Well, here we are two weeks into the new year and I haven't posted on my blog. Sorry about that! We've been traveling all over the place now that the entire family is fully vaccinated. It's been wonderful, especially for the kids, to see relatives and friends again. Like so many people, I had some trouble maintaining my waistline during the lockdown. As you might remember, I lost 60 pounds in 2019 through intermittent and extended fasting and the keto diet. I was working with a doctor on my fasting, but sadly the combination of the pandemic and the presidential election seemed to drive him crazy. He was assigning more and more extreme fasts and I started losing hair and re-gaining weight. He's now doing week-long dry fasts and stuff so I can no longer recommend him. Instead I returned to my old stand-by, the original Dr. Atkins Diet Revolution book from 1972. This is the book that taught me how to feed my son after he was diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes. I didn't want to cook different foods for everyone so we switched the whole family to his plan. Nowadays we would call this the Keto diet. After a couple months, my teenagers' acne cleared up completely and my youngest son, whose pediatrician was on the bring of prescribing immune-suppressing medicine for his eczema, saw the eczema and the mouth sores from which he suffered, completely clear up. It was obvious this was an optimal diet for everyone's health, not just for controlling diabetes. And my son's A1C went down to 6.5 and his sugars were totally flat, which is textbook-perfect diabetes control!

​A couple weeks before Christmas my diabetic son took a new job as a geneticist and moved out and I'm afraid we had a carbohydrate festival until after New Years. And almost immediately, my weight shot up and my kids' acne and mouth sores and eczema came roaring right back. Atkins was right when he said you should consider excess weight as a lifelong chronic disease. As soon as you stop treating it you go right back to gaining. I whole-heartedly recommend that book! It's pretty easy to find online and at thrift stores.  

A new popular form of fasting is the PMSF, or Protein Modified Sparing Fast, and I noticed the original first week of the original Atkins diet matches the macro percentages for that fast perfectly: 30% Protein, 65% Fat, and 5% Carbohydrate. Just reduce the calories to around 800 to induce fasting autophagy. PMSF is not a new invention, despite what many influencers claim. Dr. Atkins called it a "Fat Fast" and was prescribing it to his patients back in the 1960s. The diet mimics the influence of fasting without the spike in cortisol and malnutrition or muscle loss many people experience with dry or water fasts. After just four days of PMSF following Atkins' first week diet I was in deep ketosis and lost 2.5 inches off my waist! Our scale broke partway through lockdown and I never replaced it so I am using measurements to track my progress. One note: I am allergic to a large number of fruits and vegetables, including iceberg lettuce, so I did not eat the daily salads Atkins adds to his diet. It's a pity because I love iceberg lettuce! 

Atkins' reason for adding the lettuce to his diet is the lack of crunchiness in the texture of pretty much all keto foods. It is something you will come to miss pretty quickly. I remedied this for my family with my Keto Copycat Cheez-Its recipe. Cheez-Its are my favorite snack and I missed them terribly, but my recipe tastes just like the real thing! The annoying thing about making the original version is the requirement, if you want true Cheez-It crunch, of aging the cheese. My husband figured out a genius hack, however: you can "age" the cheese in a dehydrator! We just put the Gouda slices on parchment paper and dry for 9 hours at 125 degrees. These are great plain to snack on and are also a terrific replacement for crackers and flatbreads and chips to eat with pimento cheese or dip.

The dehydrator was my husband's Christmas present because he loves making jerky, but we've used it pretty much constantly to make Cheez-Its! I'm so glad he figured it out because I can make 200 individual crackers and they'll be gone in two days! Now I can just dry the cheese overnight or all day and it's ready to bake. I just wish the dehydrator didn't take up so much room in my kitchen! 

So, that's where I've been, just dieting and turning my son's bedroom into a new office and guest room. I am selling the incredible amount of stuff he left behind and doesn't want. I have all kinds of video games and consoles and other gaming stuff for sale, as well as a ton of clothes. A lot of the clothes are brand new because he outgrew them before he ever had a chance to wear them. You can link to all my shops from the Home page to purchase these. I am listing new stuff daily! I have so many new dolls to restore and customize, but it will have to wait until I finish the re-decorating. I hope your year is off to a wonderful start!

It's that time of year again: when, if you're like me, you realize you've missed the shipping deadline for Christmas cards and gifts! I totally get it! I will be sending digital cards and electronic gifts this year because I just never got around to ordering Christmas cards and mailing gifts to far-away friends and family. With kids' sports and holiday activities, it is really hard to keep up with the postal schedule. Therefore, I am doing my best to help you with your gift list by discounting all my ebooks 20%! You can download these gifts any time, even Christmas Day. Give your loved one (or yourself!) the gift of a new career with my Doll University ebook for less than $30! That's an amazing $50 off the price of the paperback. Doll University teaches doll repair as well as how to profit from your new-found skills by opening a doll shop or doll hospital.

