Well, yesterday evening and this morning have been spent in hair. Not real hair, mind you, but doll's hair. While it's great to be able to get the Disney princess dolls for cheaper by finding used dolls, the one problem is, you have to restore them. Now, this doesn't always mean a full make-over, in fact, in my experience this is the exception. What needs the most attention is the hair. Now with dolls like Mulan or Snow White, that's just a quick comb and wash, maybe 15 minutes, but with dolls like Megara or Jasmine or Rapunzel, whose hair is nearly as long as the doll is tall, and not to mention thick, it can be an all day, or even two day, endevor. Luckily, I haven't yet run into another doll that has had the same problems as the first Ariel I bought. Just lots and lots of hair, mats, and tangles. I've restored two more dolls and finished up Rapunzel's hair.
Rapunzel
After an over night dry, Rapunzel's hair was ready to be braided to keep it from tangling back up. While I have just braided the other dolls' hair, I wanted to try to replicate the braid from the movie from Rapunzel, minus the flowers at the moment.
Look! It's Pippi Longstockings!!! Not really. I made two small braids on the front side of Rapunzel's hair to replicate the smaller braids in her hair in the movie.
Then I very carefully braided all of the hair together, making sure to keep the smaller braids on the top side of the over-all braid.
And a re-dressed, restored Rapunzel. I'm ready to start on this dress. But I have to finish designing Snow White's peasant dress first because it is that dress that will be the base design for so many other, including all three of Rapunzel's dresses.
Megara
Well, after finishing Rapunzel, I turned my attention to the very long, very thick hair of Meg. Since it worked so well to restore Rapunzel's hair, I used the same process on Meg's hair, combing small sections out and braiding them individually before moving on. The picture is really deceiving because her unbraided section looks like it really isn't all that tangled, but it was. It took me a total of about eight hours to get her hair combed out.
Just a little bit further....an hour later!
And further. I'm about a third of the way through in this picture. It wasn't really that Meg's hair was so tangled as just how thick it was. It took a long time to work through all of it.
About half way through, I took the smaller braids out and braided it into one braid. That's a really thick braid for a doll! And that was only half way. It was so thick that...
I laid Meg next to the other doll with long, thick hair, Rapunzel. Half of Meg's hair braided is just nearly as thick as Rapunzel's entire hair braided!!! I swear there must be three times the normal amount of doll hair on Meg's head.
But I kept at it. I really wanted to see how Meg's hair looked tangle free, and to try to figure out how to style it in her updo from the movie.
Almost there!!! I'm about two thirds of the way done here. And if you are wondering what is with the short hair sticking up on the top of her head, her hair hasn't been cut. It's the side sweep bangs. Those are going to take some taming to get under control for styling.
And finally this morning, I finished getting through all that hair! Much smoother hair, but a little rough. After she washes and dries, she will be getting a second hair treatment of conditionar to soften her hair back up.
And from the front. That really is a lot of hair.
Jasmine
While I was working on doll hair this morning, since I was woken up early by a woodpecker pecking on the beams under the eves outside my window, I went to work on another doll I have collected, this time Jasmine. Jasmine has hair about as long as Meg's but not nearly as thick - not anywhere near as thick. I really started out just planning on doing a little work on Jasmine this morning because her hair seemed so tangled from the look and feel of it.
This back picture shows much more of the tangles I was faced by Jasmine, and the reason why she has stayed in the shipping box these last few days. I dreaded getting after her hair, fearing it was going to be like the first Ariel I did.
But once I started working on it, I was nicely surprised. This picture is after only about five minutes of work, and I'm about a third of the way through already! Even though her hair looked and felt massively tangled, it wasn't. It was mostly just matted together. After I got to working with it with my hands, it started coming free fairly easily.
Another few minutes and I was already about half the way done.
The only downside I had to working on Jasmine was the shedding!!! This is just after a few combs. You can see the black hair against my very pasty legs there. I need the pool at my apartment complex to hurry up and open so I can get a tan. What took the longest in restoring Jasmine's hair was not the combing, but the constant picking up of her shedded hair.
About thirty minutes in, I was just almost done. Just a small portion of her bottom hair left and then to work out the top pony tail the doll comes with to hold on her head piece.
But I got delayed. By one very pushy kitten. My little kitten literally pushed the doll out of the way and knocked the comb out of my hand to make her way into my lap, just as close to momma as she possibly could. Goofy little kitten.
Luckily, she didn't stay long. One of the other kitties ran by and she went to chase him. I finished the bottom portion of Jasmine's hair and went on to the top ponytail.
Took me a few minutes to get the little rubber band out of her hair. Unfortunately when doll's hair gets tangled, those little rubber bands get stuck. Here I have the front pony tail pulled over the front of the doll to keep it from getting mixed in with the already combed out hair.
Just a few minutes and I was just almost done!!!
About an hour after starting (including the about fifteen minute kitten delay), I had a tangle free Jasmine. I was really surprised how easily her hair came free.
Shinny black hair all ready for a wash.
So now Meg and Jasmine are sitting with their hair dangling over the sink drying. They should be dry by the time I get off work tonight at which point Meg will get a conditioning and Jasmine will get a braid.
169.5 DAYS REMAINING!
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