Not been very active on the doll scene lately so was good to get to the monthly London meet this month ^^

Had a good chat with both old and new attendees and took a few photos.

Brought my new bunny Mamachapp that I am tempted to name Bunny, Sonja, Pino and Kanu.
Wanted to bring Chloe but just could not be bothered lugging her weight around in the heat.

Yesterday I finally got around to uploading my meet pics and some of them were of Lily’s last pose before Gabe was heading home with her.
Got her too but didn’t bring her.

Got the idea to let her play around with the White Album girls’ mic as her outfit made her look slightly 70′s punk chique in a kawaii way.

So, set her up in a dynamic “rocker” pose and started snapping away.

Added this pic to the Dollfie Dream group on Flickr and thought nothing more of it.
This morning noticed it had been faved a few times and had 26 views, not bad, pretty chuffed, nothing unusual for a meet pic that have been added to a group, normally gets a fair few views.

Then, this afternoon is checking my mail and there are literally loads of Flickr pings.
Bit puzzled heads of to Flickr to find out that this image have been viewed 500+ times and still counting and been added to 2nd page of Flickr Explore. Didn’t even know there was such a thing XD
(Edit: Well, it was on there but now it’s gone :/)
(Edit: Still there but have been bumped to #91 from #11 – oh well, fame is fickle ;D)

Not bad for a random pic of a random pose taken at a random doll meet in London by me with my new 50mm lens

Go me!

(Bugger – does this mean I will have to start taking this photography stuff serious now?)

Silver dress, did not win anything but my own personal favourite

Gold dress won 3rd place in the costume competition ^^ Yay me! Thanks to all who voted for this one!

On a grey November Sunday morning I ventured out with my packed suitcases, camera bag and my ticket for the London doll event of the year: Midwinter Masked Ball.

Arrived at the pub before everyone else and started to be a bit worried that I had either gotten the address wrong or the dates mixed up…

Everyone finally started showing up about 15 minutes late and setting up could finally commence.

It was an epic day with lots of socialising, putting faces on user names, meeting up with new and old peeps, taking lots of photos, having a really good pub buffet, competitions and general sillyness.

A few of us ended up in Wong Kei for dinner which was equally epic although I am not a huge fan of their food, the company was brilliant!

Huge thanks to Madame Mau Mau of the Nacht Zircus for arranging this and hope that we can all help bring this back for next year if all goes well!

Not sure if we beat the Russians this time but we sure made a bloody good effort!!!

October means no big Pygmalion society meet as it collides with EXPO so a few of us got together today to catch up, grab some food and get down with the dolls as well as celebrating Shibby’s birthday a few days back.

After getting out the door too late as usual, went for some breakfast with hubby first before heading towards the meetup point.

Was good to see everyone, especially Mau as we have been missing each other for the last couple of meets.

Headed to Edinboro Castle, grabbed a table, pulled out the dolls and ducks, some ordered food and then we got attacked by a kid

She was very very interested in the dolls and were given an obitsu to play with as well as allowed to hold some resin under tight supervision. She also tried to grab Pino, almost giving me a heart attack lol.

Pino was un-phased though and kept playing with the ducks.

Brought Asa as well and after getting home realised I managed to take zero photos of her. Fail. Did get a lot of badness photos though.

Broke up earlyish as some wanted to hit the Market again and I personally was just super tired.
Short but sweet ^^

Now looking forward to November Masked Ball event. Need to make outfits…

Need to do something about this blogging business as currently I have only been doing it after meets.

Well, hopefully I should have more time going forward to fill up the net with my yabbering

September meet’s theme was Autumn and I think there was about two who had actually made an effort which did not include me.
So bad.
Next time

Also, was stand in meet mistress for this meet and of course there were bound to be issues when I agreed to this lol.
Big performance at the main auditorium meant we were asked to to move out of our normal spot and down half a floor.
Was ok but more of a walk through area so lots of spectators and people with video cameras >.<

Other special events this time included visitor from Australia who brought a seriously cool mod job along, getting Annie up from Portsmouth to join in the fun and luring Matt down from Sheffield as well.

Apart from that pretty much business as usual.
Lots of dollie photos and dollie chat, not so much badness as the two baddies were not at meet, hence the reason for my meet mistress stand in job and general craziness.
Love it ^^

Teddy was there as well and had brought along cute home knitted socks. Gotta try making some at some point ^^

All photos on Flickr:

Another hot and humid meet that unfortunately did not go outside as planned due to a very angry looking sky that looked like it was gonna pour water out any minute.

Nothing did pour apart from the fountain outside the Royal Festival Hall that entertained kids and adults alike to the rythms of Brasilian music played on steel drums and various other instruments.

The theme this time was Teddy Bears. I had found one small Pooh Bear that I got in a Secret Santa a couple of years back and ta-da, managed to leave at home!

Also had a BIG plan of making a bear outfit for either Pino or one of my DD girls but decided that I just could not be bothered the day before. I had left it too late, as usual.

Had brunch with hubby before catching a bus to the Southbank and the inevitable dollie madness.

Couple of new faces this time, again, not sure who they were, hope they turn up again so I actually do get a chance to find out lol.

