and Jenna's New Room (April 21st, 2012) ~ Wow, I didn't realize I'd had the rooms my dad made for this long. Four years? Time definitely flies by. This was the first of the three doll rooms my dad made for me. This original one sat on top of the previously mentioned entertainment center until the other rooms were built later that year. I remember how excited I was to have my first "official" doll room. :)

Just in Case You Thought I Was Being Lazy... (July 17th, 2012) ~ This was one of my typical apologetic posts, explaining why you guys hadn't heard from me in so long. ;) The reason? What else? Rearranging! (Among other things.) ;) Even though things were pretty cluttered at this point, it was one of my favorite periods of collecting. I loved all of my BFC Ink dolls in their fancy dresses, my doll rooms, and everything. I'd forgotten all about my Pleasant Company Samantha I had for a while. I think she was one of the dolls I ended up selling. Shortly after this post, I got really overwhelmed by the amount of big dolls I had and sold several of them. You can also see by the inelegant plastic drawer unit full of stuff that my tiny toy collections were growing as well. 

In this post, you also get a bonus look at my daughters' playroom. :)

My New Doll Rooms, Post #1! (September 1st, 2012) ~ This was the first in a series of posts I did right after my dad finished my other two doll rooms. I'm only going to link to this first one, because each of the posts in the series have links leading to the next. I had so much fun filling these new doll rooms. It was great to look back and see how I originally had them arranged. ;) This also was one of the most in-depth looks at my doll displays and accessories. I took pictures of almost every inch of space. ;)

The End of the School Year and a Special Tour (May 24th, 2013) ~ This was the only post with pictures of my room I could find for this stage of collecting, and it also includes a tour of my whole house. (Yet another fun batch of memories. Our house has changed a lot, too!) This was the "white shelves covering the windows but allowing me to have lots more stuff" stage. ;) While it was nice having so much display space, I eventually got tired of not being able to see my window, and I was constantly worried about sunlight damage to the toys and books on those shelves. My room also started to feel very closed and cave-like during this stage, since there were shelves everywhere and almost no wall space at all. 

New Doll Room Vids Up on YouTube (April 30th, 2014) ~ This short little post has no pictures, but has links to YouTube videos of my room during 2014. There weren't too many changes overall, aside from a few more white shelves added and more stuff collected. ;) You can see how my interests grew and changed to include even more doll and toy lines.

New Room Tour Video Up and Your Questions Needed (January 28th, 2015) ~ And here is an example of my collecting at its craziest. My philosophy at this stage was "if you have it, display it." I felt it was silly to have things stored away and never enjoy them. While I still hold to this point of view overall, I found that having this much stuff out on display just got too overwhelming, which is why I recently went through things and decided to store some of it. I still only store what I can fit in my room, and I try to rotate things occasionally. As crazy as this stage was, though, it was also a LOT of fun to see all of the bright colors and cheerful faces every time I entered my room. 

Thankfully, I have a very patient husband who is not creeped out by dolls. ;)

***

There are probably other posts with pictures that I missed, but this gives you a basic rundown of the changes through the past six years. Hope you enjoyed the memories as much as I did. ;)

How have your collections changed through the years? Do you ever look back and regret a doll or toy you no longer have? What direction do you see your collecting going in the future?

Did You Miss Me? ;)

Hello to all of my lovely readers! How was your January? I hope your year got off to a great start.

I wanted to thank all of you for being so understanding about my month-long hiatus. It was just what I needed to regroup and take care of some long-overdue projects. I really missed being here, though, and I'm happy to be back. :)

As usual, I had way too many things on my "to do" list for January, so I didn't quite accomplish everything I'd hoped, but it still was a pretty productive month.

So, just what did I do with all my spare time, you may ask?

1. I adopted a unicorn. This little cutie was in Barnes and Noble. I had a gift card, and I couldn't resist his cute little face. He's now named after my unicorn character in my book, which I can't share with you guys just yet. So here, he'll be referred to as "M." He came with a fun little guide on how to raise a unicorn. ;)

I'm thinking it would be fun to take him along on some of my trips. "M" the traveling unicorn. ;)

2. I installed lighting in my doll rooms. My mom found a set of six little LED lights at Costco that were on coupon for only $15 plus tax last month. She bought them for her doll rooms, and they looked great! So, of course, I decided to go to Costco and snag a set for myself. The lighting is so horrible in my room. Now I'll be able to take much better pictures and share more of the intricate details of my doll rooms.

