All My Favorite Dolls: 2014

Friday, October 31, 2014

Holiday Hostesses with the Mostesses!

In 2011, the Barbie Collector Fan Club released as one of their club dolls, the first in a series called Holiday Hostess. It was a Halloween themed doll with a retro sculpt called Halloween Haunt. I wasn't aware of this as, due to financial reasons, I had dropped out of the club (hits self in the head), but came back to the club in 2013, so I missed out on the initial release of this doll. I obtained her through the secondary market for a steal (using gift cards obtained by doing surveys and such). I am still missing the Thanksgiving doll, the Christmas doll and hope to obtain the New Year's Doll before the year is out, though I was able to obtain the Valentine's Day doll. I've heard next year's doll is St. Patrick's Day themed, which I'm looking forward to with anticipation! This post will focus mainly on Halloween Haunt, as it almost Halloween!
Halloween Haunt Barbie was designed by Bill Greening, who also designed many of my favorite dolls. The doll itself is dressed as a witch in black and orange and comes with a broom and an invitation to the Halloween party. She looks so cute, I can't stand it!

Halloween Haunt Barbie

And with this entry, this completes my Halloween Barbie collection in total! I hope you enjoyed seeing all of the Halloween dolls and I hope you will join me again in my next entry!

Happy Halloween!

Monday, October 20, 2014

Secret Spells

      In 2003, Mattel released a line of Barbie dolls which coincided with Halloween, but weren't exactly Halloween related. They were called Secret Spells Barbie or Charm Girls and consisted of three dolls, Barbie, Kayla and Christie. The promos for the dolls read:

Secret Spells™ Barbie® Doll And Friends AKA Charm Girls
Barbie® doll and her friends Christie® and Kayla® are regular high school girls that have special powers! The dolls have a fashion transformation that turns each of them into an enchantress. Girls can help Barbie® doll and her friends create "magical" mixes for love, luck, or happiness. They can actually drink the magical mixes, too!

   I thought the dolls were GORGEOUS and bought all three of them (of course!). Kayla is my favorite as she has this mysterious look about her. All of the dolls came with spell books and "cauldrons" as well as potion bottles and a drink which could be made up out of a "magic potion".

   In looking up info on the dolls online, I've come across a couple of articles condemning these dolls for promoting witchcraft to little girls. These dolls are fantasy, nothing more. They are make-believe, just like the princess and mermaid dolls. They are a way for a little girl to act out being witchy or believing in magic, but are not a gateway to becoming a witch. To me, this is right up there with the claims of Barbie making little girls anorexic or uncomfortable with their bodies. I am a plus sized woman who has loved Barbie since I was a plus sized girl and never felt like I needed to look like Barbie to be beautiful. Maybe I realized she was make believe and it had nothing to do with me. I don't know. I've just never understood that claim.

Anyways, these dolls are some of my favorite dolls (I do have a thing for witches after all!) and I'm glad Mattel put them out. Here they are in all of their glory.


Secret Spells Barbie - everyday look


Secret Spells Christie - everyday look

Secret Spells Kayla - everyday look

Secret Spells Barbie - witchy look

Secret Spells Christie - witchy look

Secret Spells Kayla - everyday look

For me, these are dolls I would have wanted as a little girl, but I'm glad I was able to get them as an adult too. Blessed be everyone!

Monday, October 13, 2014

Haunted Beauty and Yes They Are!

In 2012, Barbie Collector released a Halloween collector doll called "Haunted Beauty Ghost". She was designed by Bill Greening, who's previous works I've liked, but I wasn't able to buy her at the time due to lack of funds. I've regretted this for a long time, since she was a collector Halloween doll. I was able to get the second doll in the series, last year's "Haunted Beauty Vampire". She was GORGEOUS! I was thrilled with her. This year's release is called "Haunted Beauty Mistress of the Manor" and I was able to purchase her as well as the Ghost, which I bought from a buyer on Ebay. Oh, the power of Ebay. If you wait long enough, whatever you want, will show up!
The dolls arrive in a black box, which is appropriate on many levels, and have a plastic cover, so you can see the whole doll if you don't want to remove her from the box.

Haunted Beauty Ghost box

Haunted Beauty Vampire box

Haunted Beauty Mistress of the Manor box

The dolls themselves use the Model Muse body type and have jointed elbows and wrists, but their legs don't bend. Of course since they are covered by long skirts, there's no need for them to be posed. Without further ado, here are the dolls!

Haunted Beauty Ghost

Haunted Beauty Vampire

Haunted Beauty Mistress of the Manor

These ladies are GORGEOUS! I love the face molds, the costumes and especially the "Life in the Scream House" book the Mistress of the Manor holds (a take off of "Life in the Dream House in the playline Barbies and Barbie's own "reality" show, which is a scream in itself!). I can't wait to see what next year brings to this series!

Monday, October 6, 2014

Halloween Barbies 2014 complete!

I now have all of the Halloween Barbie dolls released this year and my Halloween collection is complete again. I managed to find the "Grocery Store" version, simply called "Barbie" on Ebay as I wasn't having any luck finding it in the stores.

Halloween Barbie 2014

I also found two cute little Halloween Barbie dolls at Target. These look like they are the mini Barbie figurines, which I don't collect, but since these are Halloweeny, I had to buy them!

Mini Halloween Barbie dolls 2014

And finally, I have this year's Haunted Beauty doll, Mistress of the Manor, on the way to my house. I can't wait for this one to arrive so I can finish my Halloween Barbie display!

