PART V: HOLIDAYS ~ CHRISTMAS

Christmas is always so wonderful and fun, at any age ... but especially NOW that I am once again, playing with dolls, and CREATING ... :)

Little ANGEL~WING Dress series

Each dress comes with REAL FEATHER wings, that I made into separate PINS, so that dress can be worn with the wings, or without  ...

Some are made from Mohair Blend;  some with sequins;  Some in Angora;  Some in metallic silver or gold ...

Some with short sleeves ... puff sleeves ... long bell-sleeves ...

 And ALL with little "face framing" collars ... some in SPARKLE HOLIDAY TRIM YARN ...

and SOME in the scallop-ruffle style ...

I made some "SANTA'S LITTLE HELPER" Dresses .... in all sorts of colors ... Christmas Reds and Green ... Sparkle Mint, Icy Blue, and Icy Pink ...

Each one has a little belt ... either white satin or black pleather, with little gold-tone buckles, or sparkle rhinestone buckles ... and the little dresses have a white tulle underskirt for volume ...

I also made some "Novelty" style dresses ... featuring RUDOLPH ... a GINGERBREAD MAN ... and some SNOWMEN ...

 SNOWMEN "FACE" ... with a little "slouch" collar piece as the BLACK TOP HAT with FUNNY FLOWER

SNOWMEN BODY ... comes complete with little black TOP HAT, and NECK SCARF in choices of COLORS ...

In the continuing theme of SANTA'S LITTLE HELPER ... I made some little SANTA-STYLE COATS ... which can be worn alone as a dress .... as a little COAT-TYPE piece OVER another dress ... or make it casual over a pair of jeans ...

CHRISTMAS will be here again .... before you know it ... and we here at SWAN LOVE DESIGNS will be READY !  :)

CHRISTMAS with MY GIRLS ... 2011

Merry Christmas Season !!!

So many MAGICAL things have been happening this year ! I would like to HOPE that I had at least a part of the * magic * that is happening, in that, I have been WORKING my a** off, all year ... not only at my job, but at my ultimate goal of getting to a point where I have enough inventory of items to open my etsy shop!

WHICH I DID ... in November :)

I opened my shop with my awesome TURKEY DRESSES FOR BLYTHE ... which no one purchased.

For some reason, I am not going to take this personally ... I mean, these people don't even know me  ... YET ... and I must be patient, and just keep plugging away, little by little .... Keep in contact with as many as possible on etsy ... on this blog ... on flickr ... and maybe some day, I will list just that "right" fashion that will catch on ... THEN, I can re-offer my little Turkey dresses ...  I did not offer them for SALE, at a reduced price, because I worked really hard on them, and .... there is always Thanksgiving 2012 ...

I then listed my CHRISTMAS FASHIONS .... Little Santa Dresses with full ice-skating dress type skirts, and little belts in black shiny pleather, with gold or rhinestone buckles ... and little Santa Coat styles ... and Angel Dresses with real white feather wings (which I made into PINS, because I thought if I attached them to the dress ... the customer would not be able to wash the dress, OR be able to use the dress again, and SINCE the Angel Dresses are ALL WHITE ... again, using the basic dress over and over again, adorned with any sort of Holiday colors, the possibilities are endless.

I think that would be the attraction of ALL my fashions ... my little TULLE BOW dresses, can have so many different possibilities AFTER they receive them!  They can put ribbon through the buckles, and different colors of tulle ... I even offer them to the customers ...

Made a couple of visits back to PALM SPRINGS, to visit my Mom ... who had complete knee replacement surgery!  She is such a trooper,and I am proud to be her daughter, coming from such strong stock and resilient genes!  Our other sister had brought her a Christmas Tree, a small but beautiful flocked one, SO, I took advantage of that photo opportunity,and posed a few of my girls "under the tree" ...

 L. to R.  Nenetl Nenetl;  Lena LaRosse;  Bertha Belle;  Hollister Harmonica
ALL wearing SWAN LOVE DESIGN dresses
Knee-Thigh socks and lace ankle-socks:  from ebay
Hollister is wearing a special little Holiday Mini-Dress I made:  Angel Face Dress with Angel Wings on back;  Her lacy leggings are made by me :)
All shoes are also "made" by me:  Stock mary-janes, painted and/or glittered;  Stock Barbie boots that I attached fur trim and white satin ribbon/bows.

Hollister Harmonica, my ADG Pleasant Peasant

 Nenetl Nenetl (ADG Aztec Arrival) and Bertha Belle (my Little Big Eyes) ... wearing their CHRISTMAS RED Party Dresses :)

LOVE these little LACE EDGE SOCKS, and the Ruby Slippers I made :)

Little BERTHA BELLE and HOLLISTER HARMONICA 

Introducing: NENETL NENETL; my VERY FIRST REAL BLYTHE DOLL!

Thanks to Patty in New Jersey, the one whom I adopted the Little Big Eyes dolls "4 sisters" from, who inspired me SO MUCH to TRY and find a "reasonably priced" real Blythe ...

