A New Idea for Clothing Storage: Collectible Card Storage Boxes

I don't know about other countries, but here in the United States, there are lots of reasons why people might own collectible cards, from sports, to games like Pathfinder, Magic: The Gathering, and Pokemon. And of course, if you have a lot of cards, you need a place to store them. When my last attempt at clothes organization didn't work out (three ring binders,) I decided to try the collectible card box idea, which I'd been considering for a while.

There are many different sizes of collectible card boxes. There are boxes that are about half the length of the box up above, although I've only seen those online. There are also larger boxes that have three or four rows inside for cards. Of course, the boxes, or slots in a larger box, are only one general width, collectible card width. However, that seems to work out really well for things like Barbie-sized shirts and shorts/shorter skirts. Plus, when they are standing upright, I can flip through them, almost like cards. It's not like in a box where they are laying flat, when you might have to pull a bunch out to get to the ones in the middle. At least, that's what I ended up doing. :)

Slightly longer skirts fit in fine sideways.

I've discovered that the length of the boxes that I have, is perfect for knee-length dresses and longer skirts, and pants/capris.

The thing is, and I realized this when I was trying out the 3-ring binder method, some Barbie clothes are so proportionally "thick," that sometimes they almost stand up by themselves. Of course, the box with my shirts in it also works well, because the box is fairly full. However, the skirts and shorts also seem to stay fairly well arranged in their box. I'm sure if I threw the box around enough, things would get out of place, but then again, the box is small enough to not have a lot of room for that.

I tried out the next size box, to see what I could fit. For now, this is going to be both my "ankle length, poofy skirt" box, and my full-length dress box. Since the box is really too long for either, I'm kind of sticking the skirts at one end and the dresses at the other, for now.

Of course, there other lengths, and I may be able to find something a little shorter, length-wise, online. I bought these from our local gaming store, because Mr. BTEG and the Dancer have played games there for hours on end, and I want to support the store. Now that I think this is going to work well, I can experiment with other sizes, too.

Just to share my experience with you, what went wrong with the 3-ring binder method was that I only wanted to use the smallest plastic pouches for my smallest tops, to save space. However, because of the thickness of Barbie clothes that I mentioned earlier, the tops really wanted to just pop right out of those small pouches. On top of that, I quickly filled up two binders (with more clothes than you see here) and both binders were so stuffed that they were too fat to hold their neat triangle shape. I could easily see the binders getting out of control, space wise, plus some clothes were falling out of the pouches, and putting them in a sleeve with bigger pouches would just take up even more room.

Teresa organizes hers in plastic bags, and then in larger plastic bags, by things like doll, year, and what fashion pack it came from. However, I'm not really much of a collector when it comes to Barbie clothes. I don't try to collect all the outfits and accessories from the 1965 Barbie and Ken wedding set (making the name and date up here.) I'd rather be able to find them by top or knee-length dress, rather than what Fashion Fever multi-outfit pack it came from. We take different approaches to our fashion doll clothes, which is fine. I hope maybe my approach will work for one or two of you out there.

I also have outside box measurements, if you are interested in those. I'm not sure how these card boxes are officially measured, if it's from the inside, or what. But this should help you know what you're looking at, when shopping for your own boxes.

Small box:

Length: 7.5 inches, about 18.5cm

Width: 4 inches, about 10cm

Height: 2 and 7/8 inches, about 7cm

Long box:

Length:  about 12.5 inches, about 31cm

Same width and height

If you prefer plastic boxes and can find some in a useful size, great. When I decided to try the "standing up" approach, the only thing I could really find both narrow in width and long enough in length were collectible card boxes. Obviously, they're not going to set inside each other for stacking, like some plastic boxes will. But, they do stack, and maybe in the doll space you have, you'll store them all flat on a shelf or in something like a drawer instead. Anyway, this is a storage approach that I have not seen anyplace else, and I hope if it doesn't work for you, it might spark an idea for something that will. Happy storage!

Ever After High Tri-Castle-On Hunter Huntsman

I was having a hard time getting a couple of pictures of Hunter that I wanted. I finally took advantage of the sunny day today to get them all done, so this is the last doll in my Tri-Castle-On series. Hunter is the undisputed winner in the archery part of the Tri-Castle-On competition.

Here's Hunter full-length, and a close-up of his face. His stand leaves marks in his faux leather top, so I undid part of the Velcro in back, and pulled the back of the top around the stand. Hunter's pants are a fairly heavy weight denim weave.

Hunter has a purple hood, which can be pulled up. I think it makes him look sharp! It has a slit in the bottom back, though, like Cerise's hoods do, even though Hunter doesn't have long hair to go through it.

He's also wearing very sturdy boots.

His outfit is very similar to what he wears in the Tri-Castle-On webisode, and also in the Heartstruck webisode, when he unintentionally causes havoc after coming upon Cupid's bow and arrows. In the webisodes, he has sleeves and more detail to his trousers, but making a three pack affordable involved some cuts, I guess.

Like his cartoon version, Hunter does come with a nice arm guard. The vinyl version is even more detailed than the cartoon one, although it's only one color.

There's only one *small* problem: Hunter's arm guard should be worn on the arm that is *not* pulling the bowstring! In this case, when Hunter releases an arrow, the arm guard should be where it can protect the released bowstring, or the arrow in flight, from grazing Hunter's arm. It's even more important for sleeveless Hunter to have that protection. But our guy is wearing his arm guard on his *right* arm, meaning he should be pulling the bow string with his *left* hand. Honestly, I'm rather surprised that the animators messed this up, not once, but twice. Since doll Hunter's arm guard is sculpted to fit his right hand and arm, we'll say doll Hunter is left-handed, and let it go at that.

Of course, Hunter has to come with his bow and arrows. Hunter can actually wear his quiver; I was afraid it wasn't going to fit. These are all nice pieces, except his "cluster" of molded arrows has a slight curve in it. That might be deliberate?

I'm especially glad to have Hunter in my collection. I already have the Hunter that came with Ashlynn Ella, but that doll's hair is slightly greasy, and it could be hard to clean up without messing up the flocking on his head. If getting the oiliness out of his hair is even possible! Tri-Castle-On Hunter's hair is just super gelled. If I manage to get some practice re-rooting some doll heads next year, I could give my first Hunter new hair, and maybe even make him a different character.

So this is the end of my Tri-Castle-On reviews! In the end, I'm happy with all of the dolls and most of the accessories, which is great! What do you think of Hunter compared to Lizzi and Cerise?