Had to move spot due to the heat so ended up packing up Cinnamon and Madicken and never got them back out of the suitcase :/ so no piccies of them this time… I am really negligent of all my Unoa girls these days due to my current DD obsession. Have to do something about that soonish

Not so much badness around this time or maybe I just missed it?

Lots of zombies though

This was the day after chasing around London after the Tokyo Trooper. Was a bit tired and a bit stressed out over all the things that I had not done the day before but decided to head out anyway as it was ages since I had seen Mich.

Took me two hours on the train on a journey that normally takes one hour >.< Stupid Sunday maintenance work.

Finally arrived after getting increasingly nervous that I was on the wrong train after Mau and Mich kept telling me I was not going in the right direction.

The rest of the party was having a sleepover in another part of town and well, over slept + did not have the address
They were a little delayed ^^

Great day, tried a lot of different lenses and got a few photos of the experiments.

This all came about after attending the SOAS DC event.

Kinda forgotten how but think I got chatting to Danny about it at some point, either at the event or afterwards online.
Mentioned that we, hubby and me, were of to Tokyo in a couple of weeks time and were gonna hit the Dollshow and Dolpa.
If I was interested in attending this Doll Summit thing that he was arranging with some other people on 3rd May, in between the two events?
Sure, why not ^^
Just had to sign up via tsubuyaku.fm – Easier said than done when you, as me, do not read or speak Japanese. Thank goodness for auto translate and general common knowledge about how websites are build *sweat*

Got Mio signed up to attend and was looking forward to it.

Then a couple of days before heading of to Japan, Danny Choo pulled out. He was planning on bringing a French TV crew but some of the Doll Summit attendants were not so keen on being on telly so he had to reschedule for Dolpa instead. Shame.

Was a bit split over this because, when I sign up for something, I sign up for something! Not because of who is going but because I actually do wanna attend whatever event it is that I am signing up to. However, as he was the only person I remotely knew and had ever spoken to + the fact that I still don’t speak any Japanese made me a little doubtful about the whole thing.

In the end, decided to just go for it!
After a little gentle pressure from various interest groups

Hubby went for an anime museum instead and general sightseeing and photo tour instead. Kinda got the impression that yet another day surrounded by dolls was not his idea of a good time

The Tama Centre turned out to be some way away from Shinjuku and central Tokyo in general + managed to get on a slow train as well heading out there. Nice scenery so pleasant but rather long train journey. Arrived around 3pm.
When arriving at the station found out that it was also the station for the Sanrio Puro Land, home of Hello Kitty. And it being Golden Week and children’s day you can imagine how packed the place was!
Loads of interesting stalls on the way up to the Tama Centre but did not stop and look. Next time

Arrived at the Centre and found the gallery, went in.
Glare!
And got the crossed arm gesture *no admission*
Tried to explain who I was and started pulling out Mio when I saw my Twitter name-tag *Dark Dollhouse* on the table and pointed at that instead. They all went *aaah*
Handed over 500yen and was in.
Wauw! So many Dollfie Dreams! And a plane! And loads of accessories! And SO much camera gear and tripods.

Was lead to an empty spot on a table and they indicated that I should put Mio down there and pose her.
Nice guys ^^ Shame, I have no idea who they were or what their usernames were or anything. Hate this language barrier thing!!! Seriously have to work on that Japanese for next time I go over there!!!
So, sat her down, posed her and wandered of to start taking pics of all the gorgeous custom faceups and gorgeous home made outfits. They just do it better than us, sorry us, but seriously, they are really Otaku in the real sense of the word.
Us, we do it very well too but they are just that little bit more crazy obsessive than most of us are. Know I am generalising but this is my blog and I am allowed to
Just very impressed with the whole thing m(_._)m

At first, Mio was all by herself, bit like me, getting the stares but no approaches, but then, nice girl came over and sat her MDD down. All customized by her. Started taking pics and saying *kawaii* – excellent! Finally something I understood lol.
More joined and I started approaching more people myself and indicating that I thought their dolls were amazing. Worked wonders. Got a few *thank you*s ^^
Unfortunately only got one business card :/ Shame, so many nice people there.

At some point shortly after I arrived there was a presentation round and I ended up with a mike in my hand O.O Bollocks!
Rambled something of in English and got an applause. Red face!

They started setting up for big shoot around 5pm and I headed back to Shinjuku to meet up with Hubby around 6pm.
Short but sweet ^^

Great day yet again ^^

Was hoping that some of the people attending the Danny Choo SOAS talk was gonna pop by but unfortunately no, could have been fun! Maybe they will turn up at EXPO.

Anyways, found out that one of the people that I chatted to at the DC event was a friend of a friend of Mao’s and they had recently been out bowling. How small the world is!

Was good seeing Mao again after her being tucked away studying somewhere up North I think and great seeing a lot of new dolls and their owners.

Not so sure it was good seeing Horse and Blood dressed up as babies but maybe in some sort of weird parallel universe kind of way it might have been Dunno. Still speculating.

Actually arrived on time for a change, instead of my stupidly late arrival last time that made me miss like, well, everyone. And managed to have breakfast with hubby before leaving as well. And doing some pattern making but that is another story.