Do you know someone dreaming of downsizing? Give them my Tiny Budget Tiny Cabin ebook, a journal detailing how we built and furnished our tiny cabin for under $20k and purchased an acre of waterfront property for less than $45k.

Know someone who just wants to repair one special doll? Give them one of my Midcentury Trade School doll repair lessons featuring specific individual midcentury dolls, such as Tiny Tears or Saucy Walker.

When you give the gift of knowledge you give endless opportunity for new experiences, something that won't break or fade or be re-gifted. Find these special prices exclusively on my Shop page.

This is the last week to order online in order to get your packages delivered in time for Christmas. I’m having a sale to help you get everything you need. Link to my eBay, Etsy, and Depop shops from the Home page to save.

Today I am going to show you how to install squeeze voice boxes. I am using one of my 3-Sound voice boxes, available from my shops (link from the Home page). I am using an applique patch to attach the voice box to a firmly-stuffed doll. If you want to put the box into a floppy, loosely-stuffed doll or plush you can just open one of the seams and insert the voice box. Squueze the body to make sure the box works. If you can't squeeze it enough to make the voice work remove some of the stuffing around it. When you get it to work re-sew the seam or add hook and loop tape so you can open and close it to get to the box.

To insert with a patch, cut out your patch. Heart-shaped patches are always cute. Sew on the applique partly, until you can insert the box. I am using blanket stitch and a fleece applique. 

Continue sewing the applique until it is complete. If you are using one of my boxes consider using hook and loop tape on one side so you can get to the box because these boxes have batteries which can be replaced. The vintage doll body shown here is too delicate to have the patch opening and closing so I sewed it all the way around. You would insert a squeaking voice box and any other box you squeeze to work the same way.

Here is a video of the crying sound. To hear the entire series of sounds please click here.

My long-time readers will remember my specialty: Ideal Velvet Skin Baby Dreams doll restoration. Ideal has been making a Baby Dreams doll since at least the 1930s but this version, with flocked "velvet" skin, was only made for one year, 1975. It so happens this was my first doll. I adored her but one day she disappeared. Unbeknownst to me, since her flocking was turning brown and peeling off, my mother threw her away. Shortly after that my father died and we moved from California to Ohio to live with my grandparents, and all the events during that traumatic era erased her from my conscious memory. Every so often, though, Baby Dreams would resurface, literally in my dreams! I had a recurring dream that I left her lying on the floor in the foyer and when I returned she was gone. In my dream I could see her soft face and her pink pointed hood. The funny thing is, I can't remember much about our house in California, but in my dream it reappeared in all it 1970s glory and I could recall every detail. I asked my mother what doll I had but she couldn't remember. In my memory she was a cloth doll but my mother told me she was flocked. I searched and searched for a flocked doll with a pink hooded bunting and finally I found a wise eBay seller who included those keywords in her listing. This is a helpful note for eBay sellers: use descriptive words because your buyer might not remember the name of a vintage item! Once I found my doll I realized she is extremely rare. Due to the issue of the flocking darkening and flaking off the dolls were often discarded and they were only made by Ideal for one year. After many years of waiting I was able to find a replacement doll I could afford and since then I no longer have the dream about her being lost. I realize, of course, the dream wasn't ever really about the doll. I linked her to my lost life in California when my family was whole and my father still alive. I am happy to have my replacement doll though anyway. I learned to restore the velvet skin and now I restore as many as I can get.

This particular Baby Dreams had lost most of her velvet skin and her vinyl was dark and stained. The tip of her nose, for example, was dark brown. I took her apart and cleaned her and re-stuffed her. Then I gave her a full body repaint and re-flocking. I applied four layers of flocking so she won't be losing hers again, at least not any time soon! The right panel of her chest had a hole and was very fragile but otherwise her body is in excellent condition. Since she didn't need a new body I repaired the hole and added a 3 sound voice box. Each time you squeeze her body she will laugh, cry, or say "Mama". The video below is the crying sound.

Baby Dreams has her original box and bunting. She is all ready for a new home. Because she is hand-painted and flocked and her body is fragile I recommend her for adult collectors. Any young child should be supervised while playing with her. You can find this extremely rare doll from all my shops. Link to all my shops from the Home page. I have another of these on the way but that one needs a new body and bunting as well as flocking so it will be a while before she's finished.

