Ranking My Top 3 Disney Princesses

It’s the Royal Wedding today. I thought this might be a fun occasion to do a post about Disney Princesses. The ranking in this list is just my current top 3 princesses, I am also only going off characters who are included in current the official Disney Princess line-up.

3 – Pocahontas

First off, I know Pocahontas has problematic parts. I also know that a lot of people dismiss the movie out of hand because of that. However I think that Pocahontas has a lot of positive aspects that people often don’t acknowledge.

Personally I think Pocahontas is a great character. (She also has the best animal sidekick in Meeko!) Pocahontas tries to fight for what she believes in, she fights for love and understanding, and she aims to bring people together. I think some of her lines like, “This is where the path of hatred has brought us. This is the path I choose.” have a lot of resonance.

2 – Merida

Merida is determined, opinionated, stubborn, and resourceful. She really broke with what is expected of a Disney Princess and it worked well. I feel like Merida is also one of a limited number of princesses who actually has to deal with her actions having consequences in terms of the rule of her kingdom.

Whilst Brave is not one of my favourite Pixar movies or one of favourite Disney Princess movies, Merida is utterly one of my absolute favourite Disney Princesses. I recently re-watched Brave and it reminded me of just how great Merida is.

1 – Tiana

I love Tiana. A self-motivated, hardworking, young woman who wants to start her own business. Tiana doesn’t just wait around for something to happen, she knows what she wants and she strives to get it.

Tiana really is a great character and for me she is absolutely the very best Disney Princess.

Disney Princesses as Doctor Who Companions

I’ve mentioned before that I like to sew outfits for my doll collection. My latest project has been making outfits inspired by Doctor Who companions for some of the Disney Princesses. Normally I don’t feel like sharing the doll outfits I make on my blog, however I am really pleased with how these ones have turned out so I thought they were worth sharing.

Merida as Amy Pond

Merida is wearing an outfit that is inspired by the one Amy Pond wore in Victory of the Daleks, to me it feels like a very natural fit to have Merida as Amy Pond. It was a relatively simple outfit to make however I think the end result is very effective. The boots (borrowed from Hasbro’s Pocahontas) finish off this one perfectly.

Belle as Clara Oswald

Belle is Clara Oswald, or more specifically Oswin Oswald from Asylum of the Daleks. The sleeves were quite fiddly to make but I think that ultimately this dress came out well.  I love the little detail of giving Belle a set of measuring spoons attached to her belt, this echoes the whisk in Oswin’s belt.

Rapunzel as Rose Tyler

Finally (for now!) we have Rapunzel dressed as Rose Tyler. This outfit is based on the one worn by Rose in The Idiots Lantern, it might not be the first outfit you think of Rose wearing but it’s certainly one of the most memorable ones she wore. I think this is the best cardigan/jacket I have made so far. I’m very pleased with how the sleeves sit on her shoulders.

I think these three princesses look ready to have adventures in time and space. They’re the only ones I plan on doing at the moment however I may well make more outfits inspired by Doctor Who companions in the future.

My Doll Rooms So Far…

So for a while I’ve wanted to do a post where I show off all 7 doll rooms that I’ve made so far. Some of these rooms I have written making of posts for previously but others I have never before shared on my blog. The idea for making a doll room in a cereal box came from My Froggy Stuff on YouTube, I have adapted her ideas to great rooms which suit my dolls.

The Forest of Enchantment Living Room

This one was the first one, the one that started it all. This room was partially inspired by the stage show The Forest of Enchantment from Disneyland Paris. That show features Rapunzel, Merida and Pocahontas who are usually displayed in this room. After I bought him Flynn Rider also hangs out in this room. The furniture in this room often varies and gets changed around to create different arrangements for the dolls to be displayed with.

Tiana’s Café

Given how much I love her I was obviously going to make a room of some sort to display Tiana in! I decided a Café would be more economical than a restaurant in terms of space. Later on I considered making Tiana a bakery inspired by The Great British Bake Off, I ultimately decided not to make this but as I’d already made and bought things for the bakery I created a combined café/bakery. The café is a great set for displaying various dolls in, at the moment Anna, Jasmine, Supergirl and the Winter Soldier are having afternoon tea in Tiana’s Café!

Megara’s Greek Villa

I came across a picture of a Greek island from an old calendar of my mum's and realised I could use it as a large window in a doll room. Megara’s Greek Villa was the result. This is one of the more simple rooms I have made but it’s an effective one for displaying Megara. Later on Hercules joined Megara after I found him for a pound in a charity shop.

The Art Gallery

Out of all the rooms I’ve made this is the one which follows a My Froggy Stuff tutorial the closest. The bench means this is a great set for displaying dolls who have unarticulated legs and can’t stand. One of my favourite things about this one is that it can be rearranged to create different spaces. Also the postcards that are on the wall as paintings in the gallery are just blu-tacked on so they can be removed to create different exhibits.

