DIY Customizing is an irregular series of customizing tutorials. These are tutorials for things that I am able to do for my Blythes and I try to make it as simple as possible so that you can do these easy customizations to your own dolls. I am not a customizer – professional, amateur or wishful thinker of any kind. If you’re a kid – ask a responsible adult for help. As always, safety first! BlytheLife.com is not responsible for any damage that you do to yourself, your doll, or your home (or wherever you’re customizing).

The eyes are a big part of what makes a Blythe unique. I bought a pair of handpainted eyechips at BlytheCon Seattle and I knew exactly who would be getting those beautiful pink chips.

To do your own eyechip change, you will need:

• Tape – masking tape or washi/paper tape
• Hot glue sticks
• Lit candle
• Water soluble glue (I use Aleene’s Original Tacky Glue)
• New eye chips

First I started by “prepping” my doll. With two pieces of washi tape, I taped her eyelashes back so I wouldn’t get glue all over them.

Yes, even the tape I use for Eden Mouse is pink!

Click to read more of this entry.

DIY Customizing is an irregular series of customizing tutorials. These are tutorials for things that I am able to do for my Blythes and I try to make it as simple as possible so that you can do these easy customizations to your own dolls. I am not a customizer – professional, amateur or wishful thinker of any kind. If you’re a kid – ask a responsible adult for help. As always, safety first! BlytheLife.com is not responsible for any damage that you do to yourself, your doll, or your home (or wherever you’re customizing).

One of the challenges with some Blythes (notably Kenners, BLs, EBLs, some SBLs and some of the newer releases) is that it can be a pain in the bum to get their heads open if you want to do anything in there. One challenge that I faced with one of my dolls, Belarus, was the fact that her stock pullstring was fraying. So I changed her string. She is an EBL and at the time I was not up to the task of opening up her head (I’m still not), so I had to do it without actually opening her head. It can be tricky, but I wanted to show how I did it.

Now, Belarus doesn’t need another string, but Eden Mouse’s string had broke once or twice since I had changed it to a light pink cord. It’s super short now, and I wanted to swap it out for a darker pink cord (but still keeping the same pullring). Eden Mouse is a Punkaholic People RBL, which means that it is relatively easy to open her up, if I wanted to. I opted to keep her head closed for this tutorial.

This is just for changing the pullstring for the string that changes the eyes, not the string (if your doll has one have one) for sleep eyes. I haven’t figured out a way to change that without opening the head (if your doll no longer have a spring), so you’re flat out of luck there.

To change your doll’s pullstring, you will need:

• Scissors
• Lighter (or lit candle)
• New cord
• Super thin wire (or a u-shaped upholstery needle)
• Fishing line or nylon thread
• Wire cutters (if using wire)
• Well lit working area

Let’s say that your doll’s string just broke, or the knot inside loosened so it came straight out. So what I did here was just snip Eden’s string.

If your doll’s string broke, I know this is the point of complete sadness. If you love the chips that are currently up, handroll them to chips that you either don’t like or don’t like as much – just in case you scratch them during this process.

The first thing you need to do is remove the old string inside of the head. I used wire and poked it out. The knot should lie on the left hand side (if you are facing the doll, that would be your left, not her left). Just poke it out until you see it come out the eye hole. Remove the old string. Click to read more of this entry.

Jen made up this fancy little face-up chart when she was sending off one of her dolls to get customized and she’s decided to share it with all of you here at BlytheLife.com! It’s a great tool if you’re sending a doll off to get customized (and want to make sure that the customizer understands what you want) or if you’re customizing a doll for yourself and want to do a bit of planning first!

The face-up chart is available as a PDF download here at BlytheLife, you will need a PDF reader in order to view it on your computer.

Some programs that you can use: Adobe Acrobat and Foxit Reader.

Feel free to print the chart off for your customizing uses, but remember to keep the credits information at the bottom of the page!

Please check out Jen’s Flickr photostream (Dolls Crystals and PositivelyStoned) as well as her website, PositivelyStoned.com.

Click here to download a PDF copy of the Blythe Face Chart!

Thank you so much, Jen, for this fantastic Blythe resource!

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