What is the most prominent memory you associate with your first BJD?

It’s the year 2011(2012? Idr) I order a luts kid delf with some money I had fallen into. I was excited to have my first doll after an eternity of staring at pretty pics online. Waiting and waiting. Finally, the doll ships and delivers.

… jerk roommates don’t answer the door when the postman knocks. So I get a yellow slip of doom. Gotta wait the whole weekend to go to the post and get her.

cue me and a friend walking through parts of Pittsburgh we had never been looking for our post office. Find it. Get doll.

only then we decide it’s a good idea to maybe take a bus lmao. So we take the bus home.

a child glared at me the whole way. It was awkward.

finally open her, all is good.

I would not do it again.

 

I love your story and I know how you feel about not celebrating things. For different reasons nothing was ever celebrated in my family so I grew up not getting excited about things. So when I made the decision to finally get into the hobby after thinking about it for a decade it was actually pretty exciting to me even if it wasn’t for anyone else.

My most prominent memory of receiving my first bjd is that she came on the last day of isolation when I had COVID, I’ll never forget it. I was really sick but not hospitalized, it’s still scary though.

 

Oh, Cap'n!!!!! I remember my first bjd faceplanting at my first meetup, such a horrible feeling. But not as dire as your poor head's nose. :/. Did you have to leave it damaged for a while or did you proceed with a new faceup?
My family chipped in on one of my early new doll purchases. Not the first doll, more like the 7th or 8th as I was so excited about how he would work with another of my dolls. They are still the perfect couple. But since I acquired many more after that the family doesn't offer to encourage me any more. ;}
Being your first doll, and such a sweet gift from your parents will make him more special.

On the lighter side, I've always loved dolls & costuming. When I saw my first bjd in 2009, I thought my friend must be mad spending that much money. Then, on the way home I got to thinking about how fun it would be to sew for them....within a couple of months I was asking my friend about helping me find one to buy. She had a doll shop & had one Dollinian doll which hadn't sold. So we met for lunch with a friend at a nice restaurant and pulled out the doll to discuss her while waiting for service. XD It was after the lunch crowd, so we had the area to ourselves, but the waitress was quite confounded as to what exactly we were doing. . And that's when it hit me as to just how different doll people can be from other people, as it hadn't seemed odd at all to us to discuss the joints & sculpting of a blank, wigless, naked doll wherever we happened to be.
My friend later gave her a faceup for me & over the years the doll's style has evolved. In fact, she's the one I was buying the doll for that my family chipped in on. .

 

I had bought my first doll secondhand, so getting her in the mail and cleaning/restringing her as a baby faced 14 yearold was a very memorable experience. Even now I can see the Tupperware container of "doll part" soup sitting on my old desk as I attempted to de-yellow her before hot glue sueding her joints. I made many mistakes with her, but those experiences have led me to be a better doll owner today lol

 

My first doll was also the first BjD I ever saw in person. He arrived about 20 minutes before I had to leave for work. I held him, cried because I loved him so much, and considered calling in sick so I could stay with him.

But I think my most memorable event with him happened a little over two years later. He started ‘dating’ someone else’s doll through photostories. I ended up becoming friends with the other owner, we met in person in Washington DC about a year later, and took our dolls on a ‘date’ to the Washington and Lincoln monuments and through a little garden as the sun went down. It was such a fun day, and I think of it every time I’m reminded of DC.

 

When she came to the front door, I actually jumped around in a circle and my husband was so amused.

 

They really do end up feeling like family! At least mine do!
I have a very small collection so each one is really extra special to me.
My first one was a gift for my 18th birthday- (Way back in 2009) and she and I have been through so much together since then.

She gave me an avenue to explore fashion and costume design- I had a small business selling doll clothes way back when- and although that business didn't do very well I have been working in the costume industry (Theater costumes for humans to wear lol) for around 10 years now! (The pandemmy has forced me to take a career break but as soon as theater gets back on my feet I will be back at it.)

So in a sense, if it wasn't for my minifee I wouldn't have the career I have

PS: I have been off DOA and away from the BJD collecting scene for a long long time now and recently just logged back in here the other day. So, I'm sort of going down memory lane myself, today.

 

For me it is how much one of my cats just LOVED her. He liked to sit with her and always wanted to be involved if I was doing anything with the doll. He was so good with her I left her on a stand in the living room beside a chair, just so he could come around and say hello to her as he wanted to. He never once damaged her or her clothes or wigs. We joked that it was "his dolly".

Been five years since he passed on, but I will always cherish "his dolly" and the memories she brings.

