Showing posts with label Sunday Surprise. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Sunday Surprise. Show all posts

Sunday, November 27, 2016

Sunday Surprise: A Few Loose Ends!

This week's Sunday Surprise is a mixed bag of goodies.  First of all, I promised that I would find a way to share my remaining Toy Box Monthly subscription boxes with you, so I'll start things off by quickly (?) revealing those items.

The second part of the surprise will be a revisit of Magic Nursery dolls.  The Magic Nursery poll is over, and it was a very close race!  In the end, 211 of you guessed that the blue doll would be a girl while 179 bet on another boy.  I'll de-box that baby at the end of the post, and also share another little Magic Nursery cutie who will help get us into the holiday spirit:

Magic Nursery Holiday Baby (discontinued).

Sunday, October 30, 2016

Sunday Surprise: A Mystery Reborn Baby!

I mentioned last week in my Saskia Project post that I've been anticipating the arrival of a surprise reborn baby for the past month.  I ordered this baby because I adore surprises, of course, but also because I was curious to see another reborn doll up-close.  I thought it might be helpful for me to see a reborn artist's work as I struggle with Saskia's paint.  This mystery baby arrived a few weeks ago and I finally opened the box on Wednesday.  It has definitely been helpful to look at how this baby was completed.  I'm also very grateful for the tips and encouragement from all of you!  I feel re-energized in my efforts to make Saskia as nice as possible.  Thank you.

For anyone arriving late to this party, I'll quickly explain what a surprise reborn doll is.  A reborn doll is a made-over play doll or a doll assembled from a kit.  Typical reborn kits include a blank vinyl head and limbs and perhaps an unfilled cloth body.  That's it.  Artists and collectors paint these kits, add eyes and hair, and assemble the parts onto stuffed, weighted bodies.  A surprise reborn baby is a completed doll offered for sale by a reborn artist, but all of the characteristics of the doll are left up to the artist to decide.  These qualities are kept secret from the buyer...to add a fun element of mystery.  So, I did not know this baby's gender, size or appearance until I opened the box!

I searched high and low for just the right surprise reborn doll.  There are many different options out there--both on eBay and on Etsy.  I spent a lot of time looking at artists' past work and reading their customer reviews.  I finally found a shop with good prices, good reviews, and a light-handed painting technique that I admire: Brenda's Reborns over on Etsy (Brendasreborns).  Brenda charges $130 for her surprise reborn babies, and also offers a large selection of custom dolls ranging from $130 to $300 (for a set of twins).  I told Brenda that there was no hurry, but I still received my baby quickly--about three weeks after I placed the order.

Surprise reborn doll by Brenda's Reborns ($130).

Sunday, October 16, 2016

Sunday Surprise: Magic Nursery Toddlers by Mattel!

My goodness, Sundays come around quickly, don't they?  This used to feel like a bad thing because Sunday symbolizes the dwindling weekend.  While Saturday morning is filled with possibilities, Sunday morning is time to clean the bird cages, vacuum the dog hair, and get ready for another week of work.  Sundays have transformed a bit in my mind recently, though.  I have a new-found appreciation for Sunday because this is the day when my son calls home from college...and also because it's the day when I get to look at another surprise doll!

The Sweet e.Baby that I reviewed during the last Sunday Surprise had a secret gender and a secret name hidden with a CD...technology that was new enough in 1999 to feel magical.  In 1990, about a decade before the Sweet e.Baby, Mattel came up with a doll whose gender was hidden within another seemingly-magical concoction: a dissolving hospital gown.  Yes, that's right--a gown that completely disintegrates in water to reveal the gender announcement (and a new outfit).  Mattel called these babies Magic Nursery dolls.

The idea might sound far-fetched, but it was wildly popular.  My parents should thank their lucky stars that I was not a child of the 90s, because this kind of toy would have been completely irresistible to me.  It's even irresistible to me now, almost thirty years later, when unopened Magic Nursery dolls--with all of their surprises still hidden--can cost a small fortune.

Magic Nursery Toddler doll by Mattel (1990).

Sunday, October 2, 2016

Sunday Surprise: Sweet e.Baby From Playmates!

I've been having an incredible amount of fun hunting around for surprise dolls.  The really good ones are rare, but exhilarating to find.  I think the most intriguing examples I've found so far have been vintage items, many from the mid to late 1990s.  Today's doll, the Sweet e.Baby from Playmates Toys, is no exception to that rule.  This baby is from 1999 and features a computer CD containing...wait for it...the baby's secret gender and name!  Oh, yay!

I have no idea how I got lucky enough to find this gem.  I was browsing eBay for a Magic Nursery doll (coming soon!) and I stumbled on the auction for this little one.  I'd never seen this type of doll  before and I haven't been able to find another one for sale anywhere.  I paid $45, which seemed like a fair deal given the doll's scarcity.  I couldn't find any substantive information about this brand online.  There are two pictures of dolls in their boxes--but that's it.  It's almost like they never existed.

