Tag: Talker Outfits

Talking Kid Ensembles

You will find that these wonderfully chatty kids, with their beautiful dresses and demands for their cup, will easily talk their way into your heart.

Talking Cabbage Patch Kids were only produced by Coleco for approximately one year and started becoming available in September of 1987. (Ref#2, p. 86) They are quite large and came with fancy outfits, cornsilk hair, a Parent’s Guide, special birth certificates, and a ‘magic cup’.

They were a remarkable toy for their time and had many surprises in store for their new parents, including a mobile moving face, numerous hidden sensors, and the ability to respond to their new parent and other talking kids! Two or more together will often be heard singing in around. It’s amazing! (Video) There seem to be a variety of different ‘scripts’ that the kids use when speaking, but the dolls can learn new phrases and words from other talking kids they interact with. (Ref#4, Vol. 2, Iss. 5, p.3) The first 250 sold at their ‘opening event’ were signed by Xavier Roberts. (Ref#4, Vol 2, Iss. 3, p.4)

The dolls came in only two head moulds, T-8 (one dimple) and T-9 (big grin, no dimple). Coleco produced AA talking kids but no boys.

Head Mould T-8
Head Mould T-9

These dolls were pretty fancy, and unfortunately, may have been ahead of their time. Many considered them creepy. It got worse when the first of the Chucky movies was released in November of 1988. These kids were also plagued with poblems, such as:

  • A high purchase price.
  • They used a lot of batteries, four AA and one 9V, and went through them like candy!
  • Many didn’t work when they were purchased or stopped working soon after purchase.
  • They weren’t ‘cuddly’ like regular Cabbage Patch Kids.

Clothing Information

There are eight different talking kid outfits made by the OK factory, numbers #695 – 702. I believe there are six versions of each outfit, letters A – F; however, they used eight different colours of velveteen fabric overall. (Aqua, Burgundy, Grey, Medium Blue, Navy Blue, Pink, Purple, Red)

Four of the outfits consist of white cotton dresses with a velveteen pinafore and matching cotton bloomers.

#695
#699, Picture courtesy of Kristi Prietos Sams
#702
#697, Picture courtesy of Denise Maggio

The other four have a velveteen dress and a cotton or taffeta pinafore. The outfits with cotton pinafores come with plain white bloomers, and the outfits with a taffeta pinafore come with taffeta bloomers.

#696, Picture courtesy of Eve Phillips
#700, Picture courtesy of Eve Pillips
#698
#701
Spreadsheet graphic that lays out which part of each outfit is velveteen, what the cotton dresses look like, and a description for each of the outfits.

The lace used on the bloomers, dress, and pinafore always match. All of them come with solid white tights and odd white or black faux leather shoes. The black shoes seem to come most frequently with the navy blue, burgundy, and red outfits.

There are hints that some talkers may have come with regular lace-up shoes instead of the ‘talker shoes’. I have no proof at this point.

Although these outfits originally came only on Talking Kids, a few can be found on ‘regular’ kids from 1988 and 1989. They likely did this to clear out leftover outfits. However, it is not something you’ll see often.

Picture of a transitional lemon blonde popcorn cabbage patch kid doll with brown eyes who is sitting in her box liner. She is wearing a pink talker outfit with pink under dress (#699) and regular white CPK shoes.

Recorded Information

I have the following outfits recorded. If you have one of the outfits that I am missing, I would greatly appreciate pictures of the clothing tag and the outfit. For details on taking pictures jump here.

A Match Made in . . . the Factory (Matching Pt. 1)

How do you know if an outfit originally came with the doll? Here’s the first step to finding out!

There is no way to know what outfit originally came on a doll. The choices were made randomly. However, you can match the production year of the doll to the production year of the outfits, and in some cases, the factory information.

1983 – 1985ish: A Match!

Coleco dolls produced from 1983 to 1984 (and some stuff in 1985) generally came with clothing made at the same factory. So, if the doll was OK factory, the outfit and shoes were also OK factory.


