Ken, But Wait, There's More: Dolls

  Finally, a post that isn't  all about Ken, although my life is right now. He is home, and  keeping Fuzzy and me very busy. It's  been super hot, so he has been sapped by the heat, as have I. We were under a heat advisory all week, so we went to Emma's house to  hang out  in her air conditioning a couple of days. He has his first real outpatient therapy this week. Temperatures are supposed to drop a bit, so hopefully he will be feeling more up to it. We did some stuff at home, but generally it was just so hot that he was weak, and I didn't want to put a drain on him. Today we did a bit more, as it's a little cooler.

  But, what you're really here for is dolls. I was out shopping for a  blood pressure cuff, etc. this week, and walked through the clearance and toy aisles at Walmart. Normally I don't like to encourage Walmart shopping, but there were a few good clearance things, and some nice dolls.

  As for the dolls, I saw that Walmart now has Naturalistas dolls. I showed you some from Target in a post last year. 

They also had the fashion packs.

I love the nightie.

  They also had a line called Latinistas, which I assume are by the same company. 

They are also very pretty dolls, and worth checking out. Both series of dolls were priced at $12.97 each. They also had the Naturalistas clothing packs.

  I also saw a couple of very articulated Fresh dolls.

 Both were good looking dolls, one being male and the other female. The articulation looked good, and they had nice faces. 

  There was a line called Fresh. Not sure if they're related. The hair on the blonde one is great.

 

  There was also a line of dolls I've never seen called Luv, which stands for Limitless, Unique, Vibrant, and their accompanying fashion packs.. They were interesting looking dolls. I'm not sure if they have any extra some articulation. I liked them though. 

  

There is a Ron in the currant line of Harry Potter dolls! Yay! 

Ron was always my favoutire character, and he gets the short end of the stick. I'm glad to see him making an appearance.

The VIP dolls looked a little cheap and ugly.

But the current line of Disney Descendants are pretty cool

The selection of Mini Brands was great. They had the books, shoes, purses, make sets, and what seemed an endless selection of others. I think at least half of one side of the aisle was Mini Brands. There were so many I'd love to buy, but they are so expensive. And of course, we've had no income for 7 weeks now.

 

 

  

  There were some great Mini Verse sets. Have I mentioned that I love tiny stuff?

  The Harry Potter Mini Verse sets were great too. Some of the stuff was so detailed. I love this stuff!

In the clearance aisle they had Rainbow High shoes and purse singles for only $2.00, and Mini Bratz for only $4.00. I had to go back today. The Rainbow High stuff was all gone, but the Mini Bratz were only $1 each!

  Yeah. Okay. That one display doll fell off while I was looking at them. Honestly. It really fell off on it's own.

 Which is not to say I didn't take it home with me.

   That's it. Ken keeps Fuzz and I busy, so I don't have much time any more. This post took three writing sessions. Sorry there were no photos. If I have to go back, (which I do, to return the blood pressure cuff I got.), maybe I will get some pictures. 

Doll-A-Day 2023 #172: Hogsmeade Harry

  How are you all doing? For the second day in a row Ohio is under an air quality alert, because we have finally received the residual smoke from the Canadian wildfires. According to the Air Quality Index, 0 to 50 is considered okay, and today the air quality is about 149 here. Ken and I didn't even go work at the house yesterday because I'd have to be outside sifting the bags of rubble he'd bring out. We did go do a few things, and on the way it looked like this.

That's somewhere around noon, and that's not fog, people.

  On to today's doll. Yesterday we saw Hogsmeade Hermione, and today, SURPRISE! It's Harry Potter himself, (in the form of Daniel Radcliff).

Hogsmeade Harry was made in 2003. He is about 10 or 11 inches tall, and uses the same body as the smaller High School Musical male dolls.

  This doll is a pretty good likeness of Daniel Radcliff.

 

Of course, he also has Harry's famous lightening bolt shaped scar, even if it does look like he drew it on with lipstick or something.

He has Daniel Radcliff's blue eyes, rather than the green eyes Harry was famous for having in the books. In the first movie Daniel Radcliff's eyes were tinted green using CGI, but in subsequent sequels the idea was dropped.

  Hermione has some features like a twist waist, tiltable head, swiveling shoulders, and bend knees, that make her more interesting to pose.  Harry is stuck with a very standard body, with a head that turns, arms that can move up and down, and legs that can move back and forth, but not bend.

 

So Hermione gets to take the lead and do all the interesting stuff, on top of being smarter than Harry.

"Look Harry! Over there!" "Where?" " There!" "I can't see. I don't have my glasses."

  He attempts to make up for his lack of posability by having nice details like a very detailed hair sculpt.

Not sure about that paint job. He has a weird line around his sculpted hair, and specks of paint all over his ears.

He did originally have glasses, but mine are missing, leaving big holes in Harry's head.

  He has his original red t-shirt, which closes in the back with Velcro.

And his jeans. They have a stitched fly and pockets.

 

He also has pockets in the back. His pants also close with Velcro.

Lastly he has black tennis shoes.

  Harry came in a box made to look like he was in Honeydukes sweet shop. He would have originally come with his school robes, a grey jacket, and a Marauder's Map. The back of his box had cutouts that could be used to make two sided, (if flat), sweets packages, like a chocolate frog, a box of Bertie Botts, and three others. Why they couldn't have made the pictures so that they could be folded into three dimensional packages, I don't know. I guess then you'd realize they could have done that all along, and you'd feel cheated when you get those cardboard accessories that you have to fold up yourself, when you buy a Barbie.

  That's today's doll. See you again tomorrow, alas, not for the Hogsmeade Ron doll because THEY DIDN'T MAKE ONE!! But we won't go into THAT again!

Doll-A-Day 2023 #171: Hogsmeade Hermione

   Today's doll Is Hermione Granger.

  This particular Hermione is Hogsmeade Hermione, from 2003.There was also an accompanying Hogsmeade Harry. They were released to coincide with the "Prisoner of Azkaban" movie. As ended up being par for the course, there was NO Ron Weasley. I will spare you from another of my rants about how Ron was my favourite character in the books, and how the character got cheated out of the spotlight at every turn in the movies, and with the dolls. Most of his best stuff from the books was left out, blah blah. Also: J.K. Rowling! "Separate the art from the artist. Separate the art from the artist..." Anyway!

  Hermione would have originally come with her robes, a time turner necklace, and a Honeydukes bag. Her box pictured her in Honeydukes sweetshop.

Hermione is about 10 inches tall. She has a very similar body to the smaller High School Musical  Gabriella dolls.

  Mine is second hand, so she is only wearing her original hooded sweater and corduroy pants, as well as grey shoes.

They're Barbie tennis shoes made in dark grey plastic.

  I like her sweater. It has real pockets.

And it's really a 'pull over your head' sweater, with no Velcro opening in the back, and no hole in the hood to accommodate her big hair.

  She has some interesting articulation. She is jointed at the neck, shoulder and hips, and also has a swivel waist, and bendable knees. Her arms can also swivel outward.

Unfortunately, she can't put her hands in those realistic pockets!

I found the right leg seemed to bend and hold a pose more than the other leg, but that could just be because she has a worn out leg. 

  She can also tilt her head up and down a bit.

And she can lean it to the side.

    The doll isn't a bad likeness of actress Emma Watson, who played Hermione. 

  But while she looks okay from the front, she has a very strange head shape in profile!

Luckily that's hidden by her big Hermione hair.

   That's today's doll. Who will we see tomorrow?