Originally she looked like this...
As you can see she was missing a leg and her scalp had some very serious issues. I'd been wanting a Kenner for quite some time. They are after all gorgeous and as I like to put it, 'the holy grail of Blythedom'. I'd tried many times and failed. Then after seeing this girl and deciding I'd give it one more try, I placed my bid. The day the auction closed I was at work, but during the course of the day I injured my foot to the point that I had to go home early. I got home feeling especially bummed and then decided to check how the action had gone down, expecting, of course, to be disappointed. And I'd won... I'd really won her!
I limped over to my husband and excitedly told him that I'd won my little injured leg Kenner. We both jokingly noted the oddness of acquiring a girl with a missing leg on a day when I was limping around the house. I don't know if it was truly kismet, but I'm going to count it as such. Both of our leg injuries are now much better. After much love and work (and a whitening toothpaste that I had to order from Bulgaria) I finally manged to make her look like this...
A video documenting her restoration, and unusual leg repair where I tried to salvage as much of her original leg can be found here.
I've improved on her a bit since then. She did have a rather unfortunate run in with lip stickers (she still has some of her original eye shadow, but as she had no blush or lip color I thought I'd give them a try). I finally just decided to paint her some new lips in a soft pink. I haven't bothered with blush and I don't think I will anytime soon (but never say never).
These days you will rarely see her with her original hair, not because I don't like it, but because in it's current condition it's not particularly versatile and also I believe her scalp was doing damage to the plastic of her head.
It's rather odd really, the hair on the scalp is quite aged but the scalp itself is very supple and fresh... I shudder to think what sort of elastisizers were being used in toys in the 70s but whatever is in there keeping the scalp so flexible it doesn't seem to react well with the plastic. There were several melt marks wherever the scalp was making contact which the plastic of the head. So for the most part I only use her original scalp on special occasions, and only with a bit of a barrier in between it and her head.
Mainly you will see her with brown hair and bangs... as this is what she originally came with and what I most think of as "her hair" (She was named after my sister who had the very same hair color and hairstyle most of the time). But occasionally I let her be blond...
Why? I dunno, I guess just because I've always admired some of those awesome blond Kenners out there. And there's no reason why dolls can't have more fun too :)
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