            KT Boy                      OK Girl

Dolls wearing 500s outfits which came out in 1985 also matched factories.

The 500 series outfits on dolls, sitting on stairs, to display the outfits.

However, I know of at least one collector who admits to taking kids out and switching clothes AT THE STORE, so even if you bought a kid from the store and it didn’t match, that doesn’t mean it didn’t originally come with the correct outfit!

Series Specific Pairs . . .

Some lines of kids had specific clothing created just for them. In many of these cases, the dolls and the outfits always match. There may be two factories producing them, but there is always a match.

Talking KidsOK 
Circus KidsP, KT 
World Travelers
WT White shirts		OK, PMI
CC, SS
Designer LineP 
1st Cornsilk Series (160s)OK, KT 
300s Cornsilk SeriesOK, KT, P
Baby outfits (BBB)SS, WS Exceptions: #1, #2
PJ Series (689-694)KT 
720s series Cornsilk and
regular kid outfits		KT
760s Cornsilk seriesP
Growing Hair KidsP, KT 
ToddlersOK 
KoosasOK, KT 
P Designer Line
SS BBB
KT Koosa

Continued in: Part 2: A Perfect Mismatch!

What’s With the Numbers?

Why 15? Why 125? Why not 485? Who knows, but here’s some thoughts.

# 1 – 20 (1983 Series)

The first outfit numbers in 1983 started at 1, which makes sense.

The first twenty outfits, created for the regular-sized kids, came out in 1983, and some stayed in production for many years. Many of the foreign outfits are based on the outfits in this series. (Visit: Jesmar Clothing)

1983 Regular kids outfits. The original 20. The dolls are wearing the outfits and sitting on stairs. The outfits are numbered.


When they created the first line of preemie outfits in 1984, they used the same numbering convention. Unfortunately, that means that if you don’t know whether an outfit is a preemie outfit or a regular kid outfit, they can be easily confused. You have to know by looking at it. (Jump to: Preemie Clothing Summery and 1984 Series)

1985 Preemie series outfits. Dolls wearing the outfits are sitting on stairs and the outfits are numbered.

Year by Number

It was eventually pointed out to me (Ref #4, Vol. 3 Issue 9/10/11, p. 6) that the code numbers used seemed to match the year they were produced.

  • 500s in 1985
  • 600s in 1986
  • 700s in 1987
  • 800s in 1988

This makes sense! For some specific lines of kids like the Toddlers, Growing Hair kids, Splashing Kids, Talkers, and a few others, this theory works.

Talking Kid
Toddler
Splashing Kid

The second preemie series (BSeries), which came out in 1985, also uses the same year-based numbering convention. They are numbered as a 500s series, but most are numbered B5__. Consequently, they are easier to distinguish from the regular kid 500s outfits. I wonder, did they consider the regular-sized kids outfits the A series?

For information on regular preemie outfits with a B in the code jump here: Preemie Clothing Summary and 1984 Series.

Year by Code Addition

The first theory about the code number being the year it came out works for many outfits, but not for all of them. Starting in 1986, some outfits no longer fit the pattern. A small addition shows up in the code to assist. To learn more jump to: Tag Codes Continued: A 2nd Theory

Series by Hundreds

Which series can be found in which hundred. To see examples of outfits in each series jump to: Series Information in Pics

The 100s

The 100s include many series.

The 200s

There’s only a handful of 200s and they are knit BBB outfits. It’s like they didn’t realize how many numbers they’d need when they started making the series, and just continued into the 200s. That’s it.

200
201
202
203
Pictures 2 & 3 courtesy of Jodi’s Punki Patch. Picture 4 courtesy of Sarah Ransom.

The 300s

The 300s contain only the second series of Cornsilk outfits that came out in later 1986. I call these the Wacky and Layered Cornsilk Series 2. That’s it.

Picture 3 courtesy of Carey Reiss Jarchow.

The 400s

There are two different 400s series.

Series 1 – Sold in 1988, they have the 8- in their codes. They are all packaged regular-sized dresses produced by Coleco. So far only 4 are recorded.

