It may have taken Ikea a couple years, but they finally released the next in the HUSET series. Yes, it may be a little confusing that they use the exact same product name but it goes with their general product naming scheme. Huset is Swedish for ‘house’, which still makes it an appropriate name. For the second in Ikea’s HUSET series, popular children bedroom pieces were shrunk down.

HUSET comes with the following: 1 chair, 1 table, 1 bed, 1 wardrobe, 1 blanket, 1 pillow, 1 mat, 1 rug, and 1 plush toy. Excited? Me too! Click to read more of this entry.

It’s been a little while since I mentioned that I wanted to challenge myself to sew for my Middie dolls. I made the unfortunate challenge to myself that I would craft Kitty Brighton’s outfit by myself and that challenge didn’t go away when Lydia Melbourne joined the dolly family. I haven’t made a lot – unemployment and job searching takes a lot of time and effort, which really took away from my general crafting energy. However, I’ve found my crafting mojo and I put my sights on creating this for my dolls:

It seemed simple enough and I could figure out the steps by looking at the diagrams. If you’re stuck on directions, one great thing about the Google Translate app is that you can take a photo and then select the text to have it translated. You do have to keep in mind that Google Translate will translate text very directly and literally, so the translation might not make complete sense. But if you just need a general hint or push in the right direction, it might work out for you! It works better on printed text than handwritten text in terms of recognizing words.

Some things I noted – the body of the coat is a bit tight when Lydia is wearing a knit dress (it may be due to the thickness) and the sleeves are just a touch too long. The pattern gives fairly generous seam allowances and I did them a bit smaller than the pattern called for, and any little bit extra in length is obvious when it comes to tiny doll clothing. But still, it is fairly cute! I still need to add button holes and beads for buttons, but I’m really pleased with it!

I hand sewed this felt coat. From start to finish (start being tracing the pattern onto a separate piece of paper), it took approximately 2 episodes of Gilmore Girls (approximately 85 minutes). I’m definitely going to make the Blythe-sized version of this, I think it’d be cute as a winter ‘wool’ peacoat!

The pattern book I’m using is often referred to, in English, as the Hand-Sewn Doll Coordinate Recipe. I used the Google Translate photo option and it translated the text as “Hand-Stitched”, which is fairly close to Hand-Sewn – you’ll get more search results with Hand-Sewn over Hand-Stitched if you want to get your hands on the same book! The Hand-Sewn DCR has seven basic patterns for each doll size (Middies are the 20cm size, Blythe wear the 22cm size): dress, top, pants/shorts, skirt, romper, coat, and cape. There are photograph tutorials on pattern usage, it’s quite handy and easy to understand with just the photographs. It is very beginner-friendly! There are also some accessories patterns like head kerchiefs, hats, eye masks, bags, and socks.

Lydia Melbourne’s wearing: knit dress (chelleshocks), coat (chelleshocks).

It’s less than a week to Halloween and this is usually the time of year that I’m thinking about the fact that a Halloween-themed Blythe meet is coming up and I don’t have any new costumes to dress my dolls in. It’s nice to be able to come up with new things to dress the dolls in, because it’s fun to be creative in coming up with unique and silly costumes!

One year I dressed up Belarus, my Love Mission, as a squid:

Another year, my Kenners all went to a Halloween meet as Dorothy (Emmalynn), Cinderella (Lillian), and Medusa (Primrose):

I still haven’t decided what I want to dress my dolls up as this year though – just in terms of what costume ideas and how I will make it happen, but I will figure it out!

What Halloween costumes are you dressing your dolls up in this year?

What an amazing year it’s been for Blythe enthusiasts! There’s been events all over the world: Brazil, USA, UK, France, Spain, Australia, and Canada – just to name a few. Next year is shaping up to be an amazing whirlwind of Blythe related excitement as well with events already scheduled for 2016 in the lovely countries of USA, UK, Germany, Australia, and Japan.

For those who are new to Blythe or haven’t attended a Blythe convention, the general types of activities that may occur include outfit and/or photo contests, workshops related to sewing or customization are typically held, there’s almost always some sort of vendor marketplace, and some drawings or raffles might take place as well. It’s a great way to get to meet the people that you have been talking to online, and to meet new-to-you people that you might not have interacted with previously. For me, my first Blythe meet ever was the pre-meet for BlytheCon Seattle in 2011 where I met someone who lived in the same general area and from there met many more local Blythe hobbyists!

In a way, attending BlytheCon and then the subsequent Blythe meets really brought Blythe to life for me. Sure, I had dolls and clothes and shoes before BlytheCon, but I didn’t have anyone in person that I could gush about dolls with. I didn’t have anyone to talk to in person about what doll I was thinking about saving up for or had my eye on, the in-person sounding board was missing, and it’s kind of lonely to take photos of dolls on my own! Plus, my ability to be shy in public about pulling a doll out knows no boundaries.

As I’ve begun my Real Adult Job™ recently, I’m getting my budgeting in order (for real, not just budgeting some money for dolls and such), and thinking about saving for going to events outside of North America. I think going to Japan would be amazing, same with Australia.

Are you thinking about attending any Blythe conventions/events in 2016? Which ones are you considering attending? (And which ones do you wish you could afford to attend?)

Hi! *waves*

1. You must  (I can’t stress how important this is) be happy to a) send me your address and b)  be happy for me to send it on to one other participant so that you can revive your present! ( I will once sending the address to the other participant I will delete it from my computer and ask the recipient to do also once the parcel is addressed and sent. )
2. Your parcel must be in the mail by the twentieth of November.
3. You must spend under £7, $10 USD, €9, ¥1239, or $14 CAD
4. You must pay postage!
5. Make sure your item(s) aren’t fragile, we don’t want anything broken on arrival. 🙁

Your email must include your screen name, your real name and your address.  You  will receive a confirmation once I have received  this. I will however only have 28 spaces all which will be available until the 10th of November 2015 on a first come first serve basis!

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