H is for How They Come in - Charity Shops Again!

I picked up a couple of bags, just after the last post on the subject, then managed to find a couple more shots I'd missed (which aren't in the big folder of stuff waiting), so here's a few bits, some of which we may have seen before?

 

Two-quid for a very mixed bag, several of which pieces will go back to a different charity shop in the next donation from me, but from which a few useful pieces were sorted into the collection, and well look at the better pieces below.

 

The dinosaurs will feature in a forthcoming post on erasersaurs, for that is what I think they are! The two lady bears are 'In My Pocket' toys from Morrison, while the red stuff is a right old mix, Nabisco Dougal, the unknown premium elephant we looked at years ago next to the Kellogg's-Raja-Dunkin ones and a bear previously shelfied in pastel shades as Baby Shower rack toys, AND found in the street in yellow plastic.

 

The ball, soft-foam, which is increasingly turning-up in these mixed lots, is from some rival to Nerf Guns, which I did see the name of the other day, but forgot to note!

I picked this up because it was cheap, and the basket was undamaged (along with all those ears!), so it was a rather fine example of a new name - Avon 'Forest friends' - for both the Tag list and the A-Z blogs - eventually! Probably meant to post it at Easter, may have, but found these images anyway!

 

The other recent bag - I seem to have veritable herds of these in dozens of sizes, sets, plastic types, because obviously it was a very successful movie, and got heavily covered, even until now, and I will have to sit down at some point in the future, and sort them all out, for a proper ID session/disambiguation post! Disney's Frozen!

 

While this was a 50p purchase a year or two ago which we may have had here, real borderline as far as taking the term 'figural' goes, but fun, and the sort of home-made stuff gift-shops still carried when I was a kid and Hong Kong's tsunami of polymer had barely started to flow!

S is for Shelfies - A Roundup I

Just a few bits and bobs which have piled-up, got lost, been found and sent somewhere else, brought back together and split into two posts and with several of them; duplicated at one point! The first shot actually goes back to last October, and got really lost for a while . . .

. . . not exciting, but shot in a newsagent (or Sainsbury's?), not so fussed by the funny little semi-flat ones above, but I thought I'd better grab a shelfie of the four-inch (or thereabouts) Disney Princesses as they may turn-up in mixed/job-lots in a year or two. Paint Your Own Frozen . . . and not the first time I've seen them.

Then in December, a visit to TKMaxx (I think) found this wild animal set from Ravensden. The giraffe wasn't quite as bad a sculpt as this forshorteing suggests, but it wasn't the best either and the tiger looked decidedly demented! The elephant's alright, but his tusks are a bit short/fat, but it puts a name to them!

 

At the same time I shot this lot from Playtek LLC, who I think we've seen before here as a brand, probably also in TKMaxx, bigger, they are less likely to appear in mixed lots of toy soldiers, but for animal collectors, may need a box-tick at some point!

While 'Maxx often turns-up these die-cast vehicle sets from HTI with a few figures, here road workers, but Peter Evans has sent me several Police (extant, or forthcoming posts) with similar bases, possibly from the Toy Project's charity shop in North London. 40mm and a replacement PVC-alike polymer, I dare say there are firefighters too?

A few days later, but still close to Christmas I shot these in The Range in Aldershot (I was rushing around trying to buy bathroom storage with suckers on because of the no glueing/drilling rule in the new flat!); two takes on T-Rex, although I thought the one on the right looked a little more Allosaur to me?

But, again, both Paint Your Own kits, from unbranded on the left (credited to and possibly clearance from Universal themselves, I assume they have gift-shops in their theme parks?), and Kandytoys on the right. One has a useful base, the other is going to keep falling over!

Finally, and an hour later I was at B&M in Basingrad (still looking for bathroom accessories) and I shot this, normally I only give the little vehicles a quick one-over for military or space, but this can be built-upon with Hestair Kiddybricks or Megabloks (other compatible building systems exist!), which I thought was novelty enough for inclusion here! Titled 'Brick Rides' this one is Bricking Trails.

H is for How they Come In - Peter II (NSFW!)

A couple of weeks after the previously seen parcel had arrived, this little lot turned-up on the doorstep, and there was a real treat in there! But it really is not safe for a work screen, so if you are at work, stop now, before you scroll down, I'll put it last!

