I'm a Barbie Girl in a Barbie World

Well, it is time to reflect on my experience being a Barbie Girls girl and maintaining this blog. I was intrigued by the notion of participating in a virtual world, but the idea of creating a blog was a bit intimidating. It was easy to create an avatar and set up my Barbie Girls account. I was glad that we had laptop Tuesday. I had a few technical difficulties, but I got the hang of it. It took a long time to create the first couple posts because I could not get my pictures to look like I wanted. I have to give a shout out to Rebecca "Lemon Panda" Lehman for showing me that Blogspot works best on Internet Explorer. I know I have a clip art "problem." I frequently have to include a picture at the top of an agenda or document. I coveted the pictures on Krysten's blog and knew I had to include them in mine, too. I think the pictures help break up the text and encourage people to read.

Writing my posts was awesome. As I mentioned previously, I have a special fondness for Barbie culture and history even though I have mixed feelings about them. I'm also passionate about gender, race, class, socio-economic class and other social justice issues so I really enjoyed writing about them in the context of pop culture texts.

It was fun to talk about our experiences on Barbie Girls and the other virtual worlds in class. I found that it helped us relate to each other better because we had this common experience. We had some good laughs, too. There is some crazy stuff online and yes, I like exposing myself to it. I learned about some of the nuances of the different

types of virtual worlds. And once my curiosity was piqued, I wanted to continue exploring. I set up a Habbo account because I was fascinated. I went back a couple times to check out the different rooms in the hotel and got more comfortable approaching other characters. As for Barbie Girls, I was very tempted to try out a VIP membership and dive into its virual depths. I decided not to do it, but I still coveted some of the things I could not obtain. That green handbag was cool--I would have bought something like that in real life.

I spent the most time playing games on Barbie Girls. Jammin' Hamsters is very similar to Rocket Mania, my Popcap.com favorite. I liked designing fashions, too, although that game had nothing on the Fashion Plates I had when I was a kid.

Spending time on my blog helped boost my confidence. I have thought about setting up a blog for a long time and now I have the basic skills needed. Of course, reading Julie and Julia at the same time also gave me some ideas. Being enrolled in another class has been a helpful reminder that I love being a student and I might pursue further education. I will miss being a student.