Mirror Mi Dolls by MGA Entertainment

With all of the big summer releases that I mentioned in my last review, I wasn't sure which ones to buy first, and then which ones to review first!  I guess I'm most excited about the KPop Demon Hunters dolls. I've been waiting for those like a predator ever since I saw the movie.  And I've pre-ordered everything associated with that franchise.  But I preordered a lot of other new releases, too.  And, as it happened, the Mirror Mi girls showed up on my doorstep first.

Even then, I was hesitant to review this brand right away.  The Mirror Mi doll who I'm the most excited about is Suki Goldpetal, and I haven't been able to get my hands on her yet.  She's a Walmart exclusive and has been slower to roll out than the other characters.  It feels competitive to buy Suki right now, but I know that feeling won't last.  MGA doesn't tend to limit their dolls, so for collectors, a little patience goes a long way.

As a reviewer, I don't have time to be patient.  There are so many new and exciting dolls that I want to look at this summer!  My schedule is full and I can't afford to wait around for one elusive character.  So, I decided to forge ahead with a review of the Mirror Mi dolls that I have right now.  One of whom, as you might have predicted, is the spicy redheaded rocker, Blaze Maxx:

Mirror Mi Blaze Maxx by MGA Entertainment, $29.99.

Fearbook Ghoulia Yelps from Monster High: A Guest Review!

Today I have a treat for you: a new guest review!  I don't feature a ton of guest reviews these days, but when Cherry emailed and said that she's been reading the blog for fourteen years and would love to write a review...well.  Of course I said yes!  Anyone who's been hanging around this place for fourteen years deserves a medal.  When I learned that Cherry wanted to review Fearbook Ghoulia Yelps, I was even more impressed.  That's not been an easy doll to find, at least not in this part of the world...or at least not for me.

Cherry is a twentysomething doll lover from New Zealand (which is arguably much cooler than New Jersey...) who likes puns and bad jokes.  She'd fit in perfectly at my house.  I feel like I live in pun stereo, with my husband in one ear and my son in the other.  But anyway, Cherry is a delightful person, and also an excellent artist.  In fact, I've been given hesitant permission (she is modest) to show you two of Cherry's drawings, but I'll save those for the very end.  For now, I'll stop yammering and turn it over to my esteemed guest!

***

Hello! Thank you Emily for having me on the blog! I'm Cherry, and today I'll be reviewing the new Monster High G3 Ghoulia Yelps Fearbook doll!

A gaggle of Ghoulias!

Wild Hearts Crew by Mattel

The doll world is poised for an explosion of big summer releases.  Mattel is rolling out their Moonspell Magic Monster High line and their KPop Demon Hunter dolls, MGA launched their Mirror Mi girls (who look like shrunken-headed Rainbow High dolls), and Zuru is tantalizing us with their pregnant My Mini Baby mommies and the 1:12 fashion doll line called Minnee.  It's overwhelming to have so many great things coming out all at once, not to mention extremely dangerous for the budget.  I'm eager for the future, when I can get my hands on all of these new dolls, but for today's review we're going to take a trip to the past: 2019, to be precise.  That doesn't sound like very long ago, but it was a different world back then--at least for me.  In my personal life, both kids were still in college and we lived in Maine.  We only had four dogs and no cats, which feels completely insufficient...but also adorably rational.  And of course the pandemic was just around the corner, although we had no idea it was coming.

In the doll part of my world, I'd recently stopped writing reviews and was focusing attention on My Twinn restorations.  I wasn't missing a whole lot at that point, I don't think.  The last few reviews that I wrote in 2018 included mostly vintage and discontinued dolls, which suggests that nothing new was grabbing my attention.  I did write about the Boxy Girls and the blind box Hairdorables, which were relatively new in 2019, but I can't remember anything earth moving going on.

What was Mattel up to in 2019, you might ask?  Well, Ever After High had been gone since 2017, and G2 Monster High was more recently deceased.  But Barbie Fashionistas were getting increasingly inclusive, American Girl was in full swing, and the charming Creatable World sets had just come out.  I reviewed Mattel's 1:6 scale WWE Superstars in 2018, so I assume they were still kicking around to some degree as well.  But a 2019 release that I was completely unaware of at the time (and have heard very little about since) is the Wild Hearts Crew.  And that's exactly who I'll be talking about today:

Wild Hearts Crew Kenna Roswell (2019).

