Review of Kiki from the 2013 Kidz 'n' Cats line

I'm pretty enchanted with this beauty.  Kiki is my first Kidz 'n' Cats doll, and I wasn't disappointed with her.  She's the first Kidz doll to have a slightly tanned skintone, and it's gorgeous!

Kidz 'n' Cats are more expensive than many other 18" play dolls, but you can immediately see where the extra money goes.  The wig quality is wonderful; the eyes are beautifully detailed, and the face is painted perfectly.  The clothes are made from quality fabrics as well, with finished inside seams.  She has panties on under her capris.  The quality of the vinyl is even nice. 

The eyes are expressive.  No blank stare, here!  I always said if a doll actually looks like it's thinking, it's the mark of an extremely talented doll artist. 

There aren't many negative things I can say about her.  Kiki has the newer 11-joint body, which the Kidz 'n' Cats dolls have had since 2011 (before 2011 they did not have wrist joints).  She's strung with elastic cord, and her range of motion is not perfect, but still better than any other 18" child doll out there.  Her biggest flaw is the knees:  When she sits down, the knees bend slightly, but if you try to bend them too far, the tension on the elastic inside will just make them pop back up again.  Beyond this limitation, though, her posing is pretty decent.  You can position her arms rather naturally, which makes her really nice for photographs.

 

Kiki can also stand on her own, and sits nicely without falling over. 

Her outfit is stretchy.  There is no back fastening on the dress, because the dress simply stretches over her head if you want to take it off.  The overshirt has a flamingo on it, with the words "Hawaii Island."

The flower in her hair is on a barrette, so you can take it off and/or reposition it if you want to.  

I had to photograph her in front of my chrysanthemums.  They're so showy this time of year!  Every doll I've ever owned has at one time or another been photographed in front of these flowers.  LOL.  I actually just planted some rust red chrysanthemums recently.  Maybe next year I can get some pictures with some rust red flowers in the background.

More later.  :)

Poppy Parker 16" Fashion Teens: Winter Wowzers and Magic Moment

Movie star.

I always have high expectations from Integrity Toys, but these two actually exceeded my expectations.  I think they're just lovely.  They are "Winter Wowzers" and "Magic Moment" Poppy Parker, from the 16" Fashion Teen line.  I only had one other 16" Poppy: "It's a Wrap" from last year's Integrity Toys convention.  There were a total of four dolls from the 2013 collection.  The other two were the blondes "The Glad Game" and "One Fine Day."  I believe the four were supposed to represent the four seasons, with the redhead being autumn and the raven being winter.  Very cool!  I love that.  Each doll was an edition of only 300. 

MAGIC MOMENT

I instantly loved "Magic Moment," the redhead.  She reminded me of Ginger from Gilligan's Island.  I grew up on that show.  I love this doll's hair color; love her dress; love the black faux fur wrap.  It's so soft!  Her eyes are an interesting grey/aqua color that is absolutely lovely.  Each eye is half grey and half aqua in a very literal sense ... very unusual.

The Professor and The Skipper approve.

I didn't attempt to put on her long black gloves.  I did examine them, and noticed they have a unique design.  They aren't open all the way down their length, but they have slit openings on either side of the wrist.  It looks like Integrity meant for you to take off the doll's hand to slide the bulk of the glove on her arm, and then try to fit her hand inside the opening on the side of the glove.  Theoretically, it should make it easier to put on the long gloves this way.  I attempted it briefly, but it wasn't worth the effort.  I wish Integrity would make optional, removable "glove hands" that have the fingers close together.  I start stressing even THINKING about putting gloves on those splayed fingers Integrity loves to put on their dollies.

Her gloves seemed to have had all the fingers separated in her promo pics, but the gloves on the actual doll do not have separate fingers.  Maybe they really wanted to give the gloves separate fingers, but came to the conclusion it would be too difficult on a doll this scale?  Don't know. 

Bettie Page, without the bondage gear and cheetahs

WINTER WOWZERS

I got Wowzers mostly because I have a weakness for raven hair.  I wasn't expecting to love her face coloring as much as I do.  She's a sultry vixen!  A bit Bettie Page.  I don't normally like blue eyeshadow on dolls, but it totally works for her.  She manages to outshine "It's a Wrap," with Wrap's more subdued coloring.  I think if the two of them were in a room together, all the boys would be looking at Winter Wowzers, and poor Wrap would feel left out and sad.  LOL. 

Out of all four of the 2013 Fashion Teens, I liked Wowzer's outfit the least.  It's OK, just not totally my style.  I wish they'd toned down the BRIGHT BRIGHT BRIGHT on the sweater a bit.  (I guess I'm not into BRIGHT unless we're talking about IQs.)  I wouldn't have chosen a (dalmation? cow? cat?) spotted print for the coat.  I'm just nit-picking, though.  Winter Wowzers is pretty special.  She's fierce and sweet at the same time.  Overall, it's a good look.  I do like her pants and cute boots, and of course the clothes on both dolls are high quality, fully lined and impeccably tailored, like the clothing on all Integrity dolls. 

Cruella DeWowzer

L-R:  It's A Wrap being totally outshined by Winter Wowzers.

 

The sweater hurts my eyes, but then again, this girl likes attention.

I always loved you more than Mary Ann.

Please click on the pictures to make them bigger. 

Trampires!

Happy Halloween! 

These two were my favorites of all the Brides of Dracula dolls, with the original blonde Contessa as a runner-up for third place.  There were two runs of the Brides: the first run was in 2010, and was a collaboration between Integrity Toys and Ashton-Drake.  It was followed a year later by another set of vampire dolls by Integrity exclusively, who had the rights to the head sculpts.  The two in these pictures are 2010 Mina, and 2011 Lucy.

Red-haired Lucy is wearing the black dress and earrings from FR2 "Strict Elegance" Luchia.  The dress fits her perfectly and looks amazing on her.  Gah! ... I love her hair color!  It's such a beautiful shade. 

 

 

 

 

Click on the pictures to make them bigger.  :)

Gearing up for Halloween ...

Doing some pictures of vampires for Halloween.  This is "Lucy" from the Brides of Dracula series by Integrity Toys. I couldn't decide whether I liked the black-and-white or the color version better, so I'll just post both.  :)  I think this is about as close as I get to being artsy.