And I think to myself, Hmmmm. There are worse things she could be asking for. And I am a little tired of Dora....

So I say to her: "Well, we'll have to talk to Daddy, but MAYBE."

And she says, "Oh, THANK YOU MAMA!" and runs back to Goat #1's room, ecstatic.

And I'm thinking, She's really happy for a little kid who just got a very noncommittal "maybe" out of her Mama...

And then I hear her tell Goat #1, with much excitement: "I just asked Mama for dat moobie, and she said MAYBE!"

And Goat #1 says, skeptically, "Do you know what 'maybe' means?"

And Goat #2 shouts gleefully, "Dat means YES!"

We have had a real hard time lately finding playmates for Allison. We have been totally out of the loop with our homeschool group and her only other friend is my brother, who is six years old. They get along great together, but I really wanted her to have some friends of her own, that enjoy doing the same types of things that she does. I was so excited when I walked in the house and saw a room filled with princesses and Polly Pockets!

So needless to say, Allison had a great time and I did too! The mom is a LLL leader and her daughters are almost exactly the same age as Allison and Lauren...did I mention they homeschool?  WOO HOO

P.S. It's my sister's birthday today. HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

This is a note I made to myself in my moleskin. Every time I look through it for new ideas, I see this and laugh because it was written so enthusiastically. I have to pay homage to my enthusiasm for this subject.

Yes. I used to have trolls when I was 9. In fact, I had a whole FAMILY of trolls that I took to school where they lived in my desk. Instead of paying attention I would watch them in their troll habitat, which in my imagination at the time, was a family room like my own. I wonder whatever happened to them.

I can't think about past childhood obsessions without remembering My Little Ponies. Specifically, this one with the jeweled eyes in my kindergarten days.

Ah. Those were the days. You know, before Barbie corrupted my fantasy world making the Ponies self-conscious and a really great personality a useless trait. I didn't know much about Barbie like my other toys. She didn't have a background story. My Little Ponies had a cartoon. Snuggles had a commercial telling us about his snuggly soft fabric softener (but I was very disappointed with the fact that he wasn't as cute in person as he was on TV). The Care Bears had cartoons (Pre-Ponies, Cheer Bear and me were like two peas in a pod. You could not separate us if you tried -- until that one day I left him in a department store where he would never be seen again. I guess I had just outgrown him). But Barbie? I don't remember watching any Barbie cartoons. I wasn't keen to any pre-existing cartoon personality. The only personality I could muster up in Barbie was based on her looks. And we all know what happens when we judge someone by their looks. It can be very superficial.

Barbie was the Queen of my all of my toys. They were very taken by her. Jealous, but taken. She had her own pool, BBQ set, and even a RV-- it was an old one belonging to my sister during her Barbie days, but still, it was a RV. The other toys didn't have such a luxury. Polly Pocket had a whole house, but it fit in my pocket so there wasn't much comparison. Although I don't remember ever having a Barbie house. She must have been a transient. Figures.

She had blond hair and blue eyes and yet I totally related to her. She was my toy, of course I related to her. Her stories were my stories. As far as I was concerned I was Barbie. If you told me back then that I was Mexican, I wouldn't have understood what you were trying to tell me. With her, the Ponies became just ponies. Barbie dehumanized them. They would talk to her, but they would also neigh and eat hay and grass while Barbie was eating at her BBQ with her good for nothing friends.

By the time I was 9 (in 1992), I was too old for Barbie (I probably should have been too old for trolls too?), but the trolls were all the rage. I seem to recall my friends bringing their trolls to class too. During free time, we would make furniture for them out of paper or cardboard or whatever was around. Naturally, I made a TV for my trolls so they wouldn't get bored while I was in class. Anyway, trolls had more then just cartoons to explain their story, they had fairy tales. And in comparison to them, I was a Goddess. They were just more wholesome then Barbie. Don't worry my love for trolls remains in my past. I'm not one of those people with a troll on their desk. That would be weird.