Tea with Lena: A Rainbow High Doll House Renovation

Lena and Ian's house is finally done!  Or it's done enough...for now.  These projects have a way of stretching on and on, because there's always some cool new accessory or decoration that can be added.  For example, not only did we squeeze in a record player from the last review, but Lena will be sifting through some Mini Brands Masterpieces artwork today to see if any of it can be used as a last-minute finishing touch.

So this review will have two purposes: the first is to show off the house and talk about all of the products I used, and the second is a mini review of the Masterpieces surprise balls.  But Lena's going to be in charge for the most part, so I'd better turn things over to her:

Lena in her renovated Rainbow High house.

A Sunday Surprise Assortment!

I've been in a kind of blog limbo for the last week or so, a lot because I'm waiting on a few finishing touches for Lena's house.  She and Ian have already moved back in, but I want everything to be just right before I show it to all of you.  It should be done by the end of this week!  I was also doing a bit of traveling to see my family, which was wonderful.  We got to celebrate the married kids and enjoy upstate New York in spring.  If it weren't for ticks and poison ivy, upstate New York would be perfect at this time of year.

Anyway, I wanted a casual review to fill the space, and decided to do a Sunday Surprise!  It's been a while since I've done that.  At one point, maybe a year ago, I hoarded a lot of surprise-themed toys with the intent of being more regular with my Sunday Surprise posts.  I've obviously made no progress with that goal, so I decided to gather up a bunch of those toys and look at them all at once.  Which means I have a grab bag of surprises for you today!

From back left: Monster High Potions, Disney Tower Surprise, OG Surprise Lunch Bag, and Pea Pod Babies.

1:12 Scale Super Flexible Seamless Figures by TBLeague (a.k.a. Phicen)

Okay, so it's mid-May already and I have yet to write a review for this month!  Ack!  My excuse is that I've been working on two reviews at once, which slows me down in the short term but makes up for itself eventually.  I also took a weekend to go see my mom for Mother's Day, which was a lot of fun.  And I've been working hard on Lena's house, which I told her would be done by spring (oops).  It's almost ready.

Today I'm going to be looking at some 1:12 scale figures from Phicen, a company that's now going by the name TBLeague.  I like the sound of Phicen better, but I gather there were some trademark hassles that cropped up in about 2017.  For right or for wrong, I'll use "TBLeague" and "Phicen" interchangeably here.  Incidentally, the last time I reviewed a Phicen doll was back in 2017, when I did a three-part Figuring Out Phicen series.  That trio of reviews looked only at the 1:6 scale figures, which are remarkable.

I've been interested in checking out Phicen's smaller dolls for quite a long time.  Almost a decade, to be more precise.  They look highly realistic and are more affordable than the 1:6 equivalents.  This felt like an opportune moment to finally take the plunge, in part because Zuru is preparing to release their own highly-articulated twelfth-scale Minnee line.  I'm eagerly anticipating those dolls, and thought the Phicen figures would offer an interesting comparison.  Even without any comparison on the horizon, these are intriguing little dolls in their own right:

TBLeague 1:12 scale Super Flexible Seamless figure, $47.99.

Tea with Lena: Mini Brands Fill the Fridge vs. Miniverse Real Brands

This review might feel a little repetitive with the last one (Miniverse Spaces), but maybe we can think of it as a companion piece or something?  I'm including it because while I was looking at the Spaces sets, Lena got interested...and a little irritated that I hadn't included her.  She doesn't fit into the Spaces or Rolife rooms, obviously, but she likes talking about anything food or kitchen-related, so she felt like I was invading her turf.  Fair enough.

By way of an apology, I offered to let Lena talk about another group of food-themed toys that have been on my radar.  In fact, she gets to talk about two different food-themed toys today: Zuru's Mini Brands Fill the Fridge sets and MGA Entertainment's Miniverse Real Brands.  The two are extremely similar--in name and in concept.  Both brands have surprise balls with brand-name food miniatures inside.  Zuru's Fill the Fridge line also has an actual fridge that Lena will be looking at.

Lena's goal here will be to see which group of surprise ball food items is best at actually filling a fridge!  I've said too much already at this point, so I'll turn things over to Lena:

Lena with Mini Brands Fill the Fridge and Miniverse Real Brands items.

