The first Barbie I ever had was a vintage Midge. I didn't know where she had come from, and I wasn't positive that she was mine. She would have been my favorite, since she was a blue-eyed brunette like me.
When they were first going to get me a Barbie as a gift, I wanted one very like that Midge, only my own. I told them I didn't want a blonde and I didn't want her to be smiling with teeth.
So they bought the 1977 Superstar Barbie.
That's the beauty of these prescribed celebrations that include mandatory gifting.
If they can't find the gift I wanted, but they feel they HAVE TO buy something, they buy the very thing I said I didn't want, bring it home, wrap it, and gift it to me while watching with critical expectation. Any reaction other than delight gets charged with "rudeness" and "spoiled little brat!"
The kids are supposed to get with the program and pretend to be delighted with the very thing they were dreading you were going to bring home and asked you NOT to.
So, they ASK us what we want - then sentence us to NOT get that thing (because the money's already been spent on THIS and the occasion is over) - and expect us to act happy.
Where to even begin.
So there I am with an uppity blonde Superstar girl who is smiling even though nothing is funny, because she might look better in pictures that way, and the admiration of strangers is really that important to her.
Fine. Yes. She's pretty. Prettier than I am. There she is, on the left, in her original dress.
On the right is Pink and Pretty Barbie, IIRC.
Middle is Hispanic Barbie. I had always loved Wonder Woman's black hair and blue eyes, so this was a way of getting at least part of that formula. Overlooking the skin and eyes was only a little bit more effort than overlooking all of that saran blonde.
(It wasn't until 1992 that I found a Western Stampin' Tara Lynn with black hair and blue eyes, and of course bought her immediately even though I was too old for that sort of thing. I bought her for my then-baby daughter to grow into. She became well loved and I have no idea where she ended up. Here's a pic from the internet.
That one's even more like me, with the dilated eyes! People always remarked on my eyes, from my earliest days, and when I was a teenager, asked if I was on drugs.)
Okay. Here's Golden Dream in her original swimsuit.
The white top and pink skirt, I vaguely remember came with a Miss Flair clone. They were kinda small and barely fit on Barbie.
The white and black dress I think was Mattel and it was so difficult to get on!
The blue handkerchief hem dress was made by my sister. She and Mother made me one each, about the same time. Mother's was a white peasant-style wedding dress with crystal sequin trim, but it came apart.
That pink dress came with the old Midge doll.
On the right is a Mattel Barbie dress.
The crochet pieces were original 14 year old me.
The shiny skirt and top in the center were from Ms Flair, too, I believe. They're modeled on a Starr doll because she was the only one that fit into them.
I made that black vest from a piece of fake leather from a discarded purse.
The white peasant eyelet dress and crochet jumper were from a gift shop in some small town in Eastern WA back in the early 80s.
Green dress, Mattel vintage.
Starr doll original outfit.
Beauty Secrets Barbie, part of her original gear (only part, obviously)
Red and blue 60s Mattel dress with the trim added by me to cover up some damaged places.
The red and blue paisley folkish looking thing was Mattel 80s.
Totally don't remember where the dotted dress came from, or the red too-sheer one.
Spanish Barbie's original outfit. (Another reason I wanted her - to get that strikingly Germanic dress.)
The black shawl came with Spanish Barbie. The blue and white, and red and white, wide-brim hats were from a clone four-pack. Green crochet swimsuit and the red crochet cap just beneath it came from that same E. WA gift shop. Neither fit very well, but they were still cool.
On the right is a pink sock that I cut and hemmed, and tacked black lace over. It actually looked pretty cool when it was on a doll.
The red and blue tutu skirt and and the tan and yellow skirt were crocheted by little me using worsted yarn. Pink swimsuit (negligee? onesie?) came with Beauty Secrets and should have been on her in the photo above. And that yellow braid is hers. The grey blob in center left was my attempt at a revolution era mob cap.
Here's rather a mess that includes some small dollhouse sized appliances I found at a craft shop and was tickled with. There's a tiny clear plastic box with tiny printed fairy tale books with real pages and extremely short stories.
Notice the white boot and the tall brown boot. One of the white boots (an off brand) had split. The mate of the brown boot had been missing for a long time, but I still liked them so much I kept the one as a souvenir. (I'm descended from a daddy who had a little box in his desk with pens that didn't work any more but had been really cool back when they worked.)
There's the card that came on the package of Ken's Blue Chip Dressing suit. I had 1981 Western Ken with the white and black outfit, and horses Dallas and Midnight. Baby girls ended up with the horses. I don't remember where Ken went, but he survived long enough for me to record in the diary that I heard a yell - "Mom! Come quick! The boys are hitting each other with a Ken doll and a hammer!"
That struck me as so funny that I laughed all the way to save them.
Center bottom white and yellow floppy hat is all that's left to show I ever had a Pretty Changes Barbie.
The child's finger is pointing at the only Superstar Barbie shoe left.
I think the yellow ones were from Pretty Changes, too.
