Needing some better

Yeah, man, the news of the world these past few days (and the memories it brings up; someone mentioned the École Polytechnique massacre in the light of what happened in Toronto yesterday and I was thrown back in time to my undergrad days, and hearing it on the crummy little tv I had in my crummy little apartment and the sadness and the concern of "could that happen here?"

And yeah, it kind of makes me want to construct an epic Blanket Fort out of all my (many) quilts and not leave. But being an adult is all about doing things you don't want to do sometimes, or going out into a world that frankly scares you, and scares you more in some ways than the imagined monster-under-the-bed scared you as a kid.

(I was...honestly never afraid of monsters, not that I can remember. I credit "Sesame Street" for that, where monsters were at worst, cranky (Oscar was kind of a monster, wasn't he? I mean, he was a Grouch but he looked kind of like a monster) and at best, kind of lovable (Grover was a screw up but he was a lovable screw-up. Cookie Monster was deranged but you got the sense that he would share his cookies with you). And when I got a little bit older, of course, I knew that literal monsters weren't real. I was less sure about space aliens or spontaneous human combustion (a fear of mine as a kid after seeing some tv program - it might have been "In Search Of" that featured it in one episode)

But at least I'm home now. Time for Duolingo and piano practice and then I think I'm going to heat up one of those noodle soups I have from the natural-foods store (hot soup sounds good on a cold rainy afternoon) and I'm going to wash my hair and put something comfortable on and finish sewing the binding on my most-recent quilt. And I might go to bed a little early tonight.

I also found the drawing of "Meowth as a Butler" I commissioned LeekFish to draw for me (I was very, very afraid it got lost in the shuffle and thrown out with the other loose papers in my frantic guest-room clean, but it did not: and I HAVE TO get a frame for it. Maybe if I make a mart-of-Wal run tomorrow or Friday (big-shopping is out for this weekend, given the wildflower field trip)

And I kind of want to get back to one of my knitting or crochet projects and work on it.

But this came, so I do have it in my "hot little hands": 

Yeah, I probably paid too much going through a "third party seller" but I couldn't get one direct from Amazon and apparently they're sold out everywhere (it seems that the nicer of the Made to Moves get snapped up by scalpers and.....well, to be polite and PG-13, I'll say Forget Scalpers but you know what I mean, and it does annoy me that someone could buy 100 of something and make it unavailable for everyone else and then turn around and resell it - doing very little work of their own - for double or treble the original price. And yes, I didn't have to buy it and it's totally a luxury item but....having a little luxury in your life is nice.)

She is totally getting unboxed and redressed, though. Yes, she's a hip-hop dancer, but I want to see her in a dress. I THINK some of the general dresses I have will fit her, and I have a pack of Curvy shoes (her feet are bigger than standard Barbie feet) that I bought back before I realized all the scalpers had bought up the $16 Amazon version of her.

So this may be edited shortly to add a photo of her in a dress....

(Though I will say, props to Mattel for taking the chubbiest body form they make and making her a dancer, instead of some "stereotypical chubby girl" hobby/profession. Not that she's all THAT fat, as I said, I think the "Curvy" is slimmer than I am)

And here she is, deboxed. I like her hair:

Her jeans are not the best. (They are actually more like "jeggings"). They kind of go mom-jeans in the back, but maybe Mattel designers have the same issues with women (or dolls) who have bigger hips as human designers do.


Yeah, most of the Gabby dresses seem like they should fit her. And I like her better in dresses:

Her coloring (sort of medium-tanned, pink hair, pale violet eyes) make her a little hard to find good colors for. This dress works because the purple picks up her eyes. (I may have to sew for her. I wonder if any of the pattern companies have specifically-for-Curvy patterns made up?)

Maybe she's better in casual things:

The Chococat dress BARELY fits but I think I like it better on her - I think she does seem to suit casual clothes better.


I still need a name for her, though. Probably a somewhat unusual name - I don't like naming dolls or stuffed animals after people's names I know well.

Rose, maybe, given her hair? I don't know any Roses.

Or maybe Cinnamon, like the spy character in the old Mission Impossible. I kind of like Cinnamon for her.