I found her on the auction site ... for only $125. !  I thought that was pretty reasonable.  First of all, she was never played with and still in her original box.  Then, she was in the U.S., so I didn't have to stress about package delivery, overseas customs, or just plain items getting lost in transit (and if you are a seller on any auction site, you KNOW the issues that can occur!)

She is an ADG;  Ashton Drake Galleries edition of AZTEC ARRIVAL.  Apparently, that is the name of one of the ORIGINAL KENNER Blythe dolls, and Ashton Drake Galleries made some reproduction models of those original designs, keeping the same names.

Sellers photo of AZTEC ARRIVAL for adoption;  Ashton Drake Galleries edition

Another reason I was attracted to THIS doll, is her title:  In high school, prior to all the uproar regarding ethnic mascot names ... our mascot was AZTECS.  I was even in the Drill Team, and our parade costumes included a massive headdress, complete with Turquoise, black and white feathers!

THAT'S ME ... on the left :)

Okay, so BACK to HOW SHE GOT HER NAME:

I immediately went on-line to do a little research, and discovered an entire webiste (probably these are even more of these ... ) dedicated to the RIGHTFUL name of "Aztecs".  In a nutshell, the name/ title of "Aztec" is some sort of insult;  a name conjured up by Europeans. 

Here are the direct quote(s) from their site:

"Aztec" is a name conjured up by Europeans. 
We never called ourselves Aztecs. The Spaniards never called us Aztecs.

Our name is Mexica (Meh-sheeh-kah).

Aztec refers to our people when they lived in Aztlan. In Aztlan it would have been right to have used that word. But in the 16th century, "Aztec" was a word that was no longer used because all the people who came from Aztlan now called themselves Mexica, Tlaxcallan, Texcoco, Tlacopan, or any other of the names of the cities in which they lived. 


Please read the history below so that you will have a good understanding of the Nahuatl names you will be choosing for yourself or for your child. 

a) A ONE WORD NAME, no surname. You would use it twice in order to satisfy European occuppier legal requirements (Mazatl Mazatl or Tochtli Tochtli).

IT IS the tradition for their children to be named with the SAME FIRST AND LAST NAME !

Nahuatl Pronunciation:    How to pronounce words in Nahuatl:

TL: at the end of a word should just pronounce the T---the L should be silent.

So, after all that … I chose:  NENETL NENETL.  Which is pronounced “Nenet” … which means …

DOLL !  I think that is TOTALLY COOL !!!

NENETL NENETL
This is poooooor little factory Blythe, straight out of the box.
Her hair is a beautiful bronze/copper/red color, but the style is quite hideous.
Her FACE IS GREEN (apparently, a known issue with ADG girls).
Her eyeshadow is ALSO a hideous GREEN color.
And to add insult to injury, Ashton Drake decided to add
THE MOST HIDEOUS LIP COLOR to this poor girl!
Did they REALLY think that the PUKE-ISH, PINKY-PURPLE-MAUVY tone went well
with her GREEN TINTED COMPLEXTION and her GREEN EYE SHADOW
and her RED/COPPER HAIR?????
That is not even mentioning her STOCK eye chip colors, yikes.  PINK?  ORANGE?  REALLY????

However, as I am not a customizer ... and I MAINLY have her to model my CROCHET FASHIONS ... I am not sure how much I can do, that will cost little to no money, and require little to no skill ... but can change the MOST glaringly obvious "un-desireble" traits they gave her.

Another note here:  In all my extensive research, I have noticed and read where a doll owner will put her girl up for adoption, for the reason of "not bonding".  I guess it may be because I am of a possessive nature, being a "moon child" and cancer crab (we hold on tight with our little crab claws, and would rather the item break off in our claw, than to let go!  true fact. ) ... but, I could NEVER, EVER give away ANY doll that was once "mine".  (exception: if she was purchased for the reason of re-sale, remained in her box, kept in storage and I never took her out.)

Introducing: BERTHA BELLE; Little Big Eyes Doll

My next girl, is also an LBE (Little Big Eyes) doll. 

Her name is BERTHA BELLE.

She is named after ~

MY 2 GRANDMOTHERS,  both of whom are not on earth, but they both lived very long and happy lives, and my three sisters and I were very fortunate to have them around for a lot of our lives, and even our childen's lives:

Bertha is my Dad’s Mother;

Belle is my Mom’s Mother’s middle name, well, actually it is ella, but close enough.


BERTHA came wearing her stock pullover knitted sweater in off white, with a red heart in the center.  She has on denim bell-bottom pants, and red mary-jane style platform shoes.  All the LEMON HAIR blonde LBE dolls have red stained feet from these shoes:

I did try a few methods to get rid of the stains, but for me personally, I do not plan to showcase her barefoot, or take any photo shoots with her not wearing shoes, and/or stockings/socks.  The feet of the LBE dolls are also quite a bit larger than Blythe, so in order for her to fit into these fashions, I plan to modify all of their feet, making them smaller, just for the purpose of fashionable footwear!