Precious Places Most Wanted List

Here is my top 5 list of Precious Places sets I still need for my collection:

5) The Pretty Penny Wishing Well - Aqua Well with Pink Roof

Okay, so I know it's rather greedy of me, but even though I have a complete Wishing Well set (pink wishing well with aqua roof), I still want the variation with the aqua well and pink roof.  I haven't seen it on eBay recently, but I think I saw it once a long time ago, maybe...  Hopefully it will come up again soon so I can be sure it does truly exist.

4) Wendy and Her Ice Cream Cart with Aqua Wheels

In my attempt to get every Precious Places piece in every color, one particular figure has been the most difficult to find, and that is Wendy and her Ice Cream Cart with aqua wheels.  The particular cart I'm looking for is featured prominently on Wendy's personality card, but does it ever appear on eBay?  No, it does not.  Why not?  This may be one of the great mysteries of the universe.  Hmmmm...

3) The Mother and Baby Pony in Pink 

I've got a complete Mother and Baby Pony set with a white baby pony, but I cannot for the life of me seem to locate the pink baby pony.  She's on the front of the Mother and Baby Pony box and ThisOldToy lists her as a variation, but I haven't seen her.  Have you?

2) The Dining Room 

I agree with ThisOldToy where they say this set is so rare that they've never seen any of the parts to the set.  Where oh where art thou, my elusive Dining Room furniture set?

1) All the County Fair Sets

Now I know these were never put into mass production, but there must have been at least one prototype made of each set since they took pictures of them.  What research I've done indicates that there were probably several prototypes at some point.  Where are the prototypes now and how can I get one?  I haven't been able to make much progress in getting answers to those questions.

If you have any of these sets, please contact me.  I would be more than happy to buy them from you.  And even if you don't want to sell them, please still contact me so that I at least know they exist!!!

The Wishing Well Watering Can

Continuing my series on the Pretty Penny Wishing Well, I wanted to highlight one particular hard-to-find piece: the watering can

In particular I wanted to address the listing on ThisOldToy.com (TOT) where it states that the watering can is a "purple garden watering [pitcher] with a handle and a round white pour spout". As you can see in the above picture, it is indeed a purple watering pitcher with a handle and a round pour spout, but the spout isn't white.

I think the misunderstanding comes from the pictures on the Wishing Well box. In the picture on the box front, it does appear at first glance that the watering can has a white spout:


However, if you look closely, you realize that the white color is merely a result of the light coming from the left of the picture which then reflects off of the flat spout.

In case you still are unconvinced, check out the picture on the back of the box:


Here you can see that the watering can does indeed have a purple spout.

Well, that's all for now, but stay tuned, because I have a few other Wishing Well posts yet to write, plus lots more on other Precious Places sets!

The Magic Key Mansion and the Mysterious Hanging Basket Part 2

In my previous post The Magic Key Mansion and the Mysterious Hanging Basket I wrote about this flower basket from the Bedroom furniture set:

The basket had always confused me because I couldn't find any place to attach it to the Magic Key Mansion bedroom ceiling. However, in the comments section my post, I had two readers who offered their suggestions as to where the basket might go, and I wanted to share those suggestions with you.

My first anonymous reader said this:

I have the Baby Cottage Nursery (it's a 2 story house with little side yard attachments) and there is a hole in the ceiling of the little victorian outcropping upstairs and I'm confident the flower basket was intended for this space, not the Mansion. :)

When I read this, I had to laugh. Of course there is a hole in the ceiling of the Baby's Nursery Cottage, it's where the little mobile goes, but why couldn't you switch it out for something else? I can't believe I never thought of that! And even if you don't want to remove your mobile, you could hang the basket in the turret of the Country Kitchen Cottage. They used the same molds for both townhouses, so there is a hole in the ceiling of that set as well.

Naturally, I had to try it out, and what do you know, the basket fits nicely in the hole and it looks really cute too!

My second anonymous reader had this to say:

I know the hanging basket goes with the Mansion because when I was little I owned the mansion and the hanging basket came with it. I think the basket went on the outside of the house under the roof on the porch. If you look under them there are little spaces to wedge the basket into.

When I read this suggestion, I was very excited. How adorable would the front porch of the mansion look with a basket of flowers hanging from the ceiling? I think we could all