Miniverse Make it Mini Spaces by MGA Entertainment

It was so nice to hear your reactions to the My Twinn repaints that I've been working on!  Thank you so much for the encouragement.  Bolstered by your kind words, I've launched into another restoration.  I'll probably list the dolls on eBay at some point, since my Etsy store is hard to maintain.  Or, rather, it's hard to keep my Etsy store stocked, and there's nothing more depressing than an empty storefront!

I've definitely been in a project mood lately, though.  Perhaps it's because I have leftover energy from thinking that we'd be moving?  That was certainly taking up a lot of my creative brain.  So now I'm filling the void with any little project that I can get my hands on.  That's been fun, I guess, but it interferes with me actually sitting down at my computer and typing up a review.  But here I am doing it, finally.

Today's review was inspired by my recent project-seeking behavior.  I've reviewed Miniverse Make it Mini items several times on this blog, so they don't necessarily need any more commentary.  However, the new Spaces line is very similar to the Rolife Super Creator kits that I enjoy, in that both products are diorama-like rooms that need to be assembled.  There are also surprise Spaces capsules with furniture that needs to be built.  I was definitely in the mood for some building, so I decided to check it all out.

Chelsea in a Miniverse Make it Mini Spaces room ($19.99).

Blythe Float Away Dream by Good Smile Company

This review is getting close to four years overdue!  That could be a new record for me.  You might remember that way back in 2022, I started a Blythe series that was meant to have three parts: an analysis of the imitation Blythe world, a review of a Takara/TOMY Blythe doll, and a review of a Good Smile Company Blythe doll.  But I haven't done the Good Smile Company review...until now.  I got the idea for this series in 2022 because Good Smile Company had recently taken over the manufacturing of Blythe dolls from Takara/TOMY, and there was some concern about whether the new dolls would be as good as the old ones.  That's not really a pressing question anymore.  However, I still wanted to see one of the newer dolls for myself, and I don't like leaving things unfinished.  So I'm going to wrap up the series today.  Better late than never, right?

I was reminded of this series last week because I got a fresh round of threats from This is Blythe, the shop where I purchased my first imitation Blythe doll.  They're back to their email harassment tactics, threatening to sue me for factually relaying my experience.  As far as I know, the First Amendment is still a thing, so I'll hold firm.  But it's depressing because I have never, in my 20+ years of blogging and collecting, encountered such a nasty, vindictive person in the doll world.  Nothing even close.  It's just not who we are as a community.

But I don't want to dwell on that unpleasantness right now.  Dolls are meant to bring joy and amusement--not anger and frustration.  And you've already waited long enough to meet my turquoise-haired Blythe beauty from Good Smile Company, so here she is:

Blythe "Float Away Dream" by Good Smile Company, ~$120.

Winx Club Dolls by Playmates Toys

My country is in a shambles right now, and it can feel hard to do everyday activities.  But I continue to forge ahead with my reviews because it helps me to balance the bad with some good in my life.  I hope the blog offers a retreat for others of you in the United States right now, and for anyone in other countries dealing with the toxic fallout. 

Today I'm going to be looking at the newest Winx Club dolls.  I'm not a lifelong fan of the Winx Club franchise, but I started to appreciate this magical fairy world back in 2012 when I reviewed Believix Bloom by Jakks Pacific.  I became even more invested in 2014, when I compared an Italian Witty Toys Bloom to the dolls from Jakks Pacific.  By now I have a decades-long interest in the evolution of these dolls, and I was particularly excited to see the newest version of Bloom, the spunky redhead who's at the center of the Winx Club stories:

Winx Club Bloom by Playmates Toys, $17.99

Maplelea & Me by Maplelea Girls

I'm here in the nick of time to finish out December (and 2025!) with one last 18-inch doll review.  This time, I'll be looking at a Maplelea doll, which isn't something I've done since my Saila Qilavvaq review in 2014.  It's certainly past time for me to check in with this brand and see what's new.

This is sort-of an addition to my advent calendar series, but I had to cheat because there's no official Maplelea advent calendar.  I wish there was, because I feel like this company would do an outstanding job with the design and execution of such a thing.  Maybe they'll consider it for the future?  I'd certainly buy something like that.  For now, I found a cute handmade calendar that I'll share with you at the end of the review.  Mostly, though, this post will be all about Maplelea & Me KMF43:

Maplelea & Me KMF43 ($115).

