Playing with dolls: what did you do with your doll today that made you happy? <3

Unstrung Ghost Moth girl, her torso any way but NOT all her 6 limbs, that magnetic limb system and stringing per limb with the elastic knot in that joint is intimidating, not something I want to tackle just now yet!
Anyways, strung up all her parts, also her fiddly bits of wings and shoes etc. in the opened-up shed since the weather is perfect today, and gave them all a few layers of MSC. This way when time and mood strike later on in the season I can start on painting her

 

Finally had a small break from school work so I worked on Minka and Saga's face ups! I managed to get them 95% ready, still need to do the final coats of sealant, gloss and glue on lashes. I'm happy to have my favorite girls complete again (soon)

 

I brought two of my dolls to my first meetup in months.

 

I’ve been working on a complete revamp of my PicotPrince Makoto…new resin fox ears to blush, a new kitsune inspired faceup, a new wig (with specially made forest-boy extensions,) and two new yukatas in fox print fabrics. Today was the day to put all these pieces together for his first photo shoot. It’s like having a brand new doll!

 

Beautiful ou

Beautiful outfit!! Well done!!

 

I took Asuna to London for a photoshoot. Asuna is a Dollfie Dream vinyl doll with a piercing gaze and optional elf ears. She's wearing the recently re-released Volks Prayer Girl set.

Omg we had an epic day.

First stop: Leadenhall Market. You might have seen it featured in the first Harry Potter movie. So now it is forever on the tourist trail.

Man taking photo of human lady wearing fashionable clothes. Not interesting to the public.

Man taking photo of 58cm tall doll (i.e. me).

OMFG what is he doing!!!!???

Fortunately everyone was really positive here and I had a really long chat with a lady who wanted to know everything about her, how many other dolls I have etc. etc. Also some Japanese tourists liked our Japanese bag and of course Asuna.

I got a few good photos there. She also stood up on a barrel for a while, so some tourists got an interesting holiday snap.



Later I went to Brick Lane and didn't get nearly so noticed. If anyone is in London this offers many excellent backdrops for doll photography. Plus we found this terrific scale book in a nearby trendy stationery store.

 

I miraculously had the time, energy, motivation, AND great natural lighting today all at once so I took a bazillion doll photos. So many came out great and it felt nice to have some good quality doll time today. Also another dolly joy was that I went to a doll meet this weekend, despite feeling like crap all last week. So glad I pushed through and went anyway.

 

I took all my dolls today and lined them up by height - I've taken plenty of group shots or have them all hang out together but I don't think I've set them up like this before. It's fun to still find new ways to look at them still!

 

I bought my doll a black train and veil set and she looks so mysterious now! I can't stop looking at her

 

I have been starting on my Halloween pictures for October with my dolls. I am being very creative this year and trying new concepts with my scenes, I am anxious to see how they will turn out. I am not going to upload them from my camera until I finish all of the photoshoots for Scary Dolltober. I think they are going to look nice and spooky!

 

Got a small package today full of doll goodies from DDE. Just bits and pieces of things I needed, but it was so nice to have a little unboxing and dress up party today.

 

I got nameless dolly new eyes and she now looks like a much bigger doll. Can you tell she's only 17 cm??



I also made her some tiny socks (though they can't be seen in the photo, as she and I are waiting on her to receive some teeny mary janes from Etsy in the mail).

 

@Lelite Those are fantastic eyes for her, great move, she has such personality in them, despite the diminutive stature!

 

I carried my darling Cheby around an anime convention today. He's so cute~ I love spending time with him outside even if it means my arms are full!

 

A pair of SDGr hands I splurged on recently arrived today and they fit Dott perfectly (somehow they fit better on her wrist joint than the OG Everpurple hands???). I'm so happy that every part of this doll looks perfect to me now (ok yeah I know the wig is too small)

 

Had a faceup party with some friends yesterday and I managed to complete a faceup start to finish in one sitting so that felt awesome. Need to do that more often!

 

That’s impressive! But don’t you have to let the varnish dry in between layers? How long do you wait?

 

Waiting longer is better, but 20 minutes is what I do between layers as I have them sit under a powerful ventilation fan. I also let them fully cure overnight before putting them back together. And I spray lightly with MSC as opposed to painting on sealant, if that matters at all. This is just what works for me with my set up.

I can add another happy moment, as today I set up and photographed my October group of dolls and they all behaved and were a joy to handle. ♥ Miki, my Elfdoll Red, was the winner for most photogenic today.

 

Oh, thank you for encouraging me! I always thought that they need to sit till next day. 20 minutes sounds good.