I forgot to take a picture of the lights in their packaging before I opened them, but here's the empty package (just in case any of you want to try and find them).

Here's what the rooms looked like before the lights (and before I tidied up the rooms). ;)

And here they are with the new lights. 

They even have a remote so I don't have to push them on individually. I can also choose four different levels of lighting. I can't wait to do some photo shoots in there now! :)

Here's a closer look at the three rooms:

I love how natural the lighting is now. I've never been able to get this clear of a picture in my doll rooms before. :) 

The only downside to these lights is that the self-adhesive pads they came with didn't hold very well. The lights kept dropping no matter how hard I tried to keep them up. Yesterday, Hubby picked up some strong double-sided tape to help keep them in place. So far they haven't had a problem anymore.  Just FYI. :)

This is the stuff he got. It's Scotch "Indoor Mounting Tape."

3. I did a major overhaul of my collection. We're talking drawers, closets, and every single shelf. I'd been feeling the need to go through things for a while, partially because I was overwhelmed with everything I had, and partially because I was just flat running out of space. I'm also trying to save up for Mount Hermon again this year, so I needed to sell some things to save up for that. (About $400 more to go and I'm paid in full.) :)

A look at my living room during the crazy eBay/Craigslist/local children's clothing and toy store phase. ;) (And actually, this is less than half of the stuff I sold.) I still have a few more listings to do, but not nearly as many as I did before.

My room is still full of stuff, but it's much more manageable and organized. A YouTube room tour will be coming your way in the next month or so. In the meantime, here are a couple of pictures.

Sorry for the less-than-stellar quality, guys. When I do a more official room tour, I'll use a lamp for extra lighting. ;)

Oh, and if you want a laugh, check out my "Tone Deaf Belle" video I just uploaded to YouTube. I'm in the process of listing my large Disney Store singing dolls on eBay, and while taking pictures and checking out their singing features, I discovered that Belle had a little...problem...staying on key. ;) She also (rather creepily) decided to start singing on her own without waiting for me to press the button on her palm. :{


4. I heard back from all of my editing friends and am now self-editing my book based on their recommendations. Whew, this is a crazy process! It takes a lot of thought, prayer, and time. Your prayers would be appreciated as I evaluate each suggestion and decide what is best for my book. I will be submitting my manuscript to two potential agents sometime next week. Eep! I'm excited and terrified at the same time. ;) I'll keep you guys posted on my progress.


5. I started Skinny Jeans again. After taking a break from the gym in December, I returned for another Skinny Jeans program at the beginning of January. It was wonderful to get back to exercising. Even better, I didn't lose all that much progress after a crazy holiday month, so that was encouraging. :)

I won't be vlogging through my experience this time, at least not on a regular basis. Still, I'm looking forward to learning more, making exercise and eating right the norm, and continuing to grow stronger and healthier. :)


6. I cleaned my house. Hooray! I've been so disgusted by how trashed my house has been. It's amazing how much stress a messy house adds to my life. I try to ignore it, but it's always there in the back of my mind. But now, it's so wonderful to get up in the morning and come out to a spotless living room and kitchen. We had company over this past weekend, and my doll club is coming over this Wednesday for our monthly meeting, so cleaning was imperative.

I'm not sure how long this phenomenon will last, so I took some pictures to document it. You may never see it this clean again. ;)

My living room. The quality's pretty bad, but at least I didn't have to pixelate anything this way. ;)

My 80s and 90s toy curio. :)

My computer desk, where all the blogging/writing/artsy magic happens. ;)

Okay, I do still have this pile of tubs to go through. It's all paperwork that needs to either be filed, shredded, or stored. Sigh.

The dining room, with Little Gal and Middle Gal playing an after school game of Nertz. :)

My kitchen. This is the cleanest it's been in a while, because my washer overflowed last Wednesday night. :} I had to scrub the entire floor and throw out a bunch of stuff that got ruined. I guess that's one way to get motivated to clean for company. ;)

Our hallway.

Our Frozen bathroom.

You've already seen pics of my room, and the girls rooms are...ahem...not exactly on the clean side at the moment, so I think that will conclude the tour pics for now. ;)

Oldest Gal stayed home with a sore throat today, so she's a little out of sorts at the moment, anyway.

7. I purchased a Post Office Box. Yep, it's official! I now have a PO Box for anyone who is interested in sending me fan mail. I have a nice blank spot on my wall behind my computer where I will hang up any notes that are sent my way.