 

Hmm.. It's like more than a decade ago i got my first doll (Man i'm old >-<) I were in a very dark place and desperately wanted something to look forward to. I had seen dolls at different conventions before and i just fell in love, i'd never been one for dolls as a kid, but for some reason, the weight of them, the look of them, the endless options with them, it all just seemed like a dream.
I looked for many a moons on different pages and i decided on a Dollmore doll, male with a hauntingly melancholic look. I were happy and my parents at the time didn't get it at all. (i were 18, so legally she couldn't do anything, and as long as i didn't spend her money i thought she didn't give a rats arse.)
When i got him i were mostly in awe, just sitting and staring at him for like an hour, ofcourse my mother weren't the most tactful person and trying to be funny she claimed: 'she looks like Michael Jackson' and forever more after that she'd comment that my doll must be michael jackson. 'They contained equal ammounts of plastic after all'. It kinda deflated my happiness for a while, until i learned that it doesn't matter, as long as you're happy with the thing you have, and i named him Micherou (Japanized version of Michael)
Well, my mother passed in april this year and i decided that while she never understood my hobby, i'd get myself my grail doll. A Dollmore Trinity. So i suppose it became a full circle. I've considered naming her after my mother. While my mother never understood my love for the dolls, i still want to combine two things i really loved. At least she really tried.

 

I got my first doll almost 4 years ago and I clearly remember holding her for the first time and being surprised at how tall she was My first doll was a DD Snow Miku who is roughly 60cm in height!

And after seeing her in person I understood why these dolls are so expensive, for once they are huge and secondly there's so much detail in the sculpting and the clothing of the doll. I don't own my first doll anymore (the vinyl material just isn't for me) but I'll always remember my first impression of seeing her in person.

 

my first full doll was also a graduation gift! Highschool was not a very pleasant experience for me, lots of dark days and i BEGGED my mother to let me drop out it was just too much...but she ordered me a Fullset MNF Kyle as a graduation/birthday gift and he holds a special place in my heart. My mother was very very old and didnt really understand a lot of the things I liked but I think this was her way of telling me she supported my interests...and bribing me to stay in school lol. I had to sell him due to tight finances years ago but I got his og head back a few months ago and i got him a new body and all new clothes and I'm so happy to have him back!

 

There are a few. I'm actually still hunting the dolls I spotted before I truly joined the hobby. A couple of Sooms (Vampire Alchemist Gluino Fullset, preferably in WS or NS) and Soom Sullivan Curse of Shadow Fullset in all three or at least gray or white are always a couple I can't remove from my mind. Loongsoul Auguste was another. I haven't found any of them as of yet.


What truly got me in was my Luts Phoenix Cherry. I saw her and absolutely had to have her without a doubt. I met a wonderful friend while paying the layaway.
Soon after I got the male Phoenix Bory. Hopefully I'll find the YOSD Phoenix fullsets.

It made me giddy to find the girl as she was really perfect for an OC.

 

I had 3 different bjds come into my collection before my first ordered doll (Bobobie Elfkin) arrived. My first bjd that I owned was an off topic Jun Planning AI doll that I received for Christmas from my parents. I remember because of her price and things she'd heard from me my mom was a little worried she'd gotten my sister and I recast dolls by accident so I was glad to be able to tell her that even though they're off topic here they are still legit. I have strong memories and feelings associated with her still and she's one of my most treasured dolls.
The thing I remember most about when my elfkin Leif finally arrived was the fact that I'd waited from September to May for him when I'd been originally quoted a wait of around 16 weeks. And that instead of being my first bjd he was instead my fourth.

 

One of my strongest memories is the days after I discovered BJDs. I bumped into a meetup at a steampunk convention. I was immediately obsessed and started researching companies. Three days later I ordered the DC Snowborn fullset. I haven't looked back since! I now have about forty dolls.

Your story is lovely. Congratulations!

 

I remember really liking the Resinsoul Mei and my mom also figured it'd be the perfect starter doll (I wanna say I was about 12ish? 11? something like that). But before I ordered her, we were taking a trip out to Colorado so we decided to pop into Denver Doll and see if they had one at the store. They didn't, but they did have the Resinsoul Ju. Soon as they brought her out and I saw how pretty the sculpt was I was like, yep, this is the one, haha.

 

I have a weird one. When I first started to research BJDs and get really into the hobby (before owning one), we were painting the house. Thirteen years later and I still associate the smell of fresh paint with sitting in my room on my laptop, looking through DOA, old Youtube videos, and any other site I could find about the hobby. It was such an exciting time, and it's a great memory!!

 

Bigger in real life as I hadn't seen one before, except on line, note this was a 60cm doll, which feel rather small and light now compared to my 70cm plus fantasy bjds...

And how difficult to stand and pose... this was before I knew the ins and outs on posing bjds and that a laminate floor isn't the best surface to practice that on.