Nice bunch of odds and sods; some of the Kinder are looked at below, while I shot the Khaki infantry for the relevant page, and the Lego figure is also in another post, waiting in the queue, indeed I was pleased to see him here as I couldn't work out why he had no scanned paperwork, but the answer was he didn't have any in the first place!

Modern, and rather in the style of those 'How to Train Your Dragon' figures we looked at a while ago, so I think that's who he is!

The Kinder's included a clip together lizard who's sticky feet allow him to be stuck to a wall or window, which is fun, reminds me of the hotel we spent our R&R in, in Kenya, where little 'rainbow-bright' guys would scurry around the suite keeping us spider and mossie-free, they failed with the mossies mind, I spent a week in RAF Wroughton with suspected Malaria, which - technically - I still have . . . an "Unspecified tropical disease" means I can never give blood again! A small jeep and a Frozen character were also notable.

The new marking on the khaki-infantry, there are others in the queue, and while I managed a couple of updates a few weeks ago, there will be more. The Timpo copies could be any one of several pirates, while the 'Giant' clone was looked at here.

But this was the pièce de résistance of the lot, a proper 'stag novelty' rudie-nudie! Ostensively a plastic skull key-ring, like many others; we've seen a few here over the years, but this one opens out to become a lady who's lost all her clothes in some epic wardrobe malfunction!

Of more interest even, is that it will more than likely be a copy of a much older ivory or bone novelty, probably from Japan, or maybe China? Stunning little thing; and much gratitude to Peter Evans for it, and the rest of the lot.

H is for How they Come In - Peter I

It's the second of January already, how did that happen, one minute we're at Christmas, next the month is whizzing-by at a rate of knots! I was moving furniture today and am now as stiff as a old man, which is hardly surprising, but a bit of a sit down and some typing/Internet faffing will be a needed break before I carry more books downstairs!

These came winging their way to SSW Towers back a the start of November, a nice handful of rack-toy Army Men and some AFV's, against the aim of one day having one of everything (an impossible task but noble aim, I feel!) they will all go to the To Be Sorted (TBS) zone for a future sorting session which will be of epic proportions and probably need several tables at once!

A few more interesting bits include an MPC ACW figure for whom I will need to find a musket, a cake-decoration dove with a icing-pick that could kill a Russian revolutionary, and Hilco knight on the upper row, with a lead figure from one of the coronation coaches (Charbens? We looked at them here briefly) and a Kinder 'Frozen' figurine, to whom's set the transparent blue horse belongs - which we either saw the other day, or will see soon?

But next to the old lead guardsman, is a more generic fellow in white trousers (pass for a Dane or some South American mob?) who I suspect is a doll's house toy soldier, could be die-cast, but is probably pewter, I'm not going to find out by digging! Many thanks as always to Peter Evans, for this lot.

Ph is for Phidal's Phrozen Phellows

No, it was similar but I don't think is was exactly the same! Just a quickie, we've seen some if these as an incomplete lot in a charity-shop bag, but this is the whole set, there was another set with smaller figures (and the useful sleigh) which has also come-in as both  awhole set and some spares now.

And it's a while since we've had a Phidal post, but apart from one or two superhero sets still to find (the earlier ones) whole, and the Transformers one (which I've nearly bought several times, to actually picking it up - only to suck my teeth at the x6 micro-vehicle blobs and put back) along with various Disney/Mickey type which I'm not so worried about, I think we seen most of the better ones here now?

A mass of snow-babies and another useful deer, useful for 54mm rather than the 25/28mm of the one in the other set? The three figures are big, too big for much @approximately 80mm, but would fit-in with ELC-Papo-Schleich medievals, while the snow monster (Marshmallow?) could be thrown straight in a fantasy/D&D army/setting!

J is for Junior!

Running late today - just a quick box-ticker for a set I picked-up from a Charity shop back in August.

All the main board-games (Cludo and Monopoly particularly so) are getting the arse ripped out of them these days as popular culture 'goes critical' and starts eating itself in line with Mr Warhol's prediction, he probably didn't realise the media and Western politics society would do likewise!