By the way, I haven't been to a Toys R Us in probably like 15 years. I'm dying to take a trip down memory lane. That's on my agenda for next week.

I'm afraid I'd have to disagree with that. There is in fact another mammal with an average speed that covers only half of that distance in at least twice the time - and I actually have one living under my very own roof. What on earth can this sluggish creature be I hear you cry? A 7 year old child of course.

Why children slow down so much by the time they reach this age remains a mystery to many. It's almost as if they start to slowly wind down as they creep closer to puberty, a biological necessity perhaps, to prepare them for the many years of hibernation that lay ahead under a festering duvet.

By the time they are 7, their ears have all but sealed over and their sense of speed has as good as vanished. Their every action is carried out in slow motion and even the simplest of tasks can be simply too painful to behold. They move at a speed that makes a snail look positively hoon-like and they make watching paint dry seem like an extreme sport.

Of course it wasn't always this way. As toddlers they took both hands, a set of reins and a series of complicated adult proof baby gates to keep them from running at breakneck speed into, over and under everything in sight. You spent your every waking minute telling them to slow down, get down and lie down.  Then the years passed and they stretched and grew. All of a sudden the only part of them that ever really picks up any momentum is their jaw, as they fight to always try and get the last word in.

Take my daughter for example. When told to go to bed it can take her a good 10 minutes to cross a totally unobstructed room, with that time being broken down roughly as follows:

At least a minute to hear and register what I have said. Another to find her feet under the cushions. A couple more spent stroking the dog on her way off the chair. A pit stop at the window to study and comment on a ball that she has suddenly spotted in the garden. A few more spent tidying up her pencil pot on the table. Another minute to clean up the contents of her pencil sharpener, which were 'accidentally' spilled on the floor, and then the last few minutes spent popping her head back around the corner of the door like a meerkat cat, while she desperately thinks of something to say that might delay the inevitable for a little longer.

In fact any activities involving my daughter (who has less urgency about her than a squirrel in winter) seem to take at least 5 times longer than they should. Brushing her teeth for example. 35 minutes it took one day. Why so long to flick a toothbrush over her gum's, spread toothpaste around the entire basin and drip water all the way back across the floor? Well that would be because she had decided to clean and polish the soap dish and bath with her towel.

Yet to give credit where credit is due, quite bizarrely on other days she takes it upon herself to get up and dressed, feed herself breakfast and bring in the washing off the line (she said she saw a dark cloud moving our way), and all before my alarm clock has even drawn it's first breath.

If only she could harness the energy she reserves for the playground and use it for everyday chores, maybe then we wouldn't have to race down the road every morning with toast crumbs flying, or reach the end of another day with a monumental battle of wills and the sound of small feet stomping away from the dinner table in silent protest.

Undoubtedly the worst part about having your child turn into a sloth is that it automatically turns you, the parent into a parrot. You find yourself repeating everything you say at least half a dozen times, nagging becomes an art form and by the time you get to the end of the day even you are sick of hearing yourself saying 'Come on', 'Hurry up' and 'How long can it take to put on a pair of shoes?'

Every night when I look at her sleeping in her bed, peaceful, angelic and for the first time that day, quiet, it makes me stop and think. I tell myself that the next day I will try to remain patient and relaxed, I will refrain from repeating myself and stop myself from expecting the impossible to happen.

Then the morning comes and 10 minutes after getting her out of bed I find her still sat on her bedroom floor in her pj's, carefully rearranging her Polly Pocket collection while her cereal sits untouched in the other room, fast losing all of its snap, crackle and pop.  As the school siren goes my calm dissolves, my eyebrows raise and my inner parrot is once again firmly back in control.

: : : : : : : : : : :

Vamos colorir a Barbie!!!

N wants to stand and stand and stand. He can even do it with no hands (only for a few seconds). I saw him in downward dog today. He's moving faster than we blink.

It was so humid today even polly pocket had a bad hair day.

It was hot hot hot, so we partied in the A/C with A's friends running around the living room. It was fun! We got a BIG cake (too hot for homemade birthday cake baking) with globs of frosting shaped as balloons. One was purple and has been enough for at least 2 cake servings. We sang "Happy Birthday A" as we brought out the cake with three candles. I was holding my girl in my arms, I could feel her body struggle to contain the excitement - she was on the verge of tears, but she didn't cry. She was so happy.

As per A's request she got a polly pocket set from Saba and Savta (courtesy of L who did the shopping), a polly pocket yacht from Mommy, Daddy and N and then another set from our dear neighbors who introduced her to these tiny dolls, and yet another from her friend M. When she opened the first set she was ecstatic. I don't recall ever seeing her so happy about anything. Granted, she's been talking about getting a polly pocket for her birthday for a month... She was in polly pocket heaven. These polly pocket things are really all consuming - she won't part with them. We have to take them to the bathroom (but shoes are not allowed - we've had some shoe drowning incidents in the potty), to the dinner table, to take a bath and to sleep.

The polly pockets and their company now live on a high table. N started to crawl on the day of the party and he is bound to be stuffing tiny green shoes in his mouth, if they're anywhere in sight. Watch out, here he comes!

Half inch doll, dressed in detailed outfits.

A miniature pink suitcase, within it, a miniature Paris, exquisite boutique hotels, the Eiffel tower, the City of love at its finest.

There were the serene miniature beaches, a rare pearl inside an oyster shell.

On her eighth birthday, Ashley got her wish, she became a Polly Pocket.

When you take her out you can see the sunshine in her smile, when playtime was over, the lid of her magical castle shut you can see the perfect painted mouth breaking into a rictus of agony.

I don't know what it is about toys, but they are the bane of my existence. The truth is that I love walking into a toy store and may appreciate the merchandise almost as much as my daughters. The smell of a new baby doll with her shiny, unknotted hair can make me smile and instantly brings me back to my days as a young shopper. It's the managing and organizing of the playthings and 10,000 little pieces that go along with them that makes me want to run for the hills.

I realize toys are and will continue to be a big part of my life for a while to come. I'm not in any way trying to age my kids away from them either. I mean, what comes next -- cell phones and iPods? I can wait for that. If someone would just like to help me organize the Polly Pocket shoes it would be greatly appreciated.

Es folgt also eine Liste der Spielzeugreihen, die wir gesammelt haben und die ich nach und nach, aus nostalgisch-verklärten Weißtdunoch-Gründen hier vorstellen werde.

Barbie
Lady Lockenlicht
Keypers
Lego
He-Man (New Adventures, Masters of the Universe, 200x)
She-Ra
Golden Girl and the Guardians of the Gemstone
Galaxy Adventure Girl
Glimmerlinge
Cherry Merry Muffin
Mighty Max
Polly Pocket
Bravestarr
Thundercats
Mein kleines Pony
Regina Regenbogen
Turtles
Cupcakes
Knuffelbunt Familie
Wuzzles
Gummibärenbande
Dino Riders
Moon Dreamers
Jem
Popples
MASK
Monster in my Pocket
Playmobil

Have fun ^^

Quando criança eu não tinha muito hábito de brincar de boneca. Nunca tive muitas. Meu barato era desenhar na parede. Enfim, me descobri uma adulta (?) fissuradinha em brinquedos de menina. Descobri também que o Flickr é repleto de fotos de bonecas e de pessoas que cultuam as dolls. Não só as lindinhas, mas também muitas fotos de bonecos assustadores e que nem por isso deixam de render excelentes clics. Mas esse post será dedicado à beleza em forma de gente miúda e feita de plástico. Deixarei o bizarre moment toy para outra ocasião.

Polly pocket da minha enteada. Click meu. ;D

A loucura dos maníacos por bonecas é tanta que eles chegam a colocá-las em cenários:

Barbie cowgirl. Foto de Krissy

Tem umas que parecem ter saído de um fotolog:

Foto de Nett

Falando em fotolog, essa me parece uma boa versão boneca da MariMoon:

"MariMoon doll" por Jeanie

Esta Barbie com cara de Rihanna pertence à coleção que visitei ontem, de Joice Giacomoni:

Mais um click meu. Logo estarei postando mais fotos da coleção.

Eu poderia postar muitas das incontáveis fotos lindas de bonecas do mundo inteiro. Eu poderia passar horas navegando por entre os frames, como fiz ontem e hoje. Mas vou dar esse prazer ao leitor. Três grupos bacanas sobre bonecas: Doll's House, Barbie e Polly Pocket.

Fotografe seus bonecos. Acredite: são os melhores modelos que se pode ter. Ficam sempre na posição que você manda. ;)

Feb: Barbies and Hot wheel 

March : Madam Alexander and TMNT 

APRIL : BIONICLE and POLLY POCKET

MAY : SHREK III

I do have rather a fondness for hippos, despite the fact that they are supposed to kill more people in Africa every year than lions do.  I once saw a baby pygmy hippo at a wildlife park and spent several months trying to persuade Jamie that we should have a watering hole in our back garden instead of decking, and that because it was a pygmy hippo it would be no trouble at all.  He didn't buy it, in much the same way that he didn't go for the domesticated pet pig idea.  No imagination that man!  Looking back on it, I should be grateful, think how much trauma three cats turned out to be.  I dread to think how I would have found a carrying case big enough to transport a pygmy hippo to the vet.  Perhaps all turned out for the best after all.

On a Freudian level the dream doesn't say much for my relationship with poor old Oscar does it?!  He's got about six more teeth all at various stages of eruption and is a little bit tetchy about it at the moment!  Not to the point where he's going to charge up out of his watering hole and bite my head off, but he is rather moody if anyone lays a finger on or near his new spinning top, and his snot swipes are getting more vicious and accurate by the day.  I must say for the record that it is a brilliant spinning top.  It's one of those old fashioned ones that is made of brightly coloured tin, and which hums and whistles as it spins.  We all love it, and many's the evening recently when we have had to form an orderly queue.

It is very difficult to see into a child's mouth in a useful kind of way rather than the watching them masticating food like a snotty cement mixer type way.  I have a tip.  This is an actual tip rather than one I randomly dreamed up by the way, so you may actually have some chance of implementing it successfully.  The idea is to put them across your knee face up, and make them laugh uproariously.  In our house tickling the tummy works a treat.  Once they are laughing like this they will forget about making it difficult for you to see their gums and because their mouths are wide open and their heads are tipped back you can get a really good look.  This is how I know how many teeth are in progress.  If I ask him to let me look he just shakes his head and tries to fill my pocket with bits of Lego in a kind of anarchist gesture of defiance.

We had to go and buy him some shoes today.  This was quite traumatic for several reasons; a) he doesn't like having shoes on, it's oppressive and violates his fundamental freedom to paddle barefoot through life, b) his feet are as wide as a duck billed platypus' fins, c) we had to go to Clarkes to get him measured.  Now for those of you who have never experienced the joy of Clarkes' shoe shop with small children I will elaborate.  You will then decide against a life of procreation, get your tubes tied and move to Venezuela to raise chinchillas.

Clarkes is a nightmare because it is one of the only 'respectable' places to buy childrens' shoes.  There are very few 'respectable' childrens' shoe shops left and this is the main one.  Whenever a parent who actually cares about the growth and shaping of their child's feet thinks about buying shoes they think of Clarkes.  It is one of the very few places where you can actually buy kids' shoes in different width and length fittings and where the people who measure their feet are articulate enough for you to place your trust in their judgement.  This means that it is a total hell hole at key times of the year such as summer sandal buying time, winter boot buying time and going back to school time.  They employ a ticketing system similar to the one for the deli counter in Sainsbury's, but to much less effect.