 

I cleaned and reorganized all of my large dolls today. Anyone 55cm and taller got taken down, dusted, fluffed, loved on, and placed in a new seat as needed. Very few ended up in the same spot, and overall things feel much more cohesive now. I have a shelf just for my CP Delfs and I was chanting 'delf shelf delf shelf' for like an hour. Only one Delf escaped to stand with her boyfriend, but that's fine, and there's room for her to go up if she wants later. Anyway, very happy with how much I got done today.

 

I felt some energy come back after a weeklong cold today so I put on a nice mix of japanese city pop and took all my dolls for a dance around the room. Surprisingly no accidents regarding shoes/wigs falling off! (They are all horrible dancers though)

 

With some non doll friends went to a local cafe to have a chat and breakfast this morning. Took Eve with me. They loved her. When Eve came out of her transport case I made her do a “hug me” gesture and the friend (after asking if it’s ok to touch) hugged her back and air kissed her.

Actually my dad also air kissed Adam a while ago.

 

That's supper cute . I need a little elf doll

 

I have my one girl sitting in my store . All the women love her but the men just give me a look. lol

 

I've been working on doll furniture for my SD dolls.

I finished making the bistro table yesterday, and I am making cushions for the wooden chairs and the benches. I am painting the benches so they look more finished. I am also finally starting to work on the bleachers that I have been putting off.

I needed a break from sewing doll clothes for awhile, and I feel very motivated about working on the furniture.

 

Just seeing them on their stands makes me happy! Currently I'm looking at a RealPuki Soso, since DDE still has a few in stock. Once I get my first paycheck it will be mine.

 

Today I grabbed some milliput and modded some of my resinsouls. It was fun to try some modifications that I'd wanted to make for a long time.
Now I'm waiting for everything to harden to see if it'll work the way I hoped. Even if it's not a perfect fix, I already like the look of those changes

 

I gave my Dandelion a another face up, hoping this one will work on her!

 

Finally removed Rupert's old face-up from when he was Gamzee. I'm thinking about how to do a new one, which is getting me amped up!

 

Gave my girl earrings. A small change, but I really like how she looks now

 

I've been making lots of jewelry for my dolls! I am having so much fun making all these tiny charm necklaces and bracelets for them! They look so cute!

 

I moved both of my dolls to be near my computer where I can see them more, and set up one to be perched on one of my speakers.

 

I spent a few hours today doing some serious restringing and maintenance on my newest doll, to get him up to my posing and handling spec. I usually string all my dolls pretty tight, but he arrived so tightly strung that it caused damage to his resin and I could barely pose him anyway. So this was the first time I wanted to loosen a doll's elastic. I already repaired the damage; this time, I gave him completely fresh elastic and hot glue sueding, removed all the wire in his legs (also a first, usually I'm wiring my dolls). Then spent a couple of hours stringing and unstringing him to get the elastic tension right. Finally got it right: he poses just as well as before but is much more pleasing to handle!

Ruach is far from finished -- he needs his own clothes and forever wig -- but I dressed him up in suitable clothes and a stopgap wig, and he's looking more like himself now.

 

i painted one of my dolls' nails-- i wanted her manicure to look like the famous Chanel "Vamp" polish, because i remember when that first came out in 94 or 95, and a lot of her character design is inspired by 90s fashion. super happy that i got the color and the finish just right!

 

@aihre just wanted to say that his for-now-outfit is beautiful Ruach seems like he is going to be a cool character!

Man I should do some doll manicures again in 2026... That sounds awesome @thedarkeststar13

Anyhoooo I guess backstory is that I have been hoping to take some portraits and group shots of everyone sometime around the holidays and new year but so far progress is definitely poor

Yesterday I had a big rummage through the doll boxes, finally handling a few I had not unearthed since moving in summer 2024. It felt great to see Hawa again. I needed to restring him, which I did, then looked through his clothes and got him all dressed in a cool outfit. It's like seeing an old friend again I love some of them so much.

I also took a deep breath and reminded myself that Marina's head is so gigantic I need to suck it up and just force myself to love the Iplehouse body. (I don't have money to buy her something new with broad enough shoulders otherwise) I took the horrible ratchet piece out of her hips and hot glue sueded like never before. I also played with random extra hands I have laying around in similar colors to her and decided on a pair I think I will enjoy using on her. For whatever reason the delicate sculpt of newer iplehouse hands just feels weird on that body to me.

As an added bonus, Hawa got to steal her old hands, which look beautiful on the resinsoul bigger boy body! Huzzah!

