The Dolly Tag - 20 Questions

I found this neat tag at Omocha Crush and thought it'd be interesting to do. I haven't seen this one before, I think. It's a long one and I'll be including photos so I will put the meme behind a cut.

1.How long have you been collecting?
I've been collecting dolls for roughly around 8 years. Time flies when you're having fun!

2.What do you collect?
My current collection consists of: BJDs, Pullips, Fashion Royalty, Barbie, Monster High, DC Superhero Girls, Obitsu and Azone Pureneemo dolls.

3.How many dolls do you have?
It depends on the doll line. 
+ 16 bjds currently including the Bluefairy girl on order and one floating head that isn't an alternate face. 
+ 10 Fashion Royalty dolls. I was only meant to collect 7 of those dolls! 
+ 12 Barbie dolls including the two that will become Lara Croft and Doctor Who at some point. 
+ My MH girls, I really don't know how many. Probably around the 15 mark I believe which is where it'll stay as I'm no longer buying anymore of that line. 
+ 5 Pullip dolls which is the amount I wanted so I most likely am not getting more of these dolls anytime soon.
+ 2 DC Superhero Girls  pretty fussy with this line so don't foresee it getting out of hand.The only other one I wanted from this line was the SDCC exclusive Kitana.She's pretty awesome but the chances of getting my hands on her is pretty small.
+ 13 Pureneemo dolls including one on order at the moment.
+ 1 Obitsu (SD size). Adore these dolls so may get an MSD size one next year.

I'm kind of feeling like some of these doll lines got a bit out of hand at some point!! 

 
4.Which of your collections are you the most proud of? Why?
 My BJDs and Obitsu collection because I never thought I would ever be able to afford to own either of these dolls. I feel extremely lucky to be able to have these doll lines in my collection. Also my Fashion Royalty collection because again, I feel lucky to be able to pick up the ones I did as they were either exclusive, older releases or lottery wins.

5.Which single doll cost you the most money? (Relatively and literally)
To my surprise, Bimong Chuu. I bought her when the exchange was doing badly but I also didn't want to miss out on the chance to own her (again) after waiting such a long time for her to be re-released by the artist. She is totally worth it.

6.Which doll line is your favorite to collect and why?
I had to think about this one but I would have to say, even though I got into them after BJDs, the fashion doll line simply because it's easier to find and make props for them and be able to set a 'scene' because of their more doable size. They also take up less space then my BJDs so I can have more of them than I can of the BJDs. They are more portable and less prone to chips, scratches, breakages etc. They do stain more than the BJDs because they are vinyl rather than resin but I don't get nearly as stressed out when taking the fashion dolls out for photo ops; if they fall, then you can simply wipe away any dirt that gets on them whereas if a BJD falls, there is a possibility of face up damage or chipping of the resin. I'm also getting a bit more confident with painting vinyl faces so if accidents do happen, I can fix it myself. I can't say the same for my BJDs though!

 

7.What made you want to collect dolls?
I've been a 'Simmer' for a long time, since the very first Sims game came out all those years ago and playing the game inspired me to write stories about the characters I created. This in turn led me to a desire to shell these characters in a format that was more tangible than a bunch of pixels on a computer screen. The rest, as they say, is history.

8.Which is your most wanted doll right now?
I'm not really sure I have one currently. I have a lot of dolls on my wishlist that I would love to own at some point but whether that happens or not is unclear at this point in time. I have a big milestone birthday coming up so maybe I'll buy myself something special for it.

9.Which of your previously most wanted dolls do you have now?
I now have: Dollshe Saint, Bimong Chuu, Bluefairy SF May (on order), Elyse Jolie, Purple Poppy, Obitsu Mafuuyu, Pullip Nana-Chan.

10.What is the most dolls you have gotten at once?
Barbie and MH makes it way too easy to get a lot of dolls at once! But generally the most dolls I have gotten at once is two and they were Barbie! I'm careful to space out the bigger ticket items like the Fashion Royalty, Pureneemo and BJDs. I need time for my wallet to replenish!

11.Which is your least favorite doll?
I would never think I'd have one of those but I do. It's one of the Barbie line. (April). I like her Made to Move body but I've always been a bit uncertain about the face sculpt. I may end up repainting her and maybe turning her into Rogue from X-Men.