The Disneyland Paris Room

I wrote about how I made this one here and little has changed since I made it. The seating in this room gets changed relatively frequently depending on what is in use. This room has been a good one for displaying various Disney dolls in.

The Bookshop

I wrote about how I made this one here, since I made it I have added another bookcase which was previously in The Forest of Enchantment Living Room. One of my favourite things about the bookshop is that it has a lot of detail without looking cluttered. As you might expect, since I bought Belle the other week she has been in the book shop a lot.

Batgirl’s Batcave

I wrote about how I made this one here a few weeks ago. I’m still very pleased with how this set came out, this has been a great set for just displaying Batgirl.

So that’s it for now. I have plans to make more doll rooms in the future however for now there’s nothing definite in the works. Possible upcoming rooms include a beach hut, a space station based on the Star Tours Ride, a new Avengers HQ, a room for Mulan, a room for Jasmine base on Agrabah Café at Disneyland Paris or some sort of Frozen room. Mostly it depends on what dolls I feel could have their own room and what supplies I have available.

My Haul – My Recent Disney Finds

This Haul Post is a little different from my usual ones. As you probably know I love Disney and I love collecting. Recently I have added several interesting Disney items to my collection. None of these items were found in a big haul however I still wanted to share them which is why they are being grouped together in this post.

First up, Merida’s Itty Bitty. I love collecting Itty Bitty’s however the Disney ones still have not been released in the UK. A few weeks back I was browsing stuff on eBay and I just came across a Merida Itty Bitty listed for only £3.99 with free postage! Merida is one of my absolute favourite Disney Princesses and so at that price I just had to add her to my collection.

At an Antiques and Collectors fair this weekend I found two Pocahontas dolls that I bought for just £10! I have done some investigating to figure out where and when they are from.

As far as I can tell from my Googling the mini doll is from a Disney Princess mini doll set that was released exclusively in the Disney Parks a few years back. She’s pictured there with a DC Superhero Girls Batgirl and a Disney Infinity Mulan to give a sense of her size, which is roughly 5” tall.

The other Pocahontas doll is from Mattel and released in 1995. I already have the 2016 Hasbro Pocahontas (pictured with her) but I like this version too. There’s differences – such as the tattoo on her arm – between the two of them. The Mattel Pocahontas is one of the original dolls who was released to coincide with the film. I am fairly sure that the outfit she is wearing is not an original one as I have yet to find any evidence of a Pocahontas doll in that dress.

Finally, I’ve bought plushies of Flik and Dot from A Bugs Life. I have always liked A Bugs Life and when I was younger I had two soft toys of Dot. At some point I think I got rid of her but recently I wondered if I could find another Dot on eBay. I managed to and bought her at a very reasonable price with a Flik.

Doll Collecting, I know it’s a bit weird.

If you’ve been following this blog you’ll probably have seen that I like to collect dolls. I’ve mentioned it in three of my haul posts, I wrote a blog post about unboxing toys and I shared how I made one of my dollcraft projects. 

Well, today it is one year since I bought my first doll, Tiana from Princess and the Frog and funnily enough I also bought Jasmine from Aladdin this afternoon.When I bought Tiana I was adamant that I wasn’t going to start collecting dolls. It's not really a surprise that Tiana was the one responsible for it all, she is the best Disney Princess. 

That resolution not to collect dolls only lasted a couple of months until I was buying a Merida off eBay. I still tried to convince myself that I wasn’t actually going to collect dolls, I was just buying my favourite Disney Princesses. At first it was just my favourite Disney Princesses that I wanted to collect (Pocahontas, Mulan, Tiana, Merida and Rapunzel plus Elsa and Anna). 

I think it was by the time I’d started to hunt down a Megara doll on eBay that I finally accepted that I’m a doll collector. By far my best doll find so far is my Hercules doll. He’s a 1997 original doll who I found in a charity shop for just £1! And best of all is that he was in near perfect condition when I spotted him.

When the DC Superhero Girls launched in this country I had a new line of dolls that I wanted to collect. DC Superhero Girls is such a cool toy line for a feminist geek, there was no way I would have been able to resist buying them!

Doll collecting has become a hobby for me but it’s also a hobby that has reignited some of my other hobbies. I make outfits for my dolls, sometimes inspired by their signature looks and other times just whatever I feel like making. This has really restarted my love of sewing and textiles – something that I had sadly let slide. I also make rooms, furniture and props to display my dolls with, most of these are inspired by tutorials from MyFroggyStuff on YouTube (seriously that woman is amazing she made a Christmas doll room out of a gift bag!) I used to love crafting when I was younger but much like my love of sewing it was something that I just sort of let slide.