A few weeks ago I added a rare member to the Crissy family of dolls for sale in my shops. Meet Brandi, Crissy's cousin, I think, from California. Brandi is extremely rare. She was made for one year only, I think. Brandi is a true California girl, with a curtain of swoon-worthy ash blond hair, the height of mod fashion! Brandi is the only member of the Crissy family with painted eyes and a deep tan. Her jointed waist is perfect for doing the Twist! Brandi was an absolute mess when I got her and I initially intended to sell her for parts because I thought her hair had been cut and the growth mechanism was broken. After a while I decided to try and fix her; after all, I couldn't really make her more broken and I could still always part her out. I was amazed I actually repaired the growth mechanism. When I opened her up I found her hair wasn't cut but just bunched up and stuck inside her body.  Her arms were faded to a pale yellow so I blushed them to match her tan body. Then I made her a playsuit romper similar to her original outfit. I found the fabric in my mom's attic. It's from the same era, so the perfectly correct style! I am having a great time restoring all these mod-era dolls, such as the Skipper trunk I finished last week. I have one Crissy doll and three Velvets as well as Brandi and I don't have any more on the way at the moment. You can find them in my shops with the links on the Home page. 

Here at last is my second trunk set for the holiday season! This set features Skipper, Barbie’s little sister. Skipper has the pretty rare mod face with bold eye lashes and white lipstick from 1967 and the straight waist Japan body. Her trunk is from 1964. True to form, Skipper has an adorable ensemble perfect for every occasion. Whether swimming in Lake Garda, skiing in the Italian alps, hosting a garden party, taking her doll for a walk around town, enjoying the Florentine sunset, or just snuggling into bed, Skipper is always impeccably turned out! Some of her clothes and accessories are quite rare and desirable. I had a wonderful time creating this unique set! I’m especially proud of the custom-restored trunk. I repaired the torn sides with pink accents and added a removable accessories case which can also be used as a tuffet-style seat. What an amazing gift this would be! You can find it in my shops. I hope to have more trunk sets completed soon.

Every holiday season my most popular offerings are doll and trunk sets. If you have been following me for a while you know I rarely see a doll trunk I don't love! Trunks sets are really not as lucrative as selling all the pieces separately but I just love making them, and my customers love buying them! I made some earlier in the year that sold out pretty much immediately. Yesterday I finished my first set for the holidays: a Marlo Twist and Turn Barbie from 1966.

I am not a Barbie expert; I've only restored a few of these older dolls. I just ordered a set of magazines suggested by one of my followers and I did a ton of research on this set. The Barbie has the "Marlo" face, a portrait of Marlo Thomas. Her hair is medium brown, which according to a blog I read is the "CoCo a Go Go" shade. This Barbie came with blond, red, brown, or dark brown hair. Barbie wears her original outfit, which consists of a bikini made of orange plastic stuff, a mesh cover-up romper, and a hair ribbon.  The trunk is the 1961 Ponytail Barbie case made over into a custom case or handbag. I re-lined it, added an accessory box, and replaced the broken handle with a chain and real leather purse strap. I then restored a bunch of handmade and factory made clothes and accessories. None of the clothes are tagged. I do recognize a couple as Mattel or other brands. The set includes a real fur stole!

Some people on eBay (and only on eBay) have told me the doll's hair doesn't look brown but cherry red or purple. I don't know what's going on with that. The hair is medium brown with a hint of auburn in certain lights. I got a new phone recently and I this is the first thing I photographed with it, so maybe I am doing something wrong with the camera. Or maybe it's the rainy weather we've been having. The fact it's only people on eBay makes me think it's possibly something with their site. At any rate, I can assure you the doll has brown hair and I have taken photos both indoor and out at different times of day so you can get the most accurate picture of it. I actually wish she had red hair; in my experience redhaired dolls sell for about 30% more than other dolls!

Earlier today this set sold, not even 24 hours after listing, but then the buyer changed her mind so I went ahead with this post. The set is now re-listed. If you order from my Depop shop before midnight tonight you will get FREE shipping! So hurry over there if you want sweet Marlo Barbie and her wardrobe please head to Depop or my other shops from the Home page.

What doll would you like to see made into a trunk set next? I have a Vogue Jill, several Topper Dawns, Tiny Betsy McCall, mod era Skipper, and so many more. Please, let me know! And please, enjoy Barbie's home video of her trip to Saluda, NC up at the top of the post!

I just added a third type of doll voice box to my shops. These battery-powered voices make three different sounds. Each time you squeeze the box they cry, laugh, or say "Mama".