You can reach me at:

   Hannah Prewett
   PO Box 87
   Anderson, CA 96007

I have plans to do a "Fan Mail Friday" post at the end of each month. In that post, I will share all of the mail I received for the month. (So if you'd rather not have me share your name, please let me know in your letter!) I will not be able to respond to fan mail, but if you include any questions in your letters, I will answer them in my post.

Also, I'm planning on doing a small giveaway each month specifically for fan mail. Anyone who sends me something will have their name put in a drawing for a free little prize.

Talking about themed posts leads to my next accomplishment for the month.


8. I brainstormed and came up with some fun future post ideas.  Because of space issues, changes to my budget, and other factors, I'm going to have to change things up just a bit here on the blog. I'll still do doll and toy reviews, but I won't be able to review every new thing that comes out (as much as I'd love to). I also want to bring back some of the other things I used to do. Here are some of the ideas I came up with:

  -Fan Art Friday: I'll share my latest art projects.

  -Thrifty Thursday: I'll share tips and tricks for finding great treasures in thrift stores and other secondhand stores. Other times, I'll share my latest thrift store finds.

  -Photography-themed posts (sorry, no fancy name for these): I've been so focused on my review posts that I haven't spent as much time doing doll photo shoots. Not only do these improve my photography skills, but they help me appreciate what I already have.

  -Writer's Corner: I'm almost 100% sure that I'll be shutting down Ramblings of a Fairy Tale Fangirl. I'm finding it a bit of a challenge to keep up with both blogs, and I have eventual plans for a tie-in blog for my books. So I decided that instead I'll transfer what I've already written over there to this blog. Then, in the future, I'll share writing-themed posts here every once in a while.

  -Media Musings: I'd love to get back to doing occasional movie reviews, especially now that the girls are older and can share their perspectives on the ones we watch together.

  -Doll Guest Posts: When Tess, Maggie, and Belle wrapped up their blogs, it was mentioned that they'd share guest posts here on Never Grow Up every once in a while. As I'm sure you've noticed, that never happened...for a number of reasons. Most of them related to a lack of organization from yours truly. I might as well say it before Maggie does. ;) Anyway, I'd really like to be better at incorporating these in the future.

Of course, I will intersperse these with my regular doll and toy review posts, posts about trips I take, and alerts about sales and new releases. I'm purposely not committing to a specific schedule for most of these so I still have some flexibility. At this point, I'm committing to at least one post of some kind a week. If I'm able to do more, I will, but I don't want to promise more than I can feasibly do.

Things I'm Still Working On:

As I said, I didn't finish everything I set out to do. Here are a few things that are still in progress.

1. Email Overhaul. Blech. My email is such a mess. I think I deleted around 2,000 spam/social media/outdated emails yesterday, which will give you an idea of why I've been so overwhelmed. Again, I apologize to all of you poor souls who have emailed me this past year or so and have never heard from me. In the next few weeks I will slowly be going through and responding to overdue emails.

I also went through and changed the settings on most of my social media accounts so I no longer get a gazillion emails every time someone looks at something I post. ;) I was getting emails every time someone pinned one of my Pinterest pins, every time someone liked, commented, or posted on my Facebook, and so on. I'm trying to declutter my email as much as possible so I can focus on reader emails.

2. Website Creation. I'm currently working on an official website that will connect to all of my social media and my blog. This won't change anything here, but it will be a nice easy way to tell people how to find me online. It will basically be an online bookmark with links to everywhere you can find me on the Internet. It's a bit beyond my level of computer expertise, though, so I'm working with my brother and husband, doing some research, and taking it slow. I'll let you know when it's ready. :)

3. Blog Update. Some of you may have noticed that a few of the pages I used to have on the top of my blog are missing. I'm in the process of transferring some of my pages to posts. Eventually, I'll have a page up there with links to my former pages. In keeping with the decluttering that has been the theme of the past month, I'm just trying to clear a few pages that aren't as relevant to my current interests and direction. I also want to clear some room for new pages.

