I have been reading all the newspaper articles about Barbie today, and so many of them are full of errors. Started out by listing each article I found, and where they were wrong. Stopped before it turned into a clip post and decided to turn this into a the things you thought you knew about Barbie are wrong.
So here goes.
1 - Barbie was first put on store shelves today. - Wrong
March 9th 1959 was the first day of the New York City Toy Fair. Mattel, a little company that made plastic doll house furniture debut an eleven and one half inch fashion doll they named Barbie, after the name of their daughter. Barbie did not appear on toy shelves until August 1959. Today is the first day she was offered for sale, not to the general public, but to toy sellers, the large and small toy stores of the day.
2- Mattel sold a 'pregnant Barbie' - Wrong
Barbie has many many friends, two of those friends, Midge and Allen had a big wedding in 1998. Mattel planned to start a new line of toys, a reboot of the Heart Family. Their plan was for Allen and Midge (Hadley) Sherwood to have children, and create a three generation group of dolls. Midge's parents (Grandma and Grandpa) Hadley were created and sold in a Grandparents house playset. Midge had a pop out belly that held Nikki Sherwood. Take a look at the Allen and Midge dolls for sale in any toy store, Allen and Midge have wedding rings painted on their fingers.
3- Barbie can still fit in her high school clothing - Wrong
Barbie has been redesigned 3 times. A Barbie doll purchased today can not wear clothing made for Barbie in the mid 90's.
4- The idea for Barbie was stolen from a German gag gift toy. - Well this one is half right. Ruth Handler had the idea for Barbie, long before she went to Europe and found Bild Lil. Using Lili as a guide Ruth and engineer Jack Ryan created Barbie.
5- All the dolls are named after member's of Ruth and Elliot's children - True, sadly this was a real problem for 'Kenneth'. Ken Handler was a gay man who died of AIDS. He never enjoyed the connection between himself and a plastic doll without genetals.
6- The plastic Barbie's are made of is toxic - Wrong
However, if you leave a plastic toy out in the sun, or in a car and the plastic gets sticky, you might want to clean the toy before you let a child chew on it.
7- Barbie and Ken were once married - This one from MSN of all places! Heck no, they have dated, and Barbie has dreamed about getting married. However he has never ever popped the question.
Well that's all I can think of for now. Time for dinner, and taking out the last of the trash.
Happy Birthday Barbie.
Showing posts with label barbie dolls. Show all posts
Showing posts with label barbie dolls. Show all posts
Monday, March 09, 2009
Saturday, March 07, 2009
Spent the day playing Barbie and fixing up the house.
I have sorted out MOST of the loose clothing. Should I be worried that it took 3 days? I ended up with more boxes than I started with, and have come close to finding all the clothing that needs repair. Large number of outfits that are not Barbie, More than I thought I had really.
I got those hanging seperators, the ones that your suppose to put in a closet over a rod. Then set two of those in cardboard storage boxes. I was able to go through the many multiple bags, boxes and drawers with doll clothing and collect it all in one place. Well at least I think I collected it all in one place.
Barbie clothing, two box of gowns -- long skirts - short skirts -- pants - shorts -- dresses -- tops -- jackets -- coats -- bathing suits -- night shirts, underwear
Ken clothing----- pants - shorts -- shirts -- jackets -- shoes (all seperated of course). - never found a single pair of Ken underwear. Guess he always goes commando
Skipper - she was much harder, because many of her clothes don't have a tag that says 'skipper' and she has changed sizes four times over the last 50 years. I am glad I have all four sizes of the doll, but still, arg... She has pants -- tops -- dress -- long dresses.
Tutti, Todd Stacie -- Put all the mid size clothing together. They really don't offer the T's any more, even when Mattel does a sisters package they only show Barbie, Stacie and Kelly, So while most of these clothes are for Stacie, some of them might fit Tutti. Not sure if I have many Todd outfits at all. That will be fore the next drill down - organization of the outfits.