12.Which of your dolls has the best story (in your life and in theirs?)
Deirdre. Hands down. She's my AOD Qian. In her story, she has two lives, one as Deirdre Quinn which is her modern counterpart and the other as Lady Maeryn Gray, her medieval counterpart.  If you're an early follower of my blog, you'll already be familiar with how many sculpts I went through to get 'Maeryn' right. You see, Maeryn was my second BJD doll I ever bought. She's been with me since 2010. She started her life as a Doll Love Brian head on an AOD female body. She originally had the company face up but it chipped a day after she arrived. She was packaged quite poorly, her bubblewrap ripped off and her head just rolling around in the box. I think maybe she got opened at customs for some reason. So I sent her out for a custom face up and she stayed for a while. Then she was replaced by Dikadoll Shuinqing. Sadly her head was a little more pink than white and the resin wasn't a good match but it was hard to tell in photos so the sculpt stayed for a while. During this time, AOD were going through a change in sculptors and they were tweaking their older sculpts slightly. But I finally decided that since I had an AOD body, I'd just get a head. Mind you, this was around 2012 and the body was now older (2010). But being the same company, I assumed it'd be okay so I ordered a blank Qian head. She arrived and it looked like AOD had also tweaked their resin and Qian was now whiter than the body. The new white resin seemed to also yellow at a lot slower pace than the original which was now a noticeable yellow. So again, I had a resin mismatch. I sent Qian to Xhanthi for a face up and she's never had any other face ups. I loved how Xhanthi brought her to life and that's how she stayed. Then I got Eve (CP Chiwoo) and that head being from 2006 matched the now yellowed AOD body a lot better so I gave Eve the AOD body and sadly Deirdre /Maeryn was just a floating head for a while. About a year or a bit more I think until I got her a new body from Guu Doll that matched a lot better. Not exact but well enough. It's great to have her complete again.

And there you have Deirdre / Maeryn through the ages. In the 2016 photo, she's still on the AOD body there but I was mostly showing the head sculpts over the timeline.

13.What do you do with your dolls?
I use them for photography mostly (they're way easier to work with than live models!), I also sew for them (or at least learning to), I use them as models for some of my sketch work, I re-dress them and use them as inspirations for short stories; generally, I treat them as my creative muse.

14.Are there any other collections that you want to start?
I've actually become very tempted by the Momoko dolls especially the most recent release girl. She has red hair and green eyes, my favourite combination. Sadly she is exclusive to Japan so she won't be coming home, which could be a good thing as far as my wallet is concerned.

15.Which of your dolls would you most like to be? Why?
It's got to be Deirdre. I love her backstory and I love her eye/hair combination a lot. She embodies everything I love about the world of fantasy and magic and mythology.

16.Do people know that you collect dolls/toys?
Yes, I don't feel the need to hide this fact. I like what I like and yes people have looked at me weird when they find out and I am sure a lot of them think it's strange for me to play with dolls still but it makes me happy and I think that is a good thing. Life's way too short to worry about what other people may think of how I spend my free time or money.

17.Does your family support your collection?
My husband and parents-in-law do but my family think it's weird.Their loss.

18.What was your first doll/toy collection that you can remember? Do you still have them?
 The She-Ra figures. I have no idea what happened to them but I really wish I still had them. I loved She-Ra growing up.

19.Which doll started each of your collections?
I always remember my firsts ...
 BJD - Dollfamily Lyre (I no longer have this doll and I don't believe the company sells this sculpt still.)
FR - Isha (I won the right to purchase her in a lottery)
Pureneemo - Shirakiin Ririchiyo.(at the time I was watching the anime she was from)
Pullip - Sepia Alice (I've customised her now to be my Clara)
Barbie - Made to Move Purple Top 
MH - Circus de Freak Frankie Stein

20.What is your favorite place to shop for dolls?
For BJDs, I don't really have one. It just depends on whether I like the sculpt or not so company isn't really an issue. For Pureneemos, I like to shop at Hobbysearch or AmiAmi. And for Fashion Royalty, I've been able to get a lot of good deals on ebay. Now if you ask what is my favourite shop to buy clothing from, that would have to be Nine9style. I really love their clothes.


Tagging the following people (and anyone else who is interested, feel free to join in):
Fantasywoods, Xanadu, Irene, jSarie,Safir