Yesterday, Zoë unearthed a Disney Princesses Sparkle Ariel doll that Paula had bought for her 4th birthday (just a few weeks away). Paula tried to recover, saying, “Oh, I bought that for the little girl of one of my friends.” But Zoë went off into a corner with the box to sulk.

So, naturally, we had to surrender it to her

Having unboxed all of Zoë’s burgeoning Barbie collection (the Ariel, while from Mattel, is not technically a Barbie, though it can wear Barbie’s clothes), I found that the packaging for Ariel was a little less like some whacked bondage fantasy than how Mattel usually packages Barbie: hair sewn to the back of the box; tape, plastic tab ties, and a half-dozen wire ties holding limbs in that perfect store-shelf pose; a variety of clear elastic bands holding jewlry and accessories just so to the doll’s body. Unboxing a Barbie is usually at least a fifteen-minute project.

Ariel had just one wire tie and a clear plastic “belt” holding her body in place, and a pair of plastic tab implants (which needed to be yanked out of her scalp) holding her head to the back of the box. Unbox time: 3 minutes.