Kelly was a bit easier, some of her clothing is marked with a K, and since she is the same size as Tommy Ken's little brother, those outfits were put together. I think the use close to the same body for both dolls anyway.
Krissy is the newest member of the family, a tiny baby. Goodness when are Barbie's parents going to stop having babies. Most of her clothing is one piece, or little sleepers.
I started this because some one asked me about Earring Magic Ken, and Totally Hair Ken. I own both, but don't have either doll in origional clothing. I got both separately, buy purchasing 'collections' of clothing off of ebay, and collections of unknown dolls. Offered to put the outfit on the doll and take a picture. Could not find the doll, or the outfit. So I started pulling down dolls, and yanking apart boxes of clothing. Now I have the entire outfit (except the necklace, but I know where that is) and still can't find the doll. How hard is it to find one doll out of 300 loose dolls. I know I did not give him away. I thought I had put him in my 'dancing group' in a tux, but I can not find him.
Do I have to many dolls. - heck no!!!!!
I hope Drummie did not get to him, he did eat two dolls his first month here, but has left them alone since then.
So question my collecting friends, how do you sort your loose doll clothing? Any one here play with their dolls the way I do? I put them in different outfits on a regular basis, move them from doll house to doll house. From room to room in my house. I like 'action' having the dolls dance, or shop, or sit for dinner.
Yes I play with my dolls
I got those hanging seperators, the ones that your suppose to put in a closet over a rod. Then set two of those in cardboard storage boxes. I was able to go through the many multiple bags, boxes and drawers with doll clothing and collect it all in one place. Well at least I think I collected it all in one place.
Barbie clothing, two box of gowns -- long skirts - short skirts -- pants - shorts -- dresses -- tops -- jackets -- coats -- bathing suits -- night shirts, underwear
Ken clothing----- pants - shorts -- shirts -- jackets -- shoes (all seperated of course). - never found a single pair of Ken underwear. Guess he always goes commando
Skipper - she was much harder, because many of her clothes don't have a tag that says 'skipper' and she has changed sizes four times over the last 50 years. I am glad I have all four sizes of the doll, but still, arg... She has pants -- tops -- dress -- long dresses.
Tutti, Todd Stacie -- Put all the mid size clothing together. They really don't offer the T's any more, even when Mattel does a sisters package they only show Barbie, Stacie and Kelly, So while most of these clothes are for Stacie, some of them might fit Tutti. Not sure if I have many Todd outfits at all. That will be fore the next drill down - organization of the outfits.
Kelly was a bit easier, some of her clothing is marked with a K, and since she is the same size as Tommy Ken's little brother, those outfits were put together. I think the use close to the same body for both dolls anyway.
Krissy is the newest member of the family, a tiny baby. Goodness when are Barbie's parents going to stop having babies. Most of her clothing is one piece, or little sleepers.
I started this because some one asked me about Earring Magic Ken, and Totally Hair Ken. I own both, but don't have either doll in origional clothing. I got both separately, buy purchasing 'collections' of clothing off of ebay, and collections of unknown dolls. Offered to put the outfit on the doll and take a picture. Could not find the doll, or the outfit. So I started pulling down dolls, and yanking apart boxes of clothing. Now I have the entire outfit (except the necklace, but I know where that is) and still can't find the doll. How hard is it to find one doll out of 300 loose dolls. I know I did not give him away. I thought I had put him in my 'dancing group' in a tux, but I can not find him.
Do I have to many dolls. - heck no!!!!!
I hope Drummie did not get to him, he did eat two dolls his first month here, but has left them alone since then.
So question my collecting friends, how do you sort your loose doll clothing? Any one here play with their dolls the way I do? I put them in different outfits on a regular basis, move them from doll house to doll house. From room to room in my house. I like 'action' having the dolls dance, or shop, or sit for dinner.
Yes I play with my dolls
Friday, March 06, 2009
Barbie doll at 50 - a collection of articles
Yes, I promise I will write an article - blog post of my own soon.
