Now Playing: another idjit skidding through the traffic light...
Current Mood : Scrappy
Decided to get some neglected housework done. Cleaned out a cabinet and decided to store the lightbox in there, just as soon as I got a couple things done with it. Mostly what I wanted to do was alter Denise Devoto's ‘To Have and To Hold' lace overlay pattern, featured in the Autumn '07 Barbie Collector. I worked it up as a lace minidress on my site, but the bodice was designed for the smaller-bodied ‘bellybutton' doll. It just didn't have enough fabric to overlap close in the back. So I used hooks and eyes.
Funny, how Mattel finally answered the since-1959 critics of Barbie's big bust by making the entire chest smaller, not just the bustline. If you believe Mattel encourages eating disorders on purpose, you could probably add the bellybutton body to your evidence pile - proportionately, Bab's bust is probably just as big as before, if not bigger. But her chest is smaller....
Anyway, I couldn't find the pattern I used, so I printed out another one. And altered it. Didn't need the lightbox, just a ruler. Once done - I just added a half inch to the back bodice piece - I re-scanned it, and saved it as the ‘1966 body' version. Then I put the lightbox away.
Cleaning our main bathroom was exhausting, so I relaxed in the Lab a bit. Found a place for the wire rack I got from Friday's yard sales, and filled it full of misc. stuff. The kittens barely left it alone for me to do so - if I ever find another, I need to buy it just for them !
Tidied up a bit in there, too. Got all the Baby Ariel and Raggedy Ann doll's clothes together - they wear about the same size - and stored them in the plastic backpack the Disney little-girl doll came in. I need to sew a bit more for both Baby Chrissy's Raggedy Ann and Baby Ariel. They got next to nothin' !
Cleaned up the mess on the sewing machine table left from Saturday's efforts. At least I don't feel like crying over it anymore. May sew tomorrow - I keep saying tomorrow, don't I ? I was all set to sew this weekend, but my mind keeps returning to Thursday night, and my interest in trying out the long-delayed Jasmine outfit just dries right up.
Well, I may as well get it over with and say it. Back on Thursday, Beloved Hubby said the LDP dolls creeped him out. He didn't have a problem with the Barbies, Elphie, and even the My Size and Baby Chrissy dolls didn't bug him. But he was worried that the LDPs signaled my wish to return to childhood, and it worried him about my mental state.
(sigh) And yes, that hurt. I'm sitting in a flippin' room fulla dolls, but only one subset indicates a childlike tendency ? There's not a doll in here who wasn't designed for kids - except maybe Elphie and Fiyero - but the ones I've felt the most interest and confidence in customizing are the ones he doesn't like ? I mean, of all the dolls in here, those are the ones that signal a psychological break with reality ? Yes, my sudden interest in them has been a bit odd for me, but if I was enjoying it, and it wasn't hurting anyone, what was the problem ? It's not like I went out and bought rhumba panties and patent leather shoes and tried to sew fluffy pink square-dance dresses and put my hair in beribboned pigtails. I wasn't sucking my thumb, OK ?
He also had some comments about how the Princess dolls reflected the princess status I had with my father. Um, I hardly ever saw him as a kid, he was as eager to escape his wife's barbs as I was to escape my mother's (you know, same person and all ) and I certainly didn't have a ‘your wish is our command' childhood. If anything, all these dolls and recent princess preoccupation is me trying to erase and write over my real childhood with something that doesn't hurt as much. Only now am I comfortable enough to allow this.
Hell, I wasn't even allowed to play princess as a kid. If I was swanning around, Mother Dear would soon notice, and toss out a few comments that cut me back down to invisible cipher, where I belonged. I never owned a toy tiara, and the closest thing I had to a wand was a plastic cat head on a black stick. It was a prop for that year's hand-me-down Halloween witch costume, and I bought it myself. How I longed to be something beautiful and fragile one year - a ballerina, a princess, a fairy. Never happened. If plastic crowns and things were available in the late 70s, it never occurred to me to buy one. I'd just open myself up to more cut-quick comments. Secretly, though, I've wanted a tiara since I was six. It was fortunate for me that Leia never wore one, or my self-esteem would probably be even worse. I could pretend to be her safely - because no one could tell.
I actually feel that, for the first time in my life, I can do what I want, and I'm aware of it. And I trust the world enough to be myself, and I trust myself to recognize and indulge some simple and stupid things I was previously denied. If it wasn't somehow important to me, I wouldn't be upset about it, I'd have let it go decades ago. Stuff you hold on to = stuff you can't let go. But now, with beloved's words, I was seriously considering either destroying or selling everything in here. Because now, my little refuge hurt.
I'm still not sure what's next. Not sure how to articulate all this without hurting anyone else. I want Beloved to feel like he can talk to me, but I didn't appreciate the rather painful freelance analysis. Even if I really needed it, I never got the chance to return the ‘favor'. Well, I'm sure it'll come up - I can never hide how I feel.
And I may start closing the Lab door when I'm not in it.
But for those who do have, its with them forever, and those of us affected by it just have to learn to deal, adjust, and move on. Please don't close the lab door. When I read that I felt so sad. Its your little pleasant nook in this world just for you. We all need our little nooks. What goes on in there stays in there, and as long as you aren't carrying your dolls everywhere you go, asking them if they are hungry, and oh that outfit your described sounded so charming and would fit where I am headed with this comment, well then I think you are just fine. So enjoy those dolls, forgive the "duh" gene, and try to have your say one day over some ice cream and quiet time with the sweet'ums. 
