Another treasure from Goodwill, that needed a LOT of restoration work:
This doll had multiple issues, some of which could be addressed, one of which I’ll live with because I feel so lucky to have found such a hard to come by doll.
1) 50% of hair plugs in the ponytail were pulled out, and tangled with the rest of the ponytail hair in a giant rats nest of matted hair at the back of the head. It took two hours of washing, conditioning, and combing to work the matted hair out. I struggled for a bit with what type of hair to reroot the missing hair with as I couldn’t use Saran as it didn’t match in texture or sheen with the remaining hair - I eventually found a brown/black Alpaca that worked beautifully.
2) Embedded grime and dirt on both doll and swimsuit. A good scrub with soap and Bon Ami had the doll looking sparkling clean, and the swimsuit had a soak in Oxy Clean laundry soap (I use the kind for baby clothes to wash my doll clothes) and came out looking bright and clean.
3) Broken neck knob. My first #3 had a broken neck knob as well, but the knob was still present stuck in the head - I was able to reattach it with a screw. This time the knob was completely gone, so I used a screw with a head the same size as the original knob to replace it and it works beautifully.
4) The left leg must have been broken off at some point, and an enterprising parent glued it back on with some sort of super adhesive. The leg isn’t budging at all, which is pretty impressive for glue that is probably at least fifty years old - I’m actually really impressed with whatever they were making glue out of back in the day. There doesn’t seem to be much I can do about this, but honestly I only display and photograph my straight leg Barbie’s standing anyway, and the other leg still has full movement so I can do a few different poses.
I got a bit excited and couldn’t wait for the curl to set on the ponytail so the curler is still in, but here’s my new brunette #3 Barbie with blue eyeshadow (hanging out with the blonde #3 Barbie with brown eyeshadow I restored from a previous haul):
A recent Goodwill haul contained no dolls, but a ton of pristine vintage clothes (which was great as I didn’t have many early Barbie pieces). Last pic is my oldest Barbies wearing some of their new wardrobe