There is a somewhat surprising number of male doll collectors out there who are proudly sharing pictures of their collections on social media. I find it interesting to see just how many #DudesWithDolls there are on Instagram and I do share pictures of my collection in that hashtag.  I’ve also noticed that quite a few of these men are gay. Side note, I have a theory that gay men are more willing to try stereotypically feminine hobbies (like doll collecting) because after coming out of the closet we no longer care if people judge us for what we like. We just want to enjoy whatever makes us happy.

Basically I know it’s a bit weird and unusual for a guy my age to be collecting dolls but I don’t really mind. It makes me happy and I don’t plan on stopping anytime soon. Why would I? There’s at least three more dolls I need to get!

Dot and Atta are not Disney Princesses?

A Bugs Life is the Disney Movie of the Month, I’m following up that initial post by considering why are Dot and Atta not Disney Princesses.

To be clear by Disney Princesses I mean characters in the marketing Disney Princess franchise (there’s currently 11 official Disney Princesses) and not just characters who happen to be princesses in movies released by Disney. Dot and Atta are essential to the plot of A Bugs Life and both of them are princesses of the ant colony, with Atta becoming a queen at the end of the movie. Like most of the other Disney Princesses they both have to overcome obstacles - both internal and external - in order to save their realm.

Perhaps the first reason that they’re Disney Princesses is that A Bugs Life is a Pixar movie. Except Merida from Pixar’s Brave is one of the 11 Princesses. Another reason could be that A Bugs Life is more about Flik than Dot and Atta. But Aladdin is obviously mainly about Aladdin and yet Jasmine is in the Disney Princess franchise. An obvious reason would be that they’re ants not humans. This one is harder to argue against, but Ariel from The Little Mermaid isn’t a human, she’s a mermaid and is often depicted as being a mermaid in products. (And funnily enough Jodi Benson – the voice of Ariel – also voiced Atta for a video game)

As far as I’ve been able to tell in the early days of the franchise there wasn’t even an official set line-up of characters. Depending on the product line was Disney would add or take away characters somewhat randomly. It was only with the release of Enchanted that it seems like an official line-up was settled on. As far as I’ve been able to find out Giselle from Enchanted was intended to be marketed as a Disney Princess but (probably due to the royalties involved in using Amy Adams’ likeness) Disney decided against long term marketing and merchandising for Enchanted. In response to this Disney seemed to have decided on a fixed line-up for the Disney Princess franchise.

I personally would like to see other characters like Dot and Atta added to the line-up. It’s about time that characters like Snow White and Cinderella started to take a back seat and characters like Dot and Atta could be good candidates to take over their spaces. If Disney did have more variety in the Princess franchise it could make merchandise collections more interesting. For example they could use Mulan and Merida for an action adventure themed collection but then maybe have Dot and Atta joining someone like Rapunzel in a garden themed collection.

Sure Dot and Atta are perhaps not the most obvious characters to add to the Disney Princess franchise but it would be good to see more of a variety in the franchise and I’d just to see A Bugs Life getting more representation from Disney.

Aladdin – Disney Movie of the Month

Starting off a new regular feature on the blog with Aladdin.

So it’s a new year and for this year I am planning on having a Disney Movie of the Month for every month of the year on this blog. I will watch a Disney movie at the start of each month, then I will post a review/opinion/thoughts piece and then I shall aim to follow up on that with other posts about that movie later on in the month. The first Disney Movie of the Month is Aladdin.

I used to watch Aladdin a lot when I was a kid but then I lost my copy of it on DVD and until recently I hadn’t seen it for about a decade. So when I watched it for the first time in years back in December I was worried that I was going to be disappointed, however I was pleased to find that it’s actually still a really enjoyable movie.

On paper the story might not be the most original, as a Disney fan Aladdin definitely feels like it’s got a lot of familiar moments, but it’s the characters and the sense of humour that runs throughout which really makes this movie work.

Obviously everyone knows the Genie but he really is a funny and likeable character. Robin Williams’ performance is just as enjoyable in 2017 as it was when I watched the movie as a kid.

Jafar might be a villain in the typical ‘mad, bad and evil’ mould but sometimes villains like that are just fun. As people who know me can tell you I think Maleficent is awesome, partially because of the 2014 live action movie but also because all out evil villains are just fun to watch sometimes. And that is certainly the case with Jafar.

Jasmine is also interesting. She might not be as powerful as Elsa, as brave as Merida or as determined as Tiana, but Jasmine is certainly not a passive princess. She’s way more interesting than the likes of Snow White and Cinderella. Also it’s worth pointing out that the fictional kingdom of Agrabah is a Muslim country, thus meaning that Jasmine is a Muslim Disney Princess making her a more progressive character for Disney than she may initially seem.

In conclusions, sometimes I’ve found that Disney movies which everyone seems to love but I’ve not seen in ages/never seemed don’t live up to the hype – like The Little Mermaid for example. However Aladdin did not disappoint me.