USA 2017 - Sasha festival part 3

Just before lunch on the Friday of the festival, I took a few photos as Anne V was setting up her expert table of beautiful studio dolls.  Many of them were hers, but several other collectors at the festival brought along their dolls to be included in the display and Anne's talk.

Four beautiful studio dolls

Several studio babies gather at the front of the table

Anneliese and Monique

A Sasha Trachtenpuppe in the foreground along with the Sasha studio dolls

Doll stands awaiting more of the lovely Studio dolls

Diane and Theresa helped Anne set up the dolls

Such lovely dolls on display

Anne V busy unpacking the dolls

While the expert tables were being prepared the children at the festival were playing together - a guessing game using some modern technology.

The children having fun getting to know each other again

Flashcards using a phone

The buffet lunch was delicious.  During lunch we received our first Festival souvenirs and table hostess gifts.  The festival souvenirs in the white gift bag were very useful for keeping Sasha forever young - a buff sponge with a tub of Orvus cream for cleaning Sasha's vinyl, a lovely white bathrobe to wear while she is being pampered and instructions on how to make a Sasha facemask.  At our table the hostess was Sheila and she had made lovely fleecy fringed baby blankets and provided a mini teddy bear for those of us at her table.  My girl was sitting at a table with the other children and she received a cape, hair brush and hair ties for Sasha.

Baby Nina with her new teddy and blanket during lunch

After lunch it was time for the Experts tables.  There were four, however I ended up spending much of the time at one as Anne S was using baby Mabel as a demo model for restringing.  Mabel, my first Sasha doll, has always been my floppiest Sasha and this year she had gone even floppier, so I brought her to the festival so she could be restrung.  Anne showed that a baby is often harder to restring than a child Sasha as the loop of elastic between the arms needs to be very short. 

I had a quick look at Sheila's re-rooting expert table before going to watch Mabel's restringing

Anne started by removing Mabel's arms

Then she carefully removed her legs, one at a time

Unhooking the left leg from the elastic

Then unhooking the right leg

With the legs now off the elastic, the head came off (they share the same elastic)

Mabel's head hook

The bar for the hook in Mabel's head, Anne did not want to restring her too tightly as sometimes the old bar can break

The old elastics, ready for measuring for the new elastic

Tying the knot in the new elastic

Tying cords around the new elastic, ready to help thread it through the body

Using the cords to thread the elastic through the body

Pulling the first leg elastic through with the chord and holding it in place ready for the leg hook

Hooking the second leg onto the new elastic

Carefully releasing the cords now the legs are hooked onto the elastic

Getting ready to restring the arms

Opening up the arm hook slightly with pliers

Threading the arm elastic

Using the cord to help thread the very short arm elastic loop through the body

Watching Mabel being restrung

The old arm elastic just before it and the old body head and leg elastic was pushed carefully inside her body (it is normal practice to retain the original stringing inside the doll)

Baby Mabel restrung and sitting up nicely!

It was wonderful to have Mabel sitting properly again without her head flopping over - thank you so much to Anne for using her as the baby demo model and for restringing her so nicely.

I went to watch Dawn's demonstration of how to curl a Sasha doll's hair, using pipe cleaners.  She had explained the process to me in the past at a Chat 'n Snap, however it was good to see a demonstration, which involves hot water and short lengths of pipe cleaner.  My girl is keen to do it to baby Theo, whose hair is perfect, however Leo is the better candidate as he has a wayward fringe!

Dawn explaining how she curls doll hair

The baby in the pushchair has lovely curls and so does the Gotz Sasha girl beside her

Discussing hair curling

Dawn demonstrating how to wind the small bunches of hair onto a pipe cleaner as a young Sasha collector watches

Baby Mabel was glad to show her new found sturdiness as she crawled up Dawn's baby's pushchair while Nina hid under her hat

I completely missed taking photos of Ann C's expert table about using vintage fabrics for Sasha clothes and Anne V was packing up all the wonderful studio dolls after her talk to a large crowd when I left Dawn's table.

During the afternoon people were also viewing and voting for their favourite Dress a Sasha entry in the other room, viewing the helper raffle items and the Children's fund Auction items as they looked forward to it the excitement of the auction that evening.  I went back to photograph all the Dress a Sasha entries to make sure I hadn't missed any.

In case you've missed them see Part 1 of the 2017 Sasha Festival and Part 2 of the 2017 Sasha Festival.