I stocked these after complaints about my vintage reproduction voice boxes when people would order them for use in reborn dolls. I had a couple bad reviews on Etsy from people who ordered my vintage voice boxes and didn't like the sound. The sound is identical to the Midcentury "mama" crying dolls like Madame Alexander Puddin' and similar. I have an audio file linked to my Etsy listing, so I was confused about why people were ordering the old-fashioned criers for modern dolls if they didn't like the sound. The mystery was solved a few weeks later when I realized Etsy was recommending the crying boxes on the home page as a suggestion for "Reborn Dolls". It's a huge deal to get a spot on the Etsy home page and to have them suggest your listing, but it's really unfortunate they recommended the wrong product, especially since my listing says absolutely nothing about reborn dolls. Most reborn doll makers want a realistic sounding voice. My pink criers are meant for doll restorers who repair vintage dolls.  After a great deal of searching I found recordable voice boxes for reborn and other dolls and these pre-recorded voices. I just hope Etsy will suggest these for reborns instead!

Here is a tutorial showing how to install these squeeze boxes. These have replaceable batteries so I recommend closing part of the seam or applique with hook and loop tape or a snap or button so you can get to the box.

I apologize for my long delay in posting. I always have the best of intentions to post at least once a week. Unfortunately, last month we had an illness go through the entire family and I was sick for more than two weeks. I don't think it was COVID because my oldest caught it first from an outbreak at the Starbucks where he works and they required him to get a COVID test, which was negative. I think it was probably the flu. It had a long incubation of about a week and then the respiratory and stomach symptoms lasted for at least 10 days, so it took up our whole September moving through everyone.

I have also been feeling discouraged and depressed lately. My sales have been slow, and I'm behind on my book. The main problems though are issues with my sales platforms, beyond my control but still causing me a lot of angst. Besides Etsy's misguided voice box recommendations I have had a recent rash of customers who don't read listings or measure or who flat out disregard my advice and then leave me bad feedback when they order the wrong items. I had one customer who ordered the wrong size doll shoes several times despite me repeatedly stating they wouldn't fit the doll in question! Normally I just let bad reviews like that go because I have a 5-Star rating with almost 2000 sales on Etsy and I figure anyone who does read the listing will see the reviewer obviously didn't. Unfortunately, Etsy has premiered a new "Star Seller" program. Despite my mostly stellar reviews I don't qualify because it requires you to have essentially 100% positive reviews. I am enough of a perfectionist without Etsy pressuring me further, especially when their website is far from perfect 100% of the time! Their sharing feature for listings hasn't worked for months! They also require sellers to respond to 85% of messages. I respond to 100% of messages but their algorithm isn't working. I figured it out, I think. If you send me a couple messages on the same topic and I only respond to the most recent one it counts it as me not responding. So, if you send a seller  different sentences as different messages or you send a message with just an emoji the seller has to respond to EVERY message separately. So, if you want to help out Etsy sellers please send your entire question or comment in one message and PLEASE don't leave poor reviews for sellers if you're the one who didn't measure or read the listing  or whatever!

My sales slowdown is largely due to problems with USPS and eBay's Global Shipping Center. They have stopped delivering to Australia and New Zealand due to COVID. International customers represent at least half my sales and my products are particularly popular in Australia. I had to cancel a $100 doll sale the other day because Etsy allowed the buyer to choose USPS postage to Australia for $53 even though they are supposed to have their own global delivery program. USPS isn't delivering there and the only alternatives were UPS or FedEx at a cost of more than $200! So, I don't know what to do. Someone told me Pirate Ship was selling postage to Australia but they only use USPS so I think it will be another situation where they sell the postage but the packages will be returned. Over the summer I told you about eBay's Global Center returning all my doll-related orders marked as prohibited, even though they are not prohibited. I reported that to them about a thousand times and I THINK they finally fixed it. The other day I was able to send a pair of doll eyes to Australia through their Global Center. I sincerely hope it's fixed because eBay is delivering to Australia and New Zealand at no extra cost. So, if you are a customer there please contact me on eBay to add the Global Center to your delivery options if you don't see it. Of course eBay possibly fixed the issue after I spent a month converting all my listings to USPS instead of the Global Center!

So, anyway, I am sorry to be absent and in such a funk. I am working hard to focus on the things I can control and find alternatives for my international peeps. Besides the doll voices, I am in the process of listing an enormous Barbie lot from 1959 to the present. I am also going through the attic and selling my kids' outgrown toys. I read there will be a toy shortage this holiday season so I am determined to get everything listed for sale. There will not be a toy shortage at Atelier Mandaline!