Surprise Swap Tweens (and Tots!) by MGA Entertainment

I'm in the middle of another mini series right now, and this time it's all about dolls with swappable heads.  I started the series by talking about Mattel's Swappin' Styles Fashionistas, and today I'll be looking at MGA's Surprise Swap Tweens line.  There's no rational order to these reviews, unfortunately.  I probably should have approached the dolls chronologically, but I'm always tweaking what's in each review and waiting for things to arrive in the mail, so broad scale organization doesn't tend to work for me.

Also, several of you had excellent suggestions for head-swapping doll lines that weren't on my radar (thank you!), so I might have to slot in a few more reviews than I'd originally planned.  I love the unpredictability of this type of series, though.  It's like a chose your own adventure novel or something.

Today's review is a good example of the chaos, because only when I was uploading pictures of the Tweens dolls did I discover that there are Surprise Swap Tots as well.  These are versions of the classic 3-inch L.O.L. Surprise dolls, and they look interesting.  So I had to hustle to include them at the last minute.  But most of this review will focus on the head-swapping Tweens:

Surprise Swap Tweens by MGA Entertainment, $29.99.

Barbie Swappin' Styles Fashionistas by Mattel

I've been thinking about dolls with swappable heads for a few weeks.  It's a strange thing to think about, granted, but I feel like I have some good reasons.  First and foremost, Lena is getting married at some point this year (they haven't chosen a date yet), and I know she'll want some fancy up-do for that occasion.  Frankly, I wish I could just swap her head with one that already has a fancy up-do.  Don't tell her I said that, though!

The other reason I have swappable heads on my mind is that they keep popping up in my life.  For example, as I was getting some of my older dolls out of storage, I found a My Scene Swappin' Styles set that I never took out of the box.  I should probably do that.  Also, MGA recently came out with a line of Tweens dolls with interchangeable heads, and those reminded me of the Moxie Girlz Magic Hair dolls from 2009.  And of course there are the Swappin' Styles Fashionistas from 2010.  I've already done a brief review of these Fashionistas, but something popped up on eBay a month or two ago that got me excited about them all over again.  More about that in a sec.

With all of these thoughts of head-swappers on my mind, I figured I'd do a mini series to highlight each of the four types of doll that are on my radar: My Scene Swappin' Styles, Tweens Surprise Swap, Moxie Girlz Magic Hair, and the stars of today's review, the Swappin' Styles Fashionistas:

Swappin' Styles Fashionista Sweetie...with an extra head (2010).

Barbie Dream Besties Update with Daisy and Ken

Back in November, before the whole advent calendar series started, I was looking at Mattel's new Dream Besties.  These dolls have an accompanying YouTube show featuring six friends: Malibu, Teresa, Renee, Brooklyn, Daisy, and Ken.  However, dolls representing two of the characters (Daisy and Ken) were not released with the very first wave of products, so I didn't have them on hand for my initial review.

Because Daisy and Ken are different from the four dolls that I've already reviewed, I didn't feel like I could move on without taking a quick look at them:

Dream Besties Daisy and Ken by Mattel ($19.99 each).

Advent Calendar wrap-up: Lego Princesses, Schleich, and Dirds

Happy New Year!  Before I launch into the regular reviews that I have planned for January, I figured I should close out the advent calendar series by showing you the last three calendars that I have on hand.  I actually only purchased two of these for review, and the third one, Lego's Disney Princess calendar, was an incredibly thoughtful and timely gift from my mother-in-law...who had no idea that I was planning an advent calendar series for the blog!  She knows me very well.

Here are the three remaining calendars:

From left: Lego Disney Princesses, Sky and Ocean building blocks, and Schleich Horse Club.