My Collection Part Nineteen: Madame Alexander Travel Friends

There aren't going to be any new pictures of these dolls. I bought them back in 2015, so even if you saw the posts when I reviewed the dolls, you've probably forgotten about them, and what they looked like. I reviewed them in great detail; unfortunately, there were a lot of flaws in the dolls, clothes, and box art. If you're interested, check out Germany and Ireland here, and Italy, Kenya and Russia here.

Here are the five dolls together.

Top from left to right: Italy, Russia, Kenya

Bottom from left to right: Germany, Ireland

The Germany doll, who I named Gretel, is wearing mini AG Felicity's dress, because her own outfit is just horrible. The shirt was too short, and the lederhosen were too baggy, and the straps were too tight when I tried to sit Gretel down. Plus her shoes were huge on her, as opposed to the other dolls. I guess that's because she came wearing stockings, which none of the other dolls did.

So ein Pech

The girls' clothes also had huge tags in them, that could stick out from the outfit.

 

When I re-read my reviews, I didn't remember how much I had really savaged some of the aspects of these dolls. However, I only paid $10 or so for each doll, and overall they *are* cute. They kind of remind of dolls like the Kruselings, only about 2" or 5cm shorter. I think I like my dolls' overall look better, actually. It's just too bad that Madame Alexander, a doll manufacturer name associated with quality, produced dolls with so many issues. This type of doll, which they also tried to use for a princess line, and a NASCAR line (so odd!) didn't sell very well, and few doll styles made it to stores.

Total dolls: 82

Twelve Days of Christmas - Day Eleven: Madame Alexander Travel Friends

The BTEG family is very interested in foreign languages. Mr. BTEG studied Latin, German and Attic Greek, as well as being exposed to Italian growing up. I studied German and Spanish; Mr. BTEG and I went on a college trip to Germany together. Several of the ornaments on our Christmas tree have greetings in another language, so I thought they would be good for a photo shoot with a couple of my 8" Madame Alexander Travel Friend dolls.

My Germany doll poses with an ornament that says Merry Christmas in German, French, Italian, Spanish and English.

My Italian doll poses with an ornament that came in a series. There are only three ornaments; each has a boy and girl in representative costumes of the chosen country. Each says Peace on Earth on the front in the given language, in this case "Pace al Mondo." All three ornaments say Peace on Earth in English on the back.

Italy was the first one in the series, then Spain, then Poland. I really wish that they would have continued this ornament line longer. Only one day left of the Twelve Days of Christmas!

Madame Alexander Travel Friends Dolls Germany and Ireland

Yes, everyone and their aunt have been reviewing these dolls lately, or so it seems. However, I haven't seen a review yet of Germany! And Germany surprised me by having quite a bit to talk about that was different from the reviews that I've seen. Yes, I went with my own heritage and picked the Germany and Ireland dolls, although Ireland's red hair was a bonus. Let's get a little info about these dolls first. They are 7" tall, and made of vinyl. They are part of Madame Alexander's Play line. A visit to MA's website showed me that they are currently dividing their dolls up into three categories: Baby, Play, and Collector. They have quite a variety of baby dolls. Play dolls are mostly represented by their 18" lines. And the Collector line includes their Wendy and Cissette dolls, among others.

This is going to be a very picture heavy review. Actually, since I haven't seen MA's Germany Travel Friend doll reviewed, this post is the first one I'm going to treat like a "real" review and not just an overview. Before the break, I'll show you pictures of the dolls in their boxes. Let me give my standard disclaimer here: the in-the-box pics are poorly lit because I often don't get the mail from the group mail box down the street until later in the day. Thus, the natural lighting is poor, and I'm eager to break the girls free, therefore poorly lit pics.

Versatile Blogger Award

jSarie at Revenge of the Toy Box was kind enough to give me a Versatile Blogger award!

This award involves sharing random facts about yourself. Here are some of mine:

- I visited Germany over the winter of 1989-1990. The first stop was Berlin. If you don't remember, the Berlin Wall was opened between east and west in November of 1989. Thus, I got to touch the Berlin Wall, and even got some souvenir wall chips to take home.

- I am one-quarter Transylvanian Saxon. The Saxons have lived in Transylvania for hundreds of years. They have their own culture and speak Saxon, which is similar to German. Folklore has it that the Saxons are the descendants of the children led out of Hamlin by the Pied Piper.

- My sister and I were born on the same date, two years apart. We were also married on the same date, eighteen years apart. The marriage thing was completely coincidental, because not only had my sister forgotten my wedding anniversary (!), she and her husband got married on a Sunday to save money on a hall.

- I started seriously doll collecting with Caboodles Barbie, which my husband got for me because I loved, and still love, my Caboodle makeup case. I still have both the human-sized and Barbie-sized Caboodle.

 

I'm going to nominate

- Mrs. Anderson of Mrs. Anderson's All-Purpose Blog 

- Black Kitty of The Mulicrafteral Lab 

- Lisa of Once Upon a Doll Collection

She also put up pictures of the Target room box, which I had completely forgotten about!

- my friend Scottius at Scottius Maximus. He posts mostly about sports and gardening, but I'd love to see what random facts about himself he'd come up with!