 

Restrung my second MSD today! This body is old enough that it doesn't have S-hooks for the hands or feet, so the elastic hooks directly onto them, which made it extra challenging I managed to get the feet back on, but there was absolutely not enough space between the hook and the inside wall of the hand to get those back on. (I don't know how they got the old elastic on the hands to begin with, I literally could not get it off and ended up cutting the elastic to remove it.) I used some little jewelry clasps to hold both the hook and the end of the elastic together and that somehow worked...??? I'm just glad I'm not wrestling with it anymore

 

I finally finished a hat for an outfit I have been working on for quite some time. What a nice feeling to finally dress my girl up in itIt is an all yellow crochet ensemble! It really made me happy to see her in it and then put her on display.

That sounds awesome!

It is such a lovely thread to read through. So cozy and fun to read!

 

I completed an outfit I had started to sew one year and one month ago. It is satisfying to finally put it on the doll! (Doll that isn't completed but that's an other subject)

 

This was technically Saturday on Valentine's Day when I was motivated to let my girls celebrate with a couple's photoshoot. Determined to also get a handle on a DLSR camera, I did a lot of trial and error.

Lo and behold, after two hours of fiddling with the camera, trying to capture them in various loving poses, and intermittently spacing out to admire how pretty they look, I managed to get just one(1) semi-decent photo worth sharing:

 

i finally finished a wig that i started making ages ago and have been procrastinating on forever it's awesome to have one less bald resin egghead on my shelf, and giving them hair is such a major part of turning a blank doll into the character they're meant to be. the wig turned out so nice that i have kind of a renewed sense of momentum in actually getting this doll put together!

 

After 3+ years of playing with dolls without any damage or breakage (even though they fell occasionally), within 3 weeks two of my dolls and one of my non-BJD action figures had falls that caused breakage to their parts. The second BJD damage happened yesterday, so I repaired it today - it was a smooth clean repair, should hold up fine.

After repairing that doll, I continued with a photo series that I started just before Valentine's Day and has been slow going. I've been shooting my entire crew, pair by pair, and I got to the challenging doll couple. One of them has become increasingly troublesome to pose - he's the only doll in my whole crew that I'm not confident at free-standing, and was also one of the 2 dolls that got damaged (and repaired) earlier. Well, this doll behaved today and gave me no trouble at all with free-standing. I got great solo pics and couple pics of them.

I'm happy about that. All three damages were upsetting and I was starting to get paranoid about playing with my BJDs, which is never a good thing. Today's photoshoot restored some of my confidence, so I'm going to push on with finishing it. And going forward, take more care with storing my dolls. (As for the action figure, that was the worst damage out of the three - I have to source materials to repair it, and that part is not going to pose anymore. But I am less invested in my figures than the BJDs.)

 

I have seen the blog post about the damage. It was regrettable but I'm glad it turned out well - it's good that you did not let it get to you.

Figures just love to break - if it can help, Hobby Search (1999.co.jp) usually has universal spare joints in stock, though I admit I haven't checked the site in ages.

 

@lutke Thanks. Playing with dolls the way I do, the hazards had to manifest eventually. I don't want to change the way I play with them so I have to make peace with the risks (and keep staying vigilant of course). And this was good chance to learn how to recover from those hazards and also practice more repair skills. Have to stay positive - and I mean, we can't shield the children from all the dangers of the big bad world 100% of the time, hospital visits are par for course

Thanks for the figure website - I'll have a look, but this is a unique part on a Goodsmile Company Figma so I don't think there will be spare parts for it. As long as I can reattach it I can make do without the posing. (it's not like I play with my Figmas much anyway, changing their poses once a year is already a good year, lol)

 

Finally got around to washing the diatomaceous earth out of a wig and some doll clothes, which I have been putting off for literally a couple years because I resented the fact that I had to do it in the first place. To the shock of nobody, when I actually did it it took me like, twenty minutes tops and all I have to do now is steal some wig detangler from my roommate. Why am I like this?

Oh well, at least Hiroki and Nobuyuki will have their clothing back and can stop sitting naked in the back of my closet now.

 

I'm repainting one of my dolls' faces. Yesterday I cleared the hardest part - painting the eyebrows and eyelashes. It was my first time painting a pale colour on already pale skin, and a fantasy colour too. The colour mixing turned out well, and the brows/lashes turned out well too - probably the best I've done so far. It did help to paint quickly and not think too hard about it! I still have more of the faceup to do and plan to continue today, but the hardest part is done and I'm quite happy with how it looks so far.

 

Yesterday I couldn't sleep so I had Anastasia hang out with me while I made a chamomile. Nothing special but it's enough to make me happy