Among all the country, city, sports team and movie character, TV-series or celebrity versions are the 'junior' versions, and while they tend to have larger figural pieces, they can be only card flats. We have looked at several Cludo sets in the last 12 month's; here's a Monopoly set ticking the Disney and Frozen boxes and the figures are polymer!

Photographed against different backgrounds as they are semi-transparent, and as such showed a willingness to look different against different backings! Figures (glitter-PVC type plastic, 50-54mm compatible) added to the collection, rule-book scanned onto the dongles and everything else off to recycling!

F is for Phour More Phidal Phat-Books with Phigures

Most of this has been sat in the queue since before the PW show, and is one of three related posts, as this stuff - a complete mystery to me until last autumn - is everywhere, once you know what you're looking for, which is; fat-spine books in the children's section, whether that be a book-shop, newsagent's, TKMaxx or a charity shop!

More Disney Princesses, we've looked at another set already and two of at least three Frozen sets, the beauty of this set being that they are approximately 54mm, and apart from the costumed Snow White, all can pass for regency ladies.

Comparing the contents (usually incomplete if found in charity shops) with the artwork above, there's a green fish/frog/gecko thing missing, a grey blob (donkey?) and two girls, the one in gold and one of the newer Disney Princesses with ethnicity (other than white) in a green dress.

One can't complain at the missing items, as these charity shop sets are usually 50 or 75p, if one does have a 12 count they tend to be a quid though!

This was a 50p one! Incomplete, but only missing the little cave boy, had I known they were cartoon caricatures; I probably would have left it, but there you go - another piece of the puzzle.

This was the full whack! All £5.99p of it from TKMaxx! I done did a video di'unt I!

Watch, enjoy, hear my evil laugh at my secured plunder! Yeah . . . I'm still learning the movie thing, each time I watch it I see another error, or niggle I'd change, but this is the third edit (I think) and each one takes a while to get right, and involves looking for folders that hide themselves in the system!

I like the Killer Croc character as it's a straight-lift from Marvel's Hulk, but with knobs-on! 

Here's our Graham, chooks - with a quick reminder! They are the smaller size at around 50mm (Batman), I don't know what Robin thinks he's wearing, but it was Pride the other day, maybe he is trying to tell us something we've already guessed!

Another day; another charity shop; another Phidal; another license! Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, with up to six enemies (which is unusual for TMNT toy lines!), the trope with this set is that the play-mat is also a board-game with simple mechanics. Other sets can be puzzles, magnetic flats (fridge magnets!) or sucker-flats.

Note also, that it points to another source of these sets (as yet unknown to me) selling at £4.71p (with VAT), that's more than a  quid less than TKMaxx and over half the price of WHSmiths, yet crooks on feebleBay are selling them BIN for 12.99-a-set (plus post!) with no book! It's criminal, but that's capitalism.

Given the locations of both me and the found object (Basingrad) it may be a Reading Warehouse (Tadley) thing, but it's been years since I was last there.

I can't work out if it's missing a green tentacle-armed humanoid, a larger black, white and yellow monster or a small turquoise rolling-die, but the eleven-count is wrong. A slightly older set (dated 2014), it seems the figures with bases are newer, while the older sets (I've found dates back as far as 2006/7 now, I think) tended to be baseless.

While I had them all out together (new container, for a growing sample pile) I did a quick scaler or two, although they are marked (by me) and measure up as 54mm, the princesses are a tad smaller than the Lone Star sailor, due in no small part to his chunky base and hat!

The thing with these Phidal's is; there's no rhyme or reason to size, I thought it might be due to cost, but with one set having twelve 60 or 65mm figures and another have 12 45mm figures (or their cartoon equivalent) it seems that the only 'rule' is that within sets figures should be in-scale, but even there; two DC sets, or two Marvel sets, two Frozen sets, two Disney Princess sets can be completely different scales from each other!

F is for Follow-up - Frozen

Just a quick one, found another set of the Frozen figures we looked at the otherday from Phidel, it was complete with the four missing figures and confirmation that there were/are two identical trees in the set - which is a bit of a swizz!

Two missing blokes; good guy on the left, bag guy pretending to be good on the right, along with the snowman and reindeer who had also slopped-off last time. I think one of them is called Olaf, but I couldn't tell you which one, well, I could; but it would require Googleing something I don't care about!

