It’s the time of year when I start thinking about family togetherness, copious amounts of baking, cheerful carols, and blatant commercialism. Even those in Canada aren’t immune to the allure that is Black Friday or Cyber Monday – even with an October Thanksgiving, we still have Black Friday sales (this is primarily to compete with the US Black Friday sales to keep money north of the border). But, I digress. Because commercialism is also something that exists in the world of Blythe (and yes, I realize how obvious this is after part 2 of the Holiday Shopping Guide…).

In a doll-eat-doll world, a lot of people do get sucked up in the cycle of buying new things all the time. A new doll, new clothes, new shoes, another new doll, selling that doll to afford another one. The cycle just keeps on going until you finally get yourself off the carousel. I tend to buy in spurts because I tend to have moments where I want to Buy All The Things! and then I wait and get so many packages in the mail, only to feel slightly guilty about the spending, I stop buying for a while, and then I repeat the process again. It’s very cyclical for me, and I know that I’m currently in my “lull” stage. This is because I spent some money on myself for my birthday, and now it’s time for thinking about giving rather than receiving. The holiday season always does this to me. Even with the many, many, many inserts in the newspapers about who’s have ‘door busters sales’ on this and ‘lowest prices of the season’ on that, I find it very hard to step away from it because it’s all just in my face all the time.

And while I would love to welcome a new doll into the family (and let’s face it, when wouldn’t I love to welcome a new doll into the family?), that is not in the cards for me right now unless I end up receiving one as a gift (and if my family is reading right now: hint hint?) or if I go for a less expensive doll (e.g. My Little Pony, Monster High). More readily available dolls are always an option, so I really should have said that I’d love to welcome a new Blythe into the family, and would love to receive one as a gift. Because the truth is, I would.

Over the next however many days until Christmas, I’ll be busy with studying (for finals), baking, and crafting (for all those Christmas gifts!) and rumour has it that the first snow of the season in my local area is predicted for this weekend! That is always fun, and I’m looking forward to cozy days indoors with some knitting and a doll by my side. Mostly because when I have downtime from school, that’s when I have the time for dolls. I might even make a few things for Kitty Brighton this holiday season!

What are your plans for the holiday season?

Welcome to the 2014 Blythe Holiday Shopping Guide! This is part 2 of a 3 part mini-series to help those who are trying to figure out what to buy for themselves, or what to buy for the Blythe-lover in their life. If you missed part 1, it was all about things that customizers might like to receive for the holidays!

This week is all about the every day Blythe lover. Not someone who necessarily sews, knits, crochets, customizes or any of that. Just someone who loves Blythe. Which is pretty much all of us.

Minnow (a Hi-Ho! Marine RBL+) thinks that everyone should get a bright doll like her!
Minnow wears Plastic Fashion (dress).

1. A new Blythe. If the Blythe enthusiast in your life is anything like me, he or she heavily hints towards doll that they want all the time. For instance, I tend to send screenshots of Blythe photos that I’m crushing on the boyfriend on a fairly regular basis. He tends to think that I “quite a few dolls already”, but I really do don’t. Some dolls that I think would make fantastic gifts include: Kenners, Regina Irwen, Bianca Pearl, Hi-Ho! Marine, Cadence Majorette, or Scotty Mum. Just to name a few.

2. A new Middie. Maybe you’ve heard your Blythe enthusiast talking about these funny dolls that are shorter that Blythe. They also make fantastic holiday gifts. My personal favourite is Jackie Ramone, but I also think that Yellow Marshmallow or Alicia Cupcake would make great gifts as well! Bonus, if the opening of the stocking is big enough, an in-box Middie would make a pretty amazing stocking stuffer.

3. What is up with all the dolls on this list? Next is something that I would love to get: Vintage doll clothing & shoes. Get yourself over to some garage sales or flea markets, online to Craigslist or eBay and start looking for vintage Skipper clothing. You’ll get bonus points if it’s in fabulous condition. All vintage Skipper will fit the standard Blythe body (and can fit Licca bodies as well). The shoes will fit onto the standard Blythe feet, but not onto Licca (just too wide!), but the flats do look so cute and dainty.

Tertiary Jane is wearing a dress by an unknown maker.

4. Hunting for vintage doll clothing not your thing? How about getting to your local Ikea (or online to get it delivered) and ordering your favourite dolly lover HUSET? It is a fantastic living room furniture set – I’ve reviewed it on the blog. I personally have one too many sets (is that possible?) and the pieces are very versatile! There’s even people on Etsy who sell couch covers (if you’re not partial to pink), along with throw pillows. Very cute! And gives the dolls a place to hang out besides on their stands.

5. Last, but certainly not least on the list of things that I think any Blythe lover would be happy to receive this holiday season… Storage or shelving. This could be in the form of a bookshelf, floating shelves, small set of plastic drawers, or sectioned off boxes to store things in. Organizational items are so great in the doll hobby. I personally love using plastic drawer sets to store clothes, and bead organizer boxes for all the doll shoes that I own (I also have a couple for beads as well, but that’s neither here nor there).

Choosing my first Blythe doll was an interesting experience. I actually bought a Cappuccino Chat in a local-ish shop in British Columbia, back in 2009. That store only carried a handful of Blythes and most of them were marked up at prices above what they were going for on eBay – except for one. Cappuccino Chat. I wish I had some crazy story about how I won a bidding war or happened across a lowly marked Blythe was being sold as a Buy It Now, but I really got her because she was the only one that they were selling that was slightly less than eBay prices. Sad but true.

You may know her just a little bit better as Sophie, my delightful and stylish drama princess. She was my first Blythe, and she still resides here. I know some people who have sold on their first Blythes in exchange for better ones, but Sophie holds a special place in my heart. If I wasn’t so enamoured with her, I never would have gone on to get so many more Blythes. In a way, she is responsible for all her sisters and how many dolls she has to share a shoe closet with.

Who was your first Blythe doll?

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Velcro is an amazing thing. Except when my hair gets stuck in it, or one of my Blythes’ hair. I’m sure many of you know what I’m speaking of. Whenever I’m buying dolly clothes online, I like to see if the seamstress listed what kind of closure it is. My personal favourite closures include metal snaps (I’ve also seen them referred to as ‘poppers’ online), and dolly velcro. Dolly velcro is like this amazing invention because it is super slim and my hair (and doll hair) doesn’t snag in it. And once in a while I end up buying something that has regular velcro in it and I just feel so bad for my dolls when their hair gets tangled up into a nest.

Dolly velcro (left), regular velcro (middle), and a metal snap (right).

After a while, it’s gotten to the point where unless someone specifies that it’s dolly or thin velcro, I might not even buy it because it’ll just cause a bit of headache for me. Snaps all the way though. Unless they’re plastic. I may have broken a plastic snap before when I wasn’t 100% gentle with it, which is why I greatly prefer metal snaps on doll clothing. When I actually take the effort to add a closure to the clothes that I make for Blythe, I use metal snaps (this may be only because I don’t actually own any dolly velcro in which to sew in). As long as dolly or human hair doesn’t snag in it, it works well for clothing closures in my opinion. I find that snaps are so much easier to find in local stores than dolly velcro though, as I’ve only ever seen dolly velcro being offered for sale online.

Do you have a preference for snaps over velcro?