The American Girl Advent Calendar

It's time for the third installment of the advent calendar series!  For those who may have missed the previous reviews, I started by looking at a My Life As doll and her calendar, then enjoyed some time with an Our Generation girl and her calendar.  Of those two, the Our Generation experience was more rewarding.  However, I've yet to look at the behemoth of the 18-inch doll market: American Girl.

My last American Girl doll review was the Girls From Many Lands post that I wrote in 2024.  However, those dolls aren't conventional American Girl dolls, so maybe it doesn't count.  Before that, I looked at Gwynn Tan in 2022.  Gwynn is a 14-inch doll, though, so maybe she doesn't count, either?  I think the last classic, 18-inch American Girl doll that I reviewed was Eliza, way back in 2017.  She was a Create Your Own American Girl, who I ordered when that concept first launched.

I decided to mirror my experience from eight years ago, and so another Create Your Own doll will join me as we look at the 2025 American Girl calendar:

Create Your Own American Girl doll ($275).

The My Life As Advent Calendar

It's advent calendar time again!  I had a lot of fun last year with this series, but got overly ambitious by opening ten calendars throughout December and part of January.  This year I decided to take a different approach: I'm only going to look at three calendars, each of which is geared towards a specific brand of 18-inch doll.

One of the reasons I chose this approach is that I've been neglecting 18-inch dolls lately.  I can't even remember the last time I reviewed a doll this size.  Part of that is because when we moved to New Jersey from Maine (five years ago now!), I gave away or sold most of my 18-inch dolls.  They take up a lot of space.  I miss them, though, and was eager to add a few back into my collection.

Each of the three reviews this month will take a brief look at an 18-inch doll, and a more in-depth look at her associated calendar.  Does that sound like fun?  I hope so, because I'm ready to kick things off with My Life As Peyton and her 2024 advent calendar:

My Life As Peyton, $29.88.

Polly Pocket Follow-Up: The Modern Playline Compacts

It's been a very restful Thanksgiving week for me here in New Jersey, and I was especially thankful that my son came for a visit and I didn't have to work on the holiday!  I hope that those of you who celebrate had a pleasant time as well.  I was a little stressed to come out of this week realizing that December is upon us, though!  Yikes.  That means I need to start getting my advent calendar series ready.

Between planning the advent calendar reviews and eating a lot of stuffing, I didn't have much time to pull together something new and creative for this week.  So, I decided to tie up loose ends from my last Polly Pocket review.  In that extensive post, I mentioned a few of the playline compact-style sets that are available right now, but I didn't have time to look at any of them in person.  Today I'll make up for that by showing you three of my favorites: the Monster High set, the Care Bears set, and the Hedgehog Cafe:

Polly Pocket in her Hedgehog Cafe from 2020 ($24.99).

Miniverse Make It Mini Baby Food (Real Baby) Sets by MGA Entertainment

Thank you so much for the wonderfully kind comments about my old dog, Geordi.  We miss him, but he left the world peacefully, snuggled up on the couch in his own floofy blanket, with lots of kisses and treats.  And my other old dog, Kit, is doing really well.  He's back to running around like a puppy and harassing me for pieces of my dried mango.  So life has stabilized, and I'm happy to be back in New Jersey playing with dolls.  Today's dolls are surprise toys, so I guess this is a Sunday Surprise post, but the title was already too long to add those words.

I didn't really plan for this review, but when I saw the new Make It Mini Baby Food sets, with their tiny silicone babies, I had to act.  I recently reviewed Zuru's crazy-popular My Mini Baby dolls, and also the strange silicone Star Babies.  So I've been on a bit of a silicone baby kick.  And when I realized that MGA had thrown their hat into this ring, I figured I should see how their version of a surprise ball mini baby measures up:

Silicone baby from a Make It Mini Baby Food set, by MGA Entertainment ($10.99).

Be Fashion Academy Dolls by Kids Hits

After getting back from Scotland and recovering from all of the wedding excitement, what I really wanted to do is look at something new.  You know, like a doll from a brand that I'd never heard of, or something that's different or unique in some way.