And I've now got a spare of the sleigh to play with - glue and paint-wise! 

Ph is for Yada yada yada . . .

Yep! Phidel again! Now I've got a system for finding them quickly they are turning-up everywhere, and when I say 'system', like some secret squirrel, it's quite simple, look for the logo!

The Phidel logo is a largish rainbow-coloured swirl of pastel P's, usually on a darker background than the above, which is easy to spot among all the tat in the kiddie's section of charity shops, whether among the board games, the books or the general toys.

With each charity shop or chain having a very different look or set-up, it's the easiest way to do it, just run your eyes over the shelves looking for the logo and if you spot it, check the spine text for My First... or My Busy if you also see ...Stick-on, ...Magnet or ...Puzzle you can ignore; the My Busy Books (with an 's') is where you'll find the pay-dirt!

A pound each, one was mint (Peanuts) the other a bit of a mess, but adding to the whole, the books gone to recycling before I'd got home, hence their being photographed on the verge . . . well otherwise it's like carrying half the Encyclopedia Britannica around for the rest of the afternoon!

One pocket got a mint set of Peanuts, nice, would never have bought them new, but now they ticked-off the lists, mental and real, and box-ticked here - favorites above, rest below.

They were a bit chewy for peanuts, but I got them all down! And I love how the kennel finally explains why Snoopy never got chronic back-pain; I always imagined he was balanced on the knife-edged ridge of a pitched roof!

The other pocket got what was covering for the frozen set, which was different from the previous one (also a part set - it's the male characters and the moose who keep going AWOL!), with smaller characters - I think I mentioned seeing it somewhere on-line the other day?

And I'm not sure if these are all from the set, nor if one of the trees might be from a second set? The girl with the purple cape won't stand-up and has to be propped so I suspect this is an older set, and things/designs have improved with better bases or chunkier, balanced figures?

This is actually quite useful, it would be OK for 28mm role play, or as a larger sled with a 2/3-man bench-seat (for towing by a light-tank or half-track) for WWII 'Ost Front' winter war games in 1:76th, put an AA-mount on the wind-cowl/arm-rest at the front, couple more guys on the back . . . bob's your uncle! It even has a ski-stick stowed down the side!

Picture 5

See 'Q is for Question Time' - published five minutes before this post (below) for what was picture five (it's now picture six but - hey-ho!) and its blurb.

Ph is for Phollow-up to Phidel's Phormer Phollow-up

So; clearly someone failed to follow my detailed directions to Bracknell and hot-footed it over to Basingrad, so the other superhero set had gone, but I grabbed this one as it had looked useful in the shots Brian sent us, and even more so in the hand or 'in persons'!

We've seen the box/book already, here it is again! With the various super hero figures and the Frozen stuff already 'in the bag', I can see myself getting most of these in the next year or two just to 'complete'!

Again; £5.99 in TXMaxx, £9.99 in WHSmith's! That's the same WHSmith who just posted a profit-warning because their Famous Five and Ladybird parodies didn't sell well enough over Christmas!

The more useful figures - I'm assuming (again? What am I like!) the middle girl is Belle (by a process of elimination), despite the figure not being illustrated (in the modelled outfit) anywhere in the book. My lack of firm knowledge in the matter being worn as a badge of pride; in going some way as to prove I've not actually seen any of these pastel-hued, mawkishly sentimental, saccharine productions!

Marida is 61mm in total, Cinderella 67, as they are [all] youngish women, this gives a scale-size requiring males of at least 70mm, but that's not such a problem with all the Bully-Heimo-Papo-Schleich et al and Early Learning/Wilco/Blue Box knock-off stuff out there?

Looking for more round the charity shops the other day I saw something else with the Marida character, she has other names in other language-markets (at least three), and two equally flame-haired daughters and would therefore seem to be a referential-nod to Boadicea / Boudicca. Somehow I can't see Disney having all-three publically raped by Roman soldiers, but - like I say - I haven't seen the movies!

The slightly less useful figures - however the mermaid will go quite well with various others including Soma's and the Archie McFee/Accoutrements hag. Likewise the Mulan character would enhance a Samurai setting and Jasmine can be used with Arabian types. Even Snow White would be useful with a paint-job, as a medieval or Renaissance 'wench'?