So, to put yourself in the mood for this review, think back (those of you who are old enough...) to 1999 and try to remember what the computer world was like back then.  That was the iBook "Clamshell" era for Apple laptops--when portable computers weighed 7 pounds.  It was before Stardoll, before Webkins, before Facebook.  1999 was also the heyday of Britney Spears, The Backstreet Boys, Ricky Martin and Eminem.  It was the year The Matrix came out--along with Star Wars I: The Phantom Menace and The Sixth Sense.  It was before reality television, and in an age when kids were still excited about vinyl Pokemon figures.  With all of that in mind, let's travel back in time and uncover this mysterious baby's seventeen-year-old secrets:

Sweet e.Baby doll and CD from 1999.

Sunday, September 18, 2016

Sunday Surprise: Bratz Lil' Angelz!

Happy Sunday!  Today's post was originally going to be short, but it's morphed into something a bit more substantial.  I'll explain.  What started me on this path was the discovery of a Bratz Lil' Angelz "Secret Surprise" set a few weeks ago.  I flipped out.  I mean, any toy that has both the words "secret" and "surprise" in the same sentence has got to be good.  And this toy looks amazing: it has a small baby doll with a secret gender, a hidden eye color and a hidden hair color.  The set also includes two shrouded pets of unknown species!  Doesn't that sound like fun??  But the other thing that makes this set so great is the fact that I knew nothing about the Bratz Lil' Angelz dolls before I saw it.  I have no idea how these babies escaped my radar, but I absolutely love discovering a new kind of doll.

Immediately after purchasing the Secret Surprise set, I made it my mission to learn more about the Bratz Lil' Angelz.  In doing so, I realized that surprises are a bit of a theme with this line.  I found two other sets (Pet Shop Surprise and Surprise Litter) that involve some kind of hidden feature.  I bought an example of each of these toys to show you today.  So, this post will feature three Bratz Lil' Angelz surprise toys, not just the set I originally bought.

The Bratz Lil' Angelz are all discontinued, but the silver lining is that none of the toys I'll show you today seem particularly expensive or hard to find at the moment.  I have to say, though, I think I got really lucky with the Secret Surprise set.  I found it for $10.24 on eBay, which is close to the original price.  The only other example I've been able to find is a blue version on Amazon for $83.  Yikes.  Of course I'm going to save the Secret Surprise for the very end of the post, but here's a preview of the wonderfully mysterious baby from that set...who looks like he/she might have red hair!

Bratz Lil' Angelz Secret Surprise baby (discontinued).

Sunday, September 4, 2016

Sunday Surprise: Toy Box Monthly Subscription!

I'm sure many of you have heard of subscription boxes like Loot Crate and Birchbox.  The idea is that you sign up to receive a mystery box of stuff every month.  These subscriptions have become so popular, it's now possible to get boxes with just about any theme you can imagine: pet supplies, books, cosmetics, food, crafts...and toys.

My son and I tried a subscription a few months ago called The Mystery Experiences Company.  This company sends out a detailed mystery to be solved every month--each with little puzzles, artifacts and clues to help with the solution.  This was fun, but we discovered quickly that we didn't have the time or patience to dig into a complex new mystery every month.  When I was canceling the mystery subscription, I spotted Toy Box Monthly.  For $20 ($15 plus shipping), this company sends a little box of mystery toys every month.  This sounded like the perfect thing for the Sunday Surprise!

I should mention right off the bat that the Shopkins Lil' Shoppie shown below did not come in the subscription box.  So why am I showing you a picture of her?  Well, I didn't want to give away what was in the subscription box (that would ruin the surprise!) but also, these Shopkins items will make an appearance at the end of the post.  That's all I'll say for now.

Shopkins Rainbow Kate ($5.49) and a Happy Places blind box ($2.99).

Sunday, August 21, 2016

Sunday Surprise: Cabbage Patch Kids Surprise Newborn Twins!

I have a long-standing fixation on toys with surprises or mysteries.  Things like Kinder Surprise eggs, for example, send me into fits of glee.  I love blind bag toys, vending machines and grab bag specials, too.  If a doll has a secret accessory or gift displayed in its box, odds are good that I'm going to want it.  Because of this obsession, I've decided to introduce a new feature to the blog.  It'll be called "Sunday Surprise" and will include short reviews of surprise-themed toys...on Sundays.  I might not be able to come up with one of these every single Sunday, but that'll be part of the surprise!  I already have a bunch of amazing toys that I can't wait to share with you.  This whole idea is beyond exciting for me, so I really hope you'll enjoy it, too!

My favorite kind of toy surprise is probably the mystery name of a doll.  You might remember how thrilling I thought the Cabbage Patch Babyland Mini dolls were with their little hidden birth certificates.  I can't believe that those cuties were on the shelves for such a short period of time.  I decided that the perfect toy to start this series would be another Cabbage Patch Kid mystery item: the Surprise Newborn Twins!

Cabbage Patch Kids Surprise Newborn Twins (discontinued) by Jakks Pacific.