I get into moods like this every so often, and it usually launches me into a random internet search.  This time around, I typed "fashion doll" into the search box at Amazon, and scrolled through the top suggestions.  I got a lot of promoted products at first (Bratz and Barbie, mostly), but when I filtered for "newest arrivals," the results were more interesting.  Among them was an eye-catching doll from a company I'd never heard of called Kids Hits, with a brand that I'd never heard of called Be Fashion Academy.  But what clinched it for me was that their doll has a cat draped over her shoulders, like a fashion accessory.  That's definitely not something I've ever seen before:

Be Fashion Academy doll, Balam, by Kids Hits ($34.99).

Sunday Surprise: Star Babies by DreamShyre!

There's a big wedding coming up that I know some of you are excited about (looking at you, Mom), so I'll formally invite everyone to attend next Saturday, August 16th...which feels like it's coming up very fast.  While you're waiting for the wedding, I have another quick Sunday Surprise to offer.  This pairs well with last week's My Mini Baby review.

Way back in March, my sister-in-law Colleen showed me a video of somebody opening a Star Babies mystery bag, and I was instantly intrigued.  The reveal process, where the baby emerges from within a foam star, is decidedly unique.  Moments after seeing that video, I ordered a Star Baby for myself.  Then, about two months later, as I was starting to get nervous that my order would never arrive and the whole thing was bogus, a mystery baby showed up at my doorstep:

Star Babies mystery bag by DreamShyre Nursery, $65.

Sunday Surprise: My Mini Baby by Zuru!

I don't collect a lot of baby dolls these days, but when I was younger, realistic babies were the primary focus of my collection.  I loved the glass-eyed, life-sized babies from Götz and Zapf, and even had a few one-of-a-kind clay babies that would startle guests with their realism.  I also love surprise-themed dolls (especially babies!), as many of you probably know from my adventures with things like Sweet e.baby, Cabbage Patch Kids, and Magic Nursery toddlers.

Given my fondness for babies and surprises, when I learned about Zuru's My Mini Baby surprise balls, I knew I would have to review them at some point.  These babies have been incredibly popular since their introduction in 2023, and have been on-and-off hard to find (or simply too expensive) for a lot of the time they've been on the market.  I managed to accumulate several Series 1 balls by waiting and watching for good prices, and when I finally saw the Series 2 balls hit the shelves a few weeks ago, I grabbed a few of those, too, knowing that the time had finally come for my review.

My Mini Baby Series 1 and Series 2 surprise balls by Zuru ($9.99).

1:6 Scale Wedding Dresses for Barbie, Part One

Spring is definitely in full swing here in New Jersey, which means a lot of flowers...and a lot of kittens.  I've been having a fun time with both recently: my husband and I spent the last two weekends re-planting large areas of our garden that didn't survive the winter, while taking breaks to watch our foster cat raise her new litter of five kittens.  It's all been pretty magical.

Springtime also means that Lena's wedding is right around the corner!  That's magical, too, but she hasn't picked a dress yet, which is stressing me out.  So, during the month of May, I'll try to help her make a decision by showcasing a variety of dresses in several different styles and ranging in price from $6.89 to $242.

My plan right now is to do three wedding dress posts.  The first two will feature gowns made by Mattel specifically for Barbie dolls.  The third post will focus on off-brand or handmade dresses that I found on eBay, Amazon, and Etsy.  This won't even come close to being a comprehensive look at all currently available Barbie wedding attire, but that doesn't mean we won't be looking at a lot of dresses over the next few weeks.  In the end, I think Lena will have nearly thirty gowns to choose from.  That ought to be enough, don't you think?

We'll see, Emily.

Tea with Lena: Skiing Dolls and Wedding Plans

It was really fun to chat with you about different kinds of head-swapping dolls.  And since my You Create kit arrived just today (!),  I'll be back to re-visit that concept soon.  Based on my experiences with the head-swapping series, and also Barbie Month back in 2023 and the advent calendar focus last December, I'm finding that I enjoy writing groups of themed reviews.  They allow me to immerse myself in one subject matter for a relatively long period of time, and tend to make each individual review shorter than average.  I wonder if this is something that works for you as readers?  If so, I have a few ideas for future series that I think could be interesting.

The problem with these grouped reviews, though, is that they can take a month or more to complete, and so I get pulled away from other things--like Lena.  She's been frustrated with me lately because I haven't had a lot of time to check in with her.  So, in an effort to mend some bridges, I'm going take a little break from serious reviewing and turn today's post almost entirely over to Lena and Ian--with a few mini reviews tucked in for good measure.

Lena with the Pink Passport Made to Move Winter Sports equipment.