Barbie dream house for real
Barbie dream house for real
Barbie Turns 50 - Forbes.com
Playweek article from March 1959Books: Celebrating Barbie at 50 | Newsweek Books | Newsweek.com
Material Girls turn 50: The weird parallels between Barbie and ...
Barbie, at 50, needs a revamp and a reboot - MarketWatch
barbie turns 50
At 50 years old, Barbie gets tattoos -- and a megastore in ChinaBarbie at 50 - Unwrinkled and None the Wiser - NYTimes.com
Barbie turns 50, but dolls forever young in eyes of U.S. girls ...Antiques - Barbie at 50 - Sales of Vintage Dolls Are Still Strong ...
Saturday, February 21, 2009
Happy Birthday Barbie
Well next week is the New York City toy fair, it's also Barbie's 50th appearance at the toy fair. So happy Birthday Barbara Millicent Roberts and family. So I started thinking again about how to figure out just how many dolls I have.
It's more than that, I have
trading cards
books
paper dolls
magnetic dolls,
color form dolls
doll cases
vehicles - planes, trains and automobiles
Pets - horses, dogs, cats, birds
Houses, castles, stores restaurants and shopping malls
furniture
Clothing
My size barbie,
Barbie and friends
Ken and friends
I have dolls that have never set foot out of a box, and dolls that had to be cleaned and repaired before they could get a foot in a shoe. I have all four sizes of Skipper, and all three sizes of Ken. The five sizes of Barbie; the walkers, the talkers, no joints, all joints, the bendy bodies.
Then there are the other dolls, Jem, Dawn, Donny and Marie. I know I have Donny's purple suit, I just don't have it on Donny. I have Bradley dolls, Celebrity dolls.
Where do I even start. I have started and stopped so many times already.
It's more than that, I have
trading cards
books
paper dolls
magnetic dolls,
color form dolls
doll cases
vehicles - planes, trains and automobiles
Pets - horses, dogs, cats, birds
Houses, castles, stores restaurants and shopping malls
furniture
Clothing
My size barbie,
Barbie and friends
Ken and friends
I have dolls that have never set foot out of a box, and dolls that had to be cleaned and repaired before they could get a foot in a shoe. I have all four sizes of Skipper, and all three sizes of Ken. The five sizes of Barbie; the walkers, the talkers, no joints, all joints, the bendy bodies.
Then there are the other dolls, Jem, Dawn, Donny and Marie. I know I have Donny's purple suit, I just don't have it on Donny. I have Bradley dolls, Celebrity dolls.
Where do I even start. I have started and stopped so many times already.
Thursday, December 11, 2008
Me my Barbies and the Boston Globe
Wow, being the center of attention for ninety minutes is hard. Just trying to hold a smile, or move my hand one way or the other. I started counting the number of times the camera clicked while I was trying to hold still. I hope he sends me some of those pictures. He had me take all the play dolls and lay them out in front of me and sit in the middle of the Barbie village. I had placed one of the Barbies in a VW Bug and had her driving. We he put the car, then the dolls then me. I can't wait to see the picture. Heck I can't wait to see all of the pictures.
I took a lot of pictures myself over the last few days, including today when I moved a lot of the dolls around. Just uploaded a group of twenty to my face book page.
Darn I am so tired I just zoned out while typing. I have to rest. The guy from the Globe was here for ninety minutes, and I did not expect just posing for pictures would tire me out so much. As we got to the end of his visit I did start to twitch, because I had not taken my 2pm medications and it was already after 3. I had a lot of fun, and I hope he sends me all of the pictures. It was funny, he had a digital camera, but it made the clicking sound every time he took a picture.
After the guy from the Globe left I took the two dogs for a walk around the block. They had been excited and following us around during the shoot. I had to shove both of them in their crates for a bit. I did not think the walk around the block would be enough, but both of them are zonked out. Works for me, I think I'll join them.
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