Frozen Elsa Nendoroid - first impressions

The "another Nendoroid" that I briefly mentioned in the end of last post is no other than Queen Elsa from Frozen~! ♥ I already picked her up on yesterday, but didn't have time to take pictures and post about her until this evening (had a relative's graduation party earlier today etc.) I tried to make a bit of a review on this Nendoroid, or at least share my first impressions on it :)

I'm such a huge dork for Disney movies and Frozen is definitely one of my favorites ever, so it was quite obvious that I needed to get my hands on this figure! I didn't pre-order Elsa right away though and apparently she was quite popular since by the time I was about to place my order, I noticed that she was already sold out on Amiami... So, I had to opt for Hobby Link Japan. I prefer getting everything from Amiami to combine shipping, but on the other hand the shipping for just one Nendoroid isn't that expensive with SAL/Airmail. At least I was able to get her shipped right away once she was released and didn't have to wait for any other items to be in stock!

The box is maybe a bit larger than the average Nendoroid boxes, which is a bit surprising considering that she didn't come with that many option parts... But the box design is super pretty, there are lovely little snowflakes everywhere and you can definitely see that Good Smile Company put a lot of thought into designing it. Many Nendoroid boxes look quite plain, so the detailing of the box was a bit of a surprise, especially since this wasn't even a limited/exclusive figure in any way.

The backside of the box shows what different poses you can put Elsa into!

Here you can see all the option parts she came with. She has three faces in total, three additional arm parts, a snowflake thing, a fabulous base and of course, her buddy Olaf. The blue special base was the only one she came with and it doesn't have an attaching mechanism like the ordinary bases. Even the Ultimate Madoka and Devil Homura Nendoroids didn't have as beautiful and detailed bases as Elsa has XD

This is what she looked like when I took her out of the box. I don't like this smiling expression that much, it looks a bit creepy...

Reminds me of a Moomin character, Lady of the Cold XDD

This face at least a bit better, but I don't like this one that much either... Overall, I could say that I'm a bit disappointed with the faces :/ They put so much thought into the detailing of the outfit, hair and even added a special base, but it feels like they failed with one of the most important things - the facial expressions. 2 out of the 3 faces look quite manic and don't really portray Elsa's character and personality correctly ^^;;

This last expression, looks a lot better, I think! ♥ And this will definitely be the pose that I'll display her in~

The background cardboard of the box had this beautiful landscape of the land of Arendelle ♥

It works perfectly as a photography background for Elsa :3

Look at how beautiful and detailed the cape is! I managed to break it almost right away though, it was very badly glued in : < But luckily it was easy to attach it back with some super glue, so no permanent damage was done!

Another close-up of her outfit, the bodice sparkles and there is a cute snowflake accessory on her hair ;3; (Forgot to remove the plastic under the bodice before I took this photo...)

Then here's Olaf, he looks a bit manic as well... "I LIKE WARM HUGS!"

But it's okay Olaf! You and Elsa can look manic together X'D

Lmao, I tried on another Nendoroid's face just for fun XDD Usually you can mix and match the parts from different Nendoroids, but it doesn't really work that well with Elsa, since her skin is lighter than most of the Nendoroids. I'm sure you can see the difference if you compare the face to the rest of her skin. It doesn't look that bad imo and I'm sure you could hide the difference in Photoshop.

Overall, even though there are things about her that I don't like, I'm still glad that I got her! I'm sure that her price will only raise on the second-hand market and due to her popularity she might be hard to find as well, so I wouldn't want to hunt for her now ^^; This is probably one of those figures that is a must-have for those who love the Frozen movie and/or Elsa's character, but don't really interest anyone who buy figures just based on how they look.

Amiami April loot

I finally received my Amiami order from April :D I was dumb and combined some Pureneemo pre-order clothes to my monthly order, thinking that they'd be released in mid April like they were supposed to, but of course they got delayed over and over again, some even until late July ^^; All of the other items that I had pre-ordered were already in stock by the beginning of May and I got tired of waiting, so I asked Amiami to separate my orders in order to finally get the April items... Now I'm wiser and will place a separate order for pre-order clothes from now on!

So, what was included in the box?

