Doll Collection Refresh - Wilde Imagination Patience

  A lot of my dolls have been in storage for quite a few years now. All of my dolls have been neglected for the last few years. Most of the dolls that have been in storage have recently been taken out of storage for display. And one thing that's glaringly obvious is that almost all of my dolls are in need of attention or help of some kind. Some only need a quick dust. Some need more extensive help. Either way I'm going to do a series of posts, introducing them here, along with what they need done. Then, unless I completely lose interest, I will hopefully be able to do follow up posts once they've been fixed up a bit. I can't guarantee they will necessarily receive help in the order that they're introduced. But I am hoping I will get them all looking like their best selves eventually.

 I'm starting with my Patience dolls, mostly because Wonderland Patience has been sitting on my shelf where I can't possibly miss her. Patience is the product of Tonner's Wilde Imagination and she's really quite adorable. She has a cartoonish, over-sized head and her eyes move independently.  As in independently of each other. One eye can be pointing far right, while the other points far left. This was a cute novelty at first but I have to say, I am completely over the eye mechanism. It's almost impossible to pose her without one or the other eyes going wonky. My other grievance with these dolls is their hair! Both of mine have rooted hair and it's horrible. Badly curled, plasticy fibre, ridiculous amounts of product in it. Both of my dolls need something done with their hair.

Wonderland Patience

 My Wonderland Patience really doesn't need much done. I'm washing her clothes because they've gotten a little dusty, the whole doll needs a dust. But the more pressing question is her hair. I was incredibly disappointed with her hair when I got this doll. The promotional pictures showed a doll with neat ringlets, the actual doll had a messy tangle of loose curls, stiff and crackly with product. I washed out the product and curled her hair around drinking straws into nice ringlets. Problem solved. . . . until one day the Giant Husband let the Giant Baby play with her to keep him quiet. Thankfully there was no damage to the doll, but two of the ringlets on one side of the doll's head, have been completely fluffed out. I really wasn't sure what to do about this. I know that simply recurling those two ringlets without messing up the rest of her hair is going to be beyond my abilities. I bought a wig, thinking I would simply rewig her. But I actually really like the yellowy blonde of her hair, the wig I bought doesn't have the same yellowy tones to it and so far I haven't been able to go through with this.

Ringlets

Ex-ringlets

 So as i see it, I have three options.
1. Wash her hair and straighten it.
2. Recurl her hair. (Ugh. Can't remember the details of the technique I used but do remember it was a pain to do.)
3. Rewig her - either with the wig I bought or buy a new one.

 Since I can't decide which thing I want to do, I'm possibly doing all three! I'm going to wash her curls out first. If I'm not happy with that, I can recurl it. If I'm still not happy, then it's time for a new wig.

Patience as not-Glinda

 My other Patience is Patience as Glinda. She needs a little more done because I really don't like her original outfit. So much so that she's been naked for the last two years, so I don't have to look at it. I would rather have her naked on a shelf than wearing that dress. Don't get me wrong, there's nothing wrong with it. If you like pink and puffy and sparkling and frilly, it's probably a dream. I simply don't like pink, puffy, sparkling or frilly that much. But I haven't been able to decide what to make her. Something with a big skirt will balance out her head and look better. And when it comes to details, it doesn't need to be overly detailed. Because her features are a little cartoonish too much detail might look funny. I would describe this as Illustration quality rather than Portrait quality. Some details can be omitted and the scale of buttons and trim doesn't have to be perfect. But I still need to decide how to dress her. When is she? Who is she? At the risk of sounding insane I think I'm having trouble because I haven't really bonded with her at all. Most of my dolls have a sort of character to me. This doll - I have no idea who she is. She's not Glinda. She doesn't have a name. She's no one.

 I also don't like her hair. Actually there are some rolls at the front sides, that I like quite a lot. But the main body of the hair is tangled not-curls, crispy with product. I don't like that.

Rolls to hold hair off face - I like this.

Crunchy birds nest hair - I don't like this.

So to summarise this doll needs-

1. Hair washed and tamed.

2. Clothes.

3. A name.

Hopefully there'll be more from me soon.