A  year with lots of happy moments, doll fun, peace and friends. Mailin, Calliope, Dots, Fiona and of course me are looking forward to see you again in 2024!

This first one sports a low waist, buttons and a bit of lace. I should have taken off the necklace, because it doesn’t really match the dresses, but she has been wearing it for years and it became her signature necklace.

This one is more turquoise, and it has a little belt with nautical looking embroidery to go with it.

The last one is the same pattern as Fiona’s, but instead of pink the tiny flowers are blue.

While I was doing my sorting and cleaning I noticed that some of my older doll shoes start to feel brittle. Some soles came off, and with two pairs the faux leather starts to flake off around the zippers. It’s my own fault, and I should have thought about proper care and storage earlier.

I have to admit that I didn’t spent much attention on doll shoe care. They don’t get dirty, and if they are not on a doll they are in a box. But of course they age, and I should have looked into ways to keep them in the best possible condition. But I am glad I noticed before they start to dissolve completely. Some of them were more expensive than some of my own, and it would be stupid to shorten their lifespan by neglecting to care for them, right?

The nice thing about the doll community is that there are always collectors who are kind enough to share their experience, so learning the best way to care for faux leather was just a matter of asking and getting some very helpful answers. And that’s why I am sharing this post with you. If your dolls are anything like mine, they have a lot of shoes, even if they never wear them ;).

The basic things to keep in mind are actually pretty obvious once you think about it, but while dressing dolls and doing a quick shoe change they are easily forgotten. Apart from pleather care it’s probably a good idea to keep the shoes in a place where they don’t get damp, cold or too hot. They are probably best kept in separate bags or wrapped in tissue, but I know that is not very practical. But storing them at least not too squished will prevent the pleather from sticking to the next shoe. I use CD paper bags I don’t use for CDs anymore to store my fragile fashion doll shoes. Most of the rest is kept in the bags they came in.

Since brittle pleather tends to break first where it is folded, sticking something into bootlegs to avoid folds helps. I didn’t, because I forgot to stick the foam rolls back in after I used the boots. Thank god these white boots don’t show any signs of damage yet. I will use packing foam to make more rolls for the rest of my boots.

And now for pleather care. I use baby milk lotion for my own leather belts, this brand is probably not available outside Europe, but some similar lotion will be. I like this especially, it’s not too oily, it smells nice and it’s the best stuff to care for soft leather belts and bags I found so far. It’s called HIPP milk lotion sensitive. I just rub a bit of it with a soft tissue into the pleather. It feels a lot less brittle now – and the shoes smell good. This lotion is absorbed pretty quickly, but I would try to avoid getting the stuff directly on a doll.

Mailin and Bell got roped into helping me. While they were busy treating the shoes with pleather care I glued some soles back on, cleaned zippers of fluff and cut packing foam into tiny rolls. I still have not counted all the shoes. But it was a couple of hours work. And since I am now mindful of what neglect can do to doll shoes, I will hopefully remember to keep it up. At least once a year I will be bootblack for a day.

So if you have pleather doll shoes that could use a bit of care, the Pentecost holiday would be a good time to do a little bit of this to keep them in good shape.

If you know of a good treatment for fake suede, please let me know in the comments. I have some fake suede shoes, and getting them all lotioned is probably not a good idea. Enjoy the holiday!

We have St. Martin’s day in November, with processions at night, where kids with self made paper lanterns follow a “St. Martin” on a white horse to a place where a bonfire is lit. After that the children go from house to house with their lanterns, sing songs and expect candy in return. They don’t wear costumes, though, that would be at carnival.

Anyway, the kids love every opportunity to dress up. Dots wanted to be a ghost, and Mailin helped with her costume. Amanthis found a new bony friend. Skeletons don’t scare her in that size- and he looks rather friendly, doesn’t he?

But since holidays became sort of international, I took the liberty to mix Halloween with the Día de los Muertos. I have not posted this one I believe.

Happy Halloween! Is Halloween a thing where you live?

I very much hope Iplehouse will consider releasing a new headsize for KIDs. The bodies look actually fine in proportion, the hands are a perfect KID/parent fit. All Iplehouse would need to do is offer a smaller head version along with the existing KID body.

This is FID Raffine with KID Lonnie. I think the body is a good proportional fit, just the head is far too large.

What I did is a little photoshopping. I scaled the head down to 90% of it’s original size. It still looks natural with the existing KID body, although the neck opening would need to be a bit larger to let the head slide further down the neck.

Same scaling, this time with a wig.

Normal KID size head and 90% head. It looks better with a shorter neck.

I will suggest this to Iplehouse and I hope they will consider it. If you can chose body versions for the dolls, why not offer head versions for the same body? After all they do have experience with scaling down heads, don’t they?

This one was not a planned picture, I put Calliope in that chair while I was posing Mailin. My cat very gently placed her paw on the doll’s knee and I was quick enough to capture the moment. :).

Bell has new pants. That small scale animal print was a lucky find, it’s the perfect size for her.

Found these panpipes in a box. I had completely forgotten they were in there.

I spent a couple of hours on my garden bench, sewing away. A pair of pants later it was time for this year’s Easter pictures.

This shoot required some props first, and I started by making a flower planter for the purple rock cress I wanted to use. I just cut a couple of wooden spatulas in halves and applied some tape on the backside.

A bit of forget-me-not, daisies, straw and a big stone, my pot with candytuft in the background and the setup is good to go.

Mailin got a new outfit for this, the pants I finished and a tunic. A bit more festive than her usual jeans and shirt.

Have a wonderful and sunny Easter holiday!

Mailin’s new favorite shirt. :). Perfect shirt for adventurous little girls.

Stella got three new shirts. I didn’t take pictures of the last one, it was too dark already.

And since I just can’t spend as much time on new ideas as I would like, I have to resort to sketching them. I am fascinated by the idea what women would have worn in the past if they had been free to combine as it pleased them. Mom’s Edwardian coat and a flapperdress for example.