Hoshizora Rin Nendoroid

FINALLY! ♥ This figure was already released on 6th of April and it only took a few days before other people started getting theirs home and took some pictures... It was so frustrating to wait for the other pre-order items to get released while looking at all the cute pictures of Rin XD She's definitely the most adorable Love Live Nendoroid so far, even though she's not one of my favorites as a character. But look at that happy face and the little maracas ;___;

Here's the girl team so far, 4 more to go x3

Tojo Nozomi ~Kyun Kuyun Sensation~ rubber strap

This is an Ichiban Kuji prize and was not available for pre-order or anything, so the moment I saw it in the pre-owned section I had to grab it because WAIFU!! ♥ Nozomi is wearing this cute Halloween outfit from the song "Dancing stars on me"~ She immediately got her place hanging on my purse, now I just hope that I won't lose her >.<

Here's a Youtube video of the song, if you'd like to hear it :)

Rilakkuma Nonbiri Danran Jikan Re-ment set

Another food-themed Rilakkuma Re-ment set ♥ I still haven't opened all of these, it takes surprisingly lot of time to open everything XD But everything seems super cute~

Azone Pureneemo hairbands

I ordered a bunch of these, since I thought they'd make nice bases :) I'm planning to accessorize them to fit each of my girls better. I only took a picture of my hairbands, but the order actually had another set like this (3 white, 3 black) for Sarg X'D Six was actually the maximum per customer, so I believe I won't be able to order more of these if I need sniff...

Azone Pureneemo Sweet Punk Girls Koron

Aaand last, but not least - a new Azone :3 I didn't pre-order this one right away, I spent quite some time contemplating whether or not I want her... But I didn't have a Koron in my Neemo family yet and this was my favorite release of her so far, so in the end I did place an order for her. And I'm happy that I did since she's absolutely adorable! ♥ I love the caramel-shaded hair and the punk style outfit~ Her name is Chizuru, or just Chizu for short :3

I took a few test photos of her on our yard, it was such a beautiful, warm day~ ♥ She already managed to get some white dust on her beanie, probably from the flowers... >3<

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There's another Nendoroid (from Hobby Link Japan) waiting for me in the post office, hopefully I'll be able to pick it up tomorrow~ The first part of my summer vacation also started today, so I'm hoping to be able to focus more on photography and sewing during these two and half weeks :)

Incoming dolls - Iplehouse Eva and two Pureneemos

My Iplehouse girl crew will be growing by another member again, since I just ordered SID Eva in peach gold skin *w* ♥ I ordered her on 2-part layaway, which I'll be finishing next month :) Iplehouse's waiting times have been around 1-2 months, so there's hope that she might even be ready to be shipped once I send the last payment!

Character-wise she'll be Medeia, a sorceress/monster hunter in-training~ She is a brave, kind-hearted, strong-willed and loyal person, deep down also has a bit of a girl next door vibe to her. Medeia is an only child and ever since her birth she's been treated like a boy by her father, who had wished (and assumed) that his unborn child would be a boy. From young age Medeia has felt like she was a disappointment to her father no matter what she did and even agreed to start hard fight training under a monster hunter Aslak's supervision to prove that she was such as good as a boy.

Later on I got some inspiration for this character from Yennefer of the game The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt. Medeia lives in a same kind of world as the characters in that game and of course she has a muscular companion Aslak (Sarg's IOS Jade), who has gotten some inspiration from Geralt, another character from the game. I could go on and on about the game, Yennefer, Geralt and their lovely relationship, I'm such a hopeless fan! ♥ That being said, we're still not looking to create "cosplay" or anything like that. Our characters Medeia and Aslak existed even before we found out about The Witcher games, but now they inspire us even more after the amazing game.

Hmm, Medeia will be my 6th girl from Iplehouse... This meme that was posted on a discussion thread on Den of Angels seems quite accurate hahah XD

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Besides Medeia, I'm also waiting for a few Azone Pureneemos!

I managed to find this pink-haired version of Majokko Little Witch of Heart Chiika for pretty cheap from Yahoo!Japan *w* I spent quite some time hunting for this one... I did bid on some earlier, but they went over 15,000yen and I wanted to wait and see if I could find one for cheaper. The waiting paid off since the one I won was less than 10,000yen, despite being a fullset in great condition! I'm still waiting if I win some Re-ment items that I could combine shipping with, but in any case I'd expect this girl to come home during next month :)

I'm really excited to be able to get some cute twin Chiika photos with Nia, my white-haired Chiika~ I still haven't figured out a suitable name... The two Chiikas are twin sisters, so I'd like one that in some way matches with Nia >3<

Then this Pink!Pink! a la mode Maya.. ♥ At first I thought that I'd be able to resist this cutie, but a few days before her pre-order started, I decided that I do want her after all ^^; I ended up selling my Tick-Tock Rabbit Himeno since I didn't bond with her and thought that this girl could be my new Kirari~