Don't worry, nothing will disappear completely. I'm also saving all of the comments from the pages I'm removing and adding them to the content of the posts, so all previous conversations will be saved as well. ;)

There might be a few other minor changes here and there, but nothing too earth-shattering. ;) I'll try to let you know what I'm doing before or as I'm doing it. If you're curious about something or can't find it, just let me know! :)

And don't worry, my Doll and Toy Reviews page and the other pages with lists of links aren't going anywhere. :)

I think that's about all the news for now. My posting may be a bit sporadic at the beginning of this month since my focus is on getting my book editing finished, but I'm looking forward to getting back into regular posting. :)

Have a wonderful week, everyone! I'll talk to you all again soon.

Toy Finds Video Up on YouTube, Plus Other Fun Finds

Hey everyone! Today I found a few fun things at Walmart before I headed in to the gym, so I did a short little video on my YouTube channel. Reviews will follow shortly here on the blog. :) In the meantime, here's a little preview. ;)

Sigh. I really need to remember to take pictures to use as thumbnails for these videos. There were NO flattering choices this time around. ;)

While I was at Walmart, I took a few pictures of some of the other fun things waiting in the toy aisles. ;)

As most of you know, I'm not a fan of the Mattel versions of the Disney dolls, but I still thought this set was cute. I'd be tempted to get it for my Disney Store Kristoff and Anna. ;)

Do any of you remember the cute little Berenguer baby dolls that were around stores in the early 2000s? Well, they're back at Walmart for $4.97 each.

They're right around five inches tall. I took a picture with my hand so you could see the scale. The detail on these little jointed all-vinyl dolls is really nice, especially for something so inexpensive. I'm holding out for the "sucky lip" doll. I saw it at Walmart earlier and didn't pick it up, but will snag it if I see it again.

The Lalaloopsy Newborns were there with their new color schemes. Here's Snoozy and Chilly...

...Berry Sweet and Shy...

...and Cheery and Silly. :) They're all the exact same molds as the first line, but each one has different colors.

And hooray for Series 4 Lalaloopsy Tinies! :D This is the package I ended up taking home with me. :)

Here were the other two nine packs that were there.

And here's where I found my Rosabella Beauty. This is the first time I've seen her AND Darling Charming in stores.

The toy aisles have been pretty sparse in our town recently, so it was a nice surprise to see all of these goodies today. :)

I'll be back soon with the Lalaloopsy Tinies and Rosabella reviews, so stay tuned! :)

Shoppies YouTube Review is Up! :)

Hey everyone! Just wanted to let you know that our YouTube review of the Shoppies dolls is up on my YouTube channel. You can see it here: 

This was our first YouTube review, so it was kind of a learning process for all of us, but we had a lot of fun doing it, and hope you guys enjoy watching it. :)

Funko Mystery Minis Frozen Figures!

Okay, so this blogging hiatus isn't as much of a hiatus as I thought it would be.  There are just too many things to share with all of you! ;)  I did get a chapter and a half written yesterday on my book, and I'm planning on writing more later this evening, so I am getting some stuff done there, too. ;)

Today ended up being more of a running errands day than a writing day.  While I was out, I found some brand new Frozen-themed Funko Mystery Minis for $5.95 each at Barnes and Noble! :D

Lol, I couldn't tell my camera had taken this picture, but thankfully it did! ;)

Since I haven't had the chance to put together my "Ask Beastsbelle" vlog yet, I thought I'd do a box opening video, just for fun, to tide you over. ;)  You can see it HERE. 

Warning: (which maybe should have come before the link) I discovered I am really bad at taking a video with one hand while simultaneously opening a box one-handed. (How do all those YouTubers do it?)  Be prepared for random dropping of items, shaky camera, and my commentary about how hard it is to open this stuff and record at the same time. ;)

I also tried turning the camera to record myself from the back of my phone, but couldn't see what was recording.  It's not the most flattering shot of me, but since I keep talking about "keeping it real" here on the blog, I guess I shouldn't be all worried about my appearance. ;)

If you'd rather not suffer through my novice video, here are pictures of the two figures I got:

Marshmallow and Kristoff! :D

I think this is probably my favorite figure version of Marshmallow I've ever seen.  They captured him perfectly! :)

Other views: 

I'm so excited I got Kristoff!!  I even said that in the video before I opened them. ;)  I especially love that they posed him with his guitar.

Other views: 

I hope you enjoyed this short little post and my rather random video! ;)  Have a wonderful day!  I'm almost done with another short post for Friday for all of you to enjoy.  

On Friday afternoon, we'll be leaving for our annual birthday trip for the girls, and won't return until Monday, so things will probably be pretty quiet around here during that time.  I'll try to check in and at least publish comments so you can all enjoy them. :)