Wednesday, October 1, 2014

Just Hanging Out in My Room

    The final line of the Generation Girl dolls featured the dolls in their bedrooms. This line included Barbie, Lara, Nichelle, Tori, Mari and brought back Ana. Blaine was a Toys R Us exclusive. Chelsie was missing from this line. The Generation Girl website explained this by having her move to China.
    The dolls came with accessories and furniture and the packaging also included floor areas and, except for Tori, an additional wall space. They also had one additional outfit, which also came with a matching bracelet for you.
      This line was interesting as it added to the personalities of the dolls. I mean, you can tell a person's personality by looking at their bedroom, which is the most private area of a person's house. There, they can decorate however they like, so their true personality shows through since people only invite those they want into their bedrooms. Barbie's showed off her love of movies, Nichelle's had fashion themed items, Mari was techno themed and Ana showed off her love of the ocean.
     Speaking of Ana, I always felt her additional outfit was meant for the Dance Party line. It seems more "party like" than the rest of the outfits and I came across a picture on BarbieCollector.com years ago that seemed to support this.


Possible Dance Party Ana?

This doll has her hair done differently, but the color of the outfit and the necklace seem to point to her additional outfit. I so wish they would have made this doll, but I was happy she was back in the My Room line.

My Room Barbie

My Room Barbie's room

My Room Barbie - Generation Girl Gear

My Room Ana

My Room Ana's room

My Room Ana - Generation Girl Gear

My Room Mari

My Room Mari's room

My Room Mari - Generation Girl Gear

My Room Lara

My Room Lara's room

My Room Lara - Generation Girl Gear

My Room Tori

My Room Tori's room

My Room Tori - Generation Girl Gear

My Room Nichelle

My Room Nichelle's room

My Room Nichelle - Generation Girl Gear

My Room Blaine

My Room Blaine's room

Going to International High School - The Tour

The second line of Generation Girls featured the dolls having their Spring Jam. Also a playset was released as well, the International High School, where the dolls went to school. This playset had four scenes in which to set up the dolls and accessories for each of the areas.

The front of the school

The front of the school features a school flag, a mural on one side and windows on the other. The Generation Girl website had different murals which could be printed out to apply to the mural side with double sided tape.


The lockers before the name stickers were added

The dance floor folds up to reveal the lockers, which open so the dolls can store their gear. The set included stickers with the name of each character and also blank stickers so you could put whatever you wanted.

With the name stickers

Open locker

The dance floor has a disco ball that drops down and a box to hold the shiny confetti so it can rain down on the dolls as they are dancing. The school also features a sound system to allow music to be played and also had a microphone to sing along with the songs.


Dance floor

To the left of the dance floor/lockers was a lunch room which included a table and four meals including forks and sodas. The meals are the same as what is written on the blackboard.

Lunch room

To the right of the dance floor/lockers was the newsroom where the Generation Beat magazine was printed.

Newsroom

The set is quite large once both screens are unrolled and the dance floor is put down.

The whole set

The school scene

This was a nice addition to the Generation Girl line and I could see many hours of play with this set. It's also great just for display, if you've got the room (which I currently don't!).

Monday, September 8, 2014

It's Time to Party! Dance Party, That Is!

     The second line of Generation Girl dolls introduced two more dolls to the line, Blaine and Mari, and two of the original girls left to make room, Ana and Chelsie, though Chelsie came back as a Toys R Us exclusive. Ironically, in the book series, Blaine and Ana dated, so I found it amusing she was the one who wasn't in the Dance Party line. I was also disappointed since she was one of my favorite dolls from the series. I appreciated that she had been given a locker in the High School playset though!
     This line did not disappoint! The dolls came with two outfits, just as the first line had, and had many accessories, both dance themed and for regular life. There were also two sets of extra fashions produced for these dolls, one a casual set and the other more glamorous. The fashions also included bracelets in the casual sets and flower shaped rings in the glam sets for little girls to wear. Some of the editions of the dolls also included a roll on sparkly gel, which I got with all of mine. I've never used it, so it is now dried up, but still sparkly! Last but not least, the International High School playset. I'll feature this item in my next post.
     I'd forgotten to mention the Generation Girl Beat magazine in the last post. This was a booklet showcasing the dolls and adding to their personalities. In their world, they all worked on the magazine in school and the magazine was included in the packaging with the dolls. This line had the Dance Party edition of the magazine with articles "written" by the dolls. The Chelsie doll had a special magazine featuring her article.
     All in all, this line was my favorite with the exception of no Ana. The Lara doll and her fashions were by far my favorites of the whole series. She went from being my least favorite doll of the original line to my favorite doll of the line!

Dance Party Barbie

Dance Party Barbie - extra outfit

Dance Party Barbie - accessories

Dance Party Barbie - Cool and Casual

Dance Party Barbie - Glitz and Glam

Dance Party Lara

Dance Party Lara - extra outfit

Dance Party Lara - accessories

Dance Party Lara - Cool and Casual

Dance Party Lara - Glitz and Glam

Dance Party Nichelle

Dance Party Nichelle - extra outfit

Dance Party Nichelle - accessories

Dance Party Nichelle - Cool and Casual


Dance Party Nichelle - Glitz and Glam

Dance Party Tori

Dance Party Tori - extra outfit

Dance Party Tori - accessories

Dance Party Tori - snowboarding (I couldn't fit the helmet over her ponytails, so she's carrying it. Tori says to remember to always wear your helmet when snowboarding!)