Series 2 – Sold in 1990 (Transitional Period), they have the 0- in their codes and often have Hasbro tags. I have 4 outfits recorded and they are all BBB outfits.

Oddly enough, the 14″ Furskin outfits produced in 1986 are also recorded in the 430s.

The 500s

Only one series of regular outfits came out in 1985. For more information visit The 500s Series.

The 600s

The 700s

The 800s

To see examples of outfits from each ‘series’, jump to: Series Information in Pics

For more information on clothing tag codes, jump to: What are Clothing Tag Codes

For information on how to locate clothing tags, jump to: Where are clothing tags located?

For more information on matching clothing to kids, jump to: A match made in . . . . the factory

Where are tags in clothing located?

Oh where, oh where does the clothing tag hide . . . . oh where, oh where can it be?

Oh where, oh where, can it be?

By clothing tag, I am referring to the information tag found inside the outfit, not the silk flash with Cabbage Patch Kids that is often found on the shoulder of shirts and dresses or pant legs.

Coleco only tagged one piece of each outfit, often leaving the other pieces unmarked in any fashion. This means that that the unmarked pieces can be easily lost and often go unrecognized as Cabbage Patch. This makes it difficult to put an outfit back together. How do you know which pieces belong in an outfit? Well, that’s a question for another post (or a bunch of posts).

In this post, I’m just going to tell you where to look for the informative little things. There are three options when it comes to tag situations.

1. My outfit has no tags

If the outfit has no tag there are four possible explanations:

  1. It’s a foreign CPK outfit.
  2. It’s a fake/aftermarket/handmade outfit.
  3. They’re all pieces of Coleco CPK clothing but didn’t all come together. OR They all came together, but at least one piece is missing.
  4. It is a CPK piece of clothing produced by a later company. eg. Play Along, Wicked Cool Toys

At least one piece in each Coleco outfit MUST have a tag.

2. My outfit has A tag

Regular Tag Locations

  1. Inside the shirt or dress piece of the outfit. If there is more than one top in the outfit, it is generally located on the piece worn closest to the doll’s body.

2. Along the side or back seam of the romper, sleeper, onsie, etc.

NOTE: There are a few outfits that can have them in either location. For example, the ruffled overalls may have the tag in the shirt OR the overalls, but not both, and not neither!

Unusual Tag Locations

There are some exceptions to these rules (of course), most of which involve later outfits (Post 1986) or jackets.

1. The Designer Line outfits that have jackets have the tag inside the jacket, not the shirt, as does the 500s series windbreakers and outfit #100.

DL Outfit
500s Outfit
500s Outfit
Outfit #100
Photo 1 courtesy of Vanessa Brisson. Photo 3 courtesy of Jodi (Punki Patch).

2. ‘Made in USA’ outfits tend to have the tag in the pants, if the outfit has pants.

3. Splashing Fun Kids clothing have the tag on the most substantial piece of the outfit, generally the robe, the jacket, or the wrap.

4. Talker dresses have the tag on either the underdress or the pinafore. I see no pattern as to which was chosen.

5. A small number of later outfits (1989 and later) have the tags in an odd location. So look carefully.

Tag in the romper (Jodi Punki Patch)
Tag in the romper, not the shirt.

3. My outfit has TWO (or more) tags

If your outfit has two or more tags, here are possible scenarios:

  1. It’s a Jesmar outfit. Jump to: Jesmar Clothing Tags
  2. You have two pieces of Coleco clothing that did not originally come together. For example, if your elephant romper has a tag, and the white shirt has a tag, they didn’t originally come together.

For more information on tags (if you haven’t already seen them), jump to:

What are Clothing Tag Codes: An explanation of the codes on Cabbage Patch clothing tags. Learn about the letters and numbers that started it all!
Oddball Tags: Not all clothing tags were made equal. Some have codes, some don’t. Which do? Which don’t?
What’s With the Numbers?: Why 15? Why 125? Why not 485? Who knows, but here are some thoughts.