Assuming (from the brown hair) that the middle figure in the second-from-top shot is Belle, that leaves two other princesses illustrated in the accompanying book; Tiana and Pocahontas (both black haired) but not represented among the models, even though they could have been instead of the two horses, or one of the horses and the idiot fish!

Speaking of idiot fish, this is the idiot fish! He's very small. Along with two markedly  different horses, one (Snow White's) being quite a reasonable sculpt (stupid expression and piggy-eyes though), and a useful mount for a 54-60mm knight, the other heavier and more cartoon-like, although a bit of surgery on the 'Disney' muzzle would improve him, and make for a half-decent heavy-horse.

The idiot fish seems to be called Flounder, rather than being a flounder, but maybe he's Flounder the floundering flounder! If these three had been dropped, you could have had Belle in her illustrated costume and the two absent 'princesses'; Tiana and Pocahontas while still hanging-on to a twelve-count!

And I'm sure it's pure co-incidence that it's two of the four 'ethnics' that have been dropped!

Ph is for Phollow-up to Phidel

Eager to see what TJ had taken delivery of, the other side of the pond from TK, Brain B took himself-off to the local outlet, and was sadly disappointed - no Marvel, no DC! However, he took his usual plethora of shelfies and fired them off to Small Scale World Towers, and it is them we are going to meander through now.

The Disney Princess is a sort of collective sub-brand, bringing various otherwise unrelated young ladies together under one heading, and there's some useful items in this set. The Mermaid looks familiar, although I don't have one here, and I didn't think Phidel had been doing these for that long, but . . .

. . . since the TKMaxx purchase and subsequent Blog post the other day I have been seeing them everywhere, or when I say everywhere, there have been at least five in the various charity-shops in town in the last week or so.

Some of which have been these, semi-flats with suckers on, that can be attached to the glossy board pages, also while looking on feebleBay I think I've seen magnetic versions as well? There's also the added element of a board-game included.

New one on me, assuming from the Nicolodeon flash that it's a kid's TV thing; less of use by the looks of it, but when they come in - in mixed lots - at least you'll know where they came from!

Also missed this, but from the number of MLP things in shops at the moment I'm guessing there's been a recent movie!

Squeeky-voiced mouse and friends, take'em or leave'em they will enhance all those 1970/80's Heimo, Schleich, Comics Spain and latterly Applause, Bully & the French Poly-whatsit figures!

And! Because it contains both Pluto and Goofy, you can arrange your own anachronistic vignette on the bookshelf, of an anthropomorphic, talking-dog in human cloths, leading a dumb-idiot dog around on a lead!

I bought one of the sets I encountered this week, incomplete it looks like a shotgun-wedding photograph for a very strange coupling! "Well; OK, I'll marry you, but only if our kids can be page-snowmen!" They were only 50p! Box went in the recycling before it was photographed and there is a second, different Frozen set out there - That's 14 different snowmen!

I've also discovered WHSmith are carrying them - they had a really nice Spiderman set, but they want £9.99 ($12.50'ish?) for theirs against the £5.99 (8-odd dollars) of TKMaxx!

I don't know why anyone actually patronises WHS, they are pricier on everything than their rivals, here we have WHS and Ryman's next door to each other and you can compare in seconds; it's not that WHS are a bit more, they are 10, 25, 50% more - every time! From books to Biro's, calendars to Christmas-cards, Ryman's, Clintons, Partners - all cheaper . . . probably not Paperchase though!

The next five images are further-cropped close-ups of the 'goody' trays from Brain's above imagery.

The woman with a bow & arrow looks very useful for fantasy stuff, and as they all have flowing dresses they may all be useful for those Napoleonic ballroom scenes which used to be de rigueur in modelling mag's a couple of decades or so ago!

Flats - with suckers . . . sorry; 'suction-cups'!

Is the peacock a worthy addition to a poultry collection, or a daftly cartoonish sculpt? The others seem to be half-Aladdin, half Powerpuff Girls!

I think the foxy-gentleman is my favourite in this lot.

Chipmunks! Donald Duck! Some other stuff . . .

Cheers Brian! We're really getting the hang of these now and they're good value for money, there are about five Superhero-sets out there, hopefully we'll get them all on here in the near future?