When I was a little kid, I had baby dolls.  They were piled in a crib, which was then put at the back of my closet and never ever played with because I didn’t see the point of babydolls and found them creepy.  Changing diapers, even ones only filled with imaginary poo, was never my idea of fun.

When I was slightly older, I had Barbie dolls.  I liked them well enough.  I sewed for them and made furniture for them, mostly. I had a dollhouse that was the coolest thing ever, and would arrange and re-arrange all of the furniture to get each room perfect.  I didn’t really play dolls with friends.  They wanted Barbie to go on dates and shop, which I found terribly, terribly boring.  But then they didn’t appreciate my kidnapping, murder, and alien invasion storylines either.

I didn’t touch a doll again until after college, and that was Pullip.  Pullips didn’t appeal to me as a doll, more as a vehicle through which I can do everything else I like.  Pullips combine my interests in customizing, painting, sewing, storytelling, carpentry, interior decorating, photography, web design, and more.  I’ve stuck with Pullips for a long time because to get tired of them wouldn’t be getting tired of dolls, it would be getting tired of all those other things.

But!  Pullips don’t combine everything I like to do, and not everything I like to that could involve Pullips does involve Pullips.  In fact, unless someone went into my workroom, no one who visits would have any idea I liked dolls as there isn’t a single doll-centric thing around the entire house.   Madness!  So the next few posts I think will be about some of the other things I enjoy…

I mention this because I’m not especially talkative, especially online.  If I have something useful to add, I will.  If I don’t think I have anything to say that is either a) useful or b) interesting I tend to spare my fingers the typing and everyone else’s eyes the reading.  If I were a comedian, I would definitely be one of those “Don’t think I’m nearly as funny as I am” people.

I’m sure there are dozens of topics I could talk about that people would find interesting, just as there are dozens of topics I could talk abut that I don’t generally because I think most people would find it terribly boring.  Like my fascination with nail polish.  See?  I bet your eyes are already glazing over.

(suffer the sparkles!)

And yet there are blogs on nailpolish.  I’ve visited them.  To me, they are interesting because they are things I don’t already know.  However, this is not a website about nailpolish, it’s a website about customizing.  Therefore, to most people reading this, the nailpolish is not so interesting.

See the problem? I don’t blog for myself, because I already know everything I put in the articles and tutorials.  To me, most of the things I could write about are less interesting than reading an article on how to wet-marble nailpolish, because I don’t know how to do that and I already figured out how to do whatever it is I would be blogging about.

What’s the point of all this?  Feedback.  Specifically, if you all want to see more posts in the future, tell me what you want to see more of. Pictures of customs?  Random dissertations of the evolution of the pullip bust line?  The story of the time I accidentally shrunk a doll head?  Leave a comment here (or in whatever blogpost is most recent if that’s easier)or shoot me an email.

It’s an awesome store, and the owners are very friendly and let the local doll collectors have meets in their store, and even let us rearrange their store on a moderate-major scale (I mean moving entire shelves around) for more space. And if you get a pullip at the meets? Discount + free re-ment.

I put together a set of anime-based BLEACH dolls for them to display at Anime Boston (only 2 left!), made them a doll version of their store mascot, and get to display some customs for people to swing by and see in person.

Unfortunately (?) whenever I go there I tend up leaving with at least as much as I brought.

In this case, the Petit Luxury furniture. Really detailed? Check. Made of resin? Yep. Fully upholstered like real furniture is? You got it. Incredibly expensive… except they got a whole bunch discounted, so they’re selling it pretty reasonably! And so I left with almost a full set of the brown furniture. Yaaah, doomed again.

But just LOOK at all those dolls. And they’ve sold out of some dolls since their last restock (at least 2 different ones, because the last time I was there, er… haha…) so this isn’t the ‘peak’ of their stock! It is a very difficult temptation.

For me, it was a bookshelf on my desk that I cleared out for my dolls. The dolls never just stood there: the stands they come with aren’t very pretty, so I got them furniture to chill on. And then accessories to go with the furniture. Then a shelf all their own, and then, when that shelf was too small, a bigger shelf. And then I just started making the damn things, because finding a shelf in just the right dimensions for dolls is a lot harder than you’d think.

I’m forever remodeling my dollhouses. I’m also forever remodeling my real house, so that doesn’t seem very strange. After I finish this blog entry, I’m going to go put on my painting clothes and get to it. It’s not that the rooms aren’t good enough as it is, it’s just that it always seems you can add something more, like crown moldings. Tiny, 1/6 crown moldings, cut with a tiny mitre and a 6″ saw. It’s a lot cuter (and easier) when I installed new moldings in my me-sized house.

That’s another benefit of dollhouses and dioramas: I can spend a couple of days doing special effects painting in my front hall with a 2 story extent-able paint roller and never want to paint again, OR I can do the exact same special effects painting in a dollhouse room and be done in an hour or less and love every minute.

I also enjoy the hunt. In a big house, you go to Lowes, Home Depot, or any of the various furniture and accessory stores for your house. Not so in miniatures. Sure, you COULD get everything at a toy store, but you’d have a hard time. It’s better to just keep in mind “dollhouse” wherever you go in regular activities. Doll-sized rugs can be made from place mats, party accessories, board games… the limit is your imagination. I have a perfect 1/6 scale red UK telephone booth (originally a cd holder) mailbox (change bank) devil duckies (pencil toppers) not to mention all the things that are just sold as cute ornamental miniatures not originally intended for dolls, like Christmas ornaments.

Let’s also not forget how you can do things with dollhouses you just can’t do to your normal house. I have a doll-sized mad science lab, armory, prison, porn studio, and chocolate shop. An entire dollhouse was made to be a bond-esque evil lair. And things like this:

Yeah, yeah, I hear your filthy thoughts. I’ll also point out that the first ceiling mirror I installed shattered, and I had tons of little cuts just from cleaning the damn thing up. The second mirror has also fallen a few times because the damn thing is BLOODY HEAVY even if it is only 15″ wide (but hasn’t shattered yet). Realistically, I’ll sleep a lot safer without a giant death trap installed in my ceiling, thankyoumuch.

So all in all, I highly recommend that if you keep dolls, figures, or anything else of a similar nature, to try out making a 1-room diorama to keep them in. Once you get over the stigma of ‘dollhouses are for little girls’ you’ll find it’s a lot of fun.