It was a bit of a hassle to get her on preorder. First, I contacted one shopping service agent asking them to order her for me (being a Direct Store version, she wasn't available on Amiami or other international sites), but they never replied anything ; . ; Then I tried getting her through some other shopping services, but they couldn't help me either due to the quantity limit per doll set by Azone (they had obviously already ordered this doll for some other people). Finally I managed to place my pre-order through Treasure-Japan! ♥ Apparently Maya will be released in late June, hopefully near my birthday, hahah~

Sarg is getting the standard version and we're planning to swap the shoes, socks and maybe cardigans as well ♥ I don't know yet whether Kirari will be wearing this kind of clothes or if I'll let Shiori (Heartful Kiss Maya) steal this outfit X'D

A thousand cherry blossoms

As promised, a few cherry blossom photos of Ceci and Janna from the Hanami meetup :) I only got a few good photos though and the posing is repetitive, but I still like these~

I've had this lovely pink yukata (from Infinite Love) for a while now and this seemed like the perfect moment to take photos of Ceci wearing it! I even made a pair of matching geta shoes, but unfortunately they don't really show in the photos :( And you also can't see the gorgeous painting that Sarg did on the parasol so well! I definitely need to take more photos on our yard at some point :)

We actually had an audience as some people came to wonder what kind of doll Ceci is and wanted to take photos, for some reason they wanted to take photos of ME as well ^^;; It was quite hard to focus on taking photos of your doll when at the same time some strangers are taking photos of you, lol...

Next up is Janna-sensei in the tree! I wish I could've dressed her up in a yukata/kimono as well, but unfortunately I don't have any for my Neemos yet :'( Azone's summer clothing collection will have some lovely ones though, so I'm definitely going to grab a bunch of them~ I need more Pureneemo clothes in general too!

Hanami meetup with friends~

On Sunday we had a little Hanami picnic meetup in the Roihuvuori Sakura Park, just in time to see the lovely cherry blossom trees in full bloom~! The official Hanami festival was held on Thursday, but the place was crowded then, so we obviously wanted to pick another day for our meetup :) Still, there were a lot of people admiring the beautiful park, taking a walk and having a picnic.

This time our meetup crew consisted of me, Sarg, Janina, Spica, Elina and Elina's friend, Lunaticz :) Unfortunately Tiinyan couldn't come since she was sick, but we took a lot of pics for her and hopefully she can attend the next meetup! Hope you're already feeling better, dear! >3<

It was a beautiful, sunny weather, but all the brightness made it quite difficult to see how the photos look in the camera... I ended up with a bunch of blurry photos, but luckily some also succeeded well enough to be posted! :3

All the dolls, figures, plushies and Melon-chan XD

This is the crew I brought to the meetup :) Janna (Minami-sensei), Yui (Lien), Ginny (Lipu) and Ceci (IH Emilia)

Elina brought this adorable tan Pukifee Luna ;___; I've always loved the sculpt and especially after Fairyland started making tan events, I've been so tempted to get one as a sister for my Littlefee Chiwoo elf... *must resist* Do also note that Little Twin Stars unicorn plushie!! ♥

My little Yui~ This is actually the first photo of her with the new haircut :3 Yes, I cut her hair shorter! I wasn't feeling that inspired with her before, but it feels like she gained a lot of character by this change, I'm loving her much more now!

Two of Lipu! The braid-haired is Elina's Pip, the other one is my Ginny :) It was so adorable seeing these two side by side! They look the same even though they're not even the same version! Elina took a better picture of these two with the sakura flowers, so I hope she'll share the photos on her blog soon~

Sarg's Molly! And a scary Nagisa Nendoroid stalking behind her D:

Elina's Tove :3 Elina was kind to let me buy the snowflake wand that came with this doll, thank you so much ♥ My snow fairy Sereni is super happy~

Sarg's Gemma ♥

The lovely DD ladies! Janina's Momoko on left and Spica's Yumeka on right~

Mr. Aopaca was at the meetup too, of course! Unfortunately I forgot my pink Arpakasso, Pinky-chan at home, so the two couldn't meet ;___; Hopefully next time!

Momoko was so cute in her bunny hoodie! ♥

Janina's crew :3 Besides Momoko, she also brought Miu and Sena Nendoroid.

That Miu.. ♥

This guy (belongs to Spica) totally stole the spotlight the moment he got out of the bag XD Definitely one of the funniest moments during the meetup hahah

While being there, I naturally also wanted to take a few photos of the cherry blossom trees themselves! It was my first time ever seeing them in full bloom, it was so pretty ^w^ I wish I could have a bunch of these at home~

I also took some "official" doll photos of Ceci and Janna, but I think this post is already quite picture heavy so I thought I'd save the rest for another post :)

Thank you for the lovely meetup once again, it was such a blast! ♥