The children zoom about creating chaos, trying to climb onto the lethal foot measuring machine, sliding down the funny little seat that looks like a slide for midgets, disrupting the window display and garrotting each other with tape measures.  The parents are trying to look at 'sensible' shoes, coax Jacinta down from the 'Polly Pocket' display and listen out for their number.  They invariably fail, which throws the whole queue into violent disarray and eventually leads to all out shoe warfare between irate parents who have been waiting to get Simon measured for four hours and are high on the smell of patent leather shoe cleaner.  I hate it. 

The only other shoe shop in Leicester which is any good however, is called Jelly Rolls.   I love it dearly, as do the children, but it is a 'designer' children's shoe shop.  This means that the average pair of shoes in there costs over £40.  It would be fine except that my children go through about one pair of shoes in about four to six months.  These things mount up when you have multiple children and they need multiple types of footwear, which they invariably do.  We have decided against Jelly Rolls while Oscar is being a shoe anarchist, as the last pair of shoes I bought him in the summer lasted two days before he worked out how to rip the velcro off and threw one into the path of an oncoming bus in the middle of a torrential downpour.  It was a sad day as I watched twenty quid's worth of shoe being mashed into a large greasy puddle by a double decker bus.  Tragically it couldn't be saved.

To try and avoid any kind of queue nightmare we decided to go to the big Mothercare store out of town.  They have a Clarkes' outlet there, but they also have coffee machines, baby changing rooms and comfy chairs, so if there is a queue, it's not quite as hellish as normal.  Because it is a big store it also means that the concentration of children is less oppressive as they tend to scatter to the four winds, so you're not cheek by jowl with Brett who is screaming the place down wanting to know why his parents won't buy him an eighty five pound pair of trainers from Foot Locker instead of a pair of shoes that look like Cornish Pasties from Clarkes.  It's much less stressful all round.

We did manage to get him a pair of shoes with minimal fuss, which was lucky.  The sales are almost over and the kids are back at school, so it was optimum shoe buying time.  The only problem was the woman in front of us who made so much fuss out of buying her grandson a pair of slippers you would have thought he had feet made of such a rare and delicate material that the rough weave of the slipper might accidentally break them.  I've never seen the like.  The kid was wildly unimpressed by the whole thing and spent the whole time trying to escape and drive away on a giant Brum in the corner.  I could have told him that it was nailed to the floor, but kids these days just don't listen to their elders and betters.  It could also have had something to do with the fact he was eighteen months old, but you have to train them young these days!

Might I just nominate the bright spark who came up with the idea of shifting more units of boring black school shoes for boys by inserting a secret compartment under the inner sole, for the stashing of small plastic cars, as the biggest idiot on the planet so far.  The idea of shoes, is to keep them on your feet.  This protects you from sharp objects, foot fungus and dog pooh amongst the toes.  If you put some desirable object inside the shoe they will undoubtedly be whipped off every thirty seconds to a) check it is still there, b) take it out and fill it with other potentially more lethal and less desirable matter, and c) take it off so that you can swap said objects with your dirty and evil smelling friends.  As all these shoes look the same, the likelihood of catching athlete's foot or some other rampant foot fungus because you've accidentally got your neighbour's shoe on in all the excitement, is quite high.  Duh!

We were just parking when Jason pointed out that the car next to us was empty except for a baby, fast asleep in the back.  This was quite disturbing, as it was a busy car park shared by lots of different businesses and there were a lot of people wandering around.  It was a dedicated Mothercare space, so when we got in, we went to see the store manager and told her that a baby was unattended in one of her parking spaces.  She said: 'Oh! Well! If anything happens it will be the parents' responsibility.  Best not to interfere really.'  Jason was amazed.  He pointed out that if something did happen to the child that all the ensuing media furore wouldn't say that and Mothercare wouldn't come out of it looking very good, especially when it emerged that they knew the baby was in the car.  She looked most put out that he had forced her to do something and stumped off huffily to the tannoy to make an announcement.

