Happy Lunar New Year!

Our lovely model shows us the accessories I bought for the Lunar/Chinese New Year celebration. They are two separate ORCARA sets put together, from their Happy Chinese Festival Celebration series. Despite the name, the sets in this series are not all strictly Chinese/Asian festival related. There is an Easter/spring one, which I have, and there is also a Christmas set with some kind of large bird waiting to be carved. Which always reminds me of the Chinese restaurant scene from A Christmas Story. Although the bird in the ORCARA set, fortunately, does not come with its head.

Peanuts are apparently very common for Chinese New Year, and you can see those on the blue plate, which is the only item that did not come from one of the Chinese Festival sets. I believe the filling of the cake-looking items on the white plate, is pineapple.The red round serving dish looks exactly like a Chinese candy box for the holiday, that I found online. You will have to scroll down there to see the picture. I also took a clear picture of the character on the tea pot, in case any of you who know the language wanted to see it.

I don't celebrate this holiday in the human world, but I've getting more interested in some Asian cultures lately, and I thought the above sets would be fun for my dolls to have. I wish health and prosperity to all of my readers, no matter the season! :)

J-Doll Punkka Street

This is the second J-Doll I got during the sale at Groove; the story of that purchase and the other review is here. This doll has been gracing the top of my blog for several months now, but I'm finally getting out her review. As always, this doll is named after a physical locale. Punkka Street is in Finland, "where an old castle sits amid surrounding forests and lakes." The theme Groove chose to use with her was "water sprite." I named her Anni after a Finnish vlogger I watch.

Anni photographs beautifully, but it was hard to capture the real color of her hair. The above picture was taken in our front bedroom, which faces north. I also took some pictures in my bedroom, which faces south. The southern pictures did not accurately capture the color of her hair. The ones in the north bedroom turned out better, plus I took a couple of pictures outside in the sunlight. Here is Anni wearing most of her outfit.

That's the last you'll see of those shoes. They're the same as the ones that came with Stephen Avenue Walk; they're way too big and don't really march the arch in her foot. She also has knee-high stockings, a dress with a thick belt, a small lace jacket, a hat and a purse.

Above she is standing, holding the purse that came with her. The purse is another wasted accessory, honestly. The faux leather has cracked and come off in multiple places, and I think this probably happened to all of these purses, and not just the display model. The color of her purse, shoes and the flower on her hat are also interesting to me. They don't match her hair, eyes, or the beading on her dress, nor do they harmonize. At least the hat is nice, so she could wear it with something else.

Here are up-close views of her jacket and belt. As usual for J-Doll, the jacket is a little on the small size. The belt is really more of what you might call a sash. There's actually a lot of material in it, sewn together in bunches, and decorated with beads.

I was not fortunate with Anni as far as cracking plastic issues. This is what her left arm looks like just below the wrist. Of course, she was a traveling display doll at one point.

And below are a couple of pictures I took of Anni in direct sunlight. I don't think the picture of the back of her head accurately captured her hair color either. It's probably actually closest to the pictures with the northern light. It's very nice hair, not super soft, but not overly coarse either.

She's a beautiful doll, and I'm glad I managed to get a good deal on her. She has too many outfit issues, plus the arm crack, to have been worth full price. Her delicate face and inset eyes are her biggest appeals; she'd make a lovely water sprite.