Some woman came forward, and when the store manager told her that someone was concerned about the baby being alone in the car she said: 'Well, she was sleeping!' which obviously made everything alright.  Obviously, when my children are sleeping I like to leave them unattended while I nip off for a coffee, or to do a bit of shopping.  That's what sleeping kids are for, surely!  She then said that she would see to it, but that she just had to finish getting some bits and pieces first and calmly wandered off. 

Now, I can in no way be called the best parent in the world, but I was totally astonished by this attitude and behaviour.  I mean, there are times when I feel that I would happily give my kids away to a passing stranger in exchange for five minutes peace, but really.  With all the hoo ha about Madeleine McCann and reports of kids being murdered every day, even in their own homes, the fact that someone could wilfully leave their sleeping child in a car in the middle of a busy car park is baffling.  The only thing I could think of was the fact that she might have been hoping that the kid would get pinched.

So, I know my blogging is usually more light hearted than this, but I just couldn't help writing about it because it was quite the most amazingly stupid, and careless thing I've seen in many a long day and seemed worthy of comment.  Poor kid.

Do you have a daughter that loves Polly Pocket?  I do!  What is better than getting Polly Pocket on sale?  Getting it free!  You can go to Mattel and print coupons for $5 off any Polly Pocket Product.  These coupons expire on 12/31/07.  You can get Polly Pocket items under $5 for FREE!  Yes, free.  We have been using them at Toysrus, but other people have used them at Kroger, Target, Walmart, Walgreens, and a number of other stores.  Polly Pocket now has little pets that are so cute. 

Start printing and start shopping! 

BEIJING - China on Thursday said a global recall of millions of its toys was the responsible thing to do, but said that was the result of new industry standards — not poor quality.

Meanwhile, a Cabinet-level panel announced the launch of a nationwide safety campaign focused on food and drugs, as well as increased monitoring of exports. The measures underscored government efforts to win back consumer confidence.

Earlier this month, Mattel Inc. recalled almost 19 million Chinese-made items around the world including dolls, cars and action figures. Some were contaminated with lead paint....

Read the rest at:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070823/ap_on_re_
as/china_tainted_products_31

Mattel issued a HUGE list of toys that are being recalled and if you are a parent of a child chances are, you have one. The recall involves toys that were distributed by them that either A) have lead paint on them or B) have very strong magnets that can come loose. The lead paint issue was caused by a toy manufacturer that was subcontracted that went to a 3rd party paint supplier to cut corners without authorization from Mattel. Regardless, Mattel wants you to discontinue use on the following items below:

The single product recalls:

If you own the "Sarge" collectible figure from the Cars movie shown here, it most likely was made with lead paint. If it says that it's made in China and has a code on the bottom ending in 7 EA, then your die cast car is affected. Visit the Mattel site at http://www.mattel.com/safety/us/ for the order form. They will send a prepaid tag via email and also a check for the cost of the item.

The Barbie Doll and Tanner Recall

If you have the Barbie Doll and Tanner set that comes with the blue pooper scooper with the silver tip on the end, then that toy is affected by this recall because the magnet can come out which can cause a potential choking hazard to very young children.

Now for the big lists.

Click on any of these product category links to check on your toys. You need to visit Mattel's website, double check the codes on the bottom and then download the form and return your product if it meets the criteria. This item list could change, so again visit Mattel's site for more current info since they are in the midst of a heavy investigation right now;

Fisher Price recalls (including Dora, Sesame Street Toys and more)

Polly Pocket related recalls

Batman related recalls (and Shonen Jump toys)

We hope this was helpful. Again, visit Mattel's website for the latest and if you have one of these toys, get them away from your kids and visit Mattel's site for a walk through on identifying affected toys. You can also visit Corner Stork Baby Gifts for a great selection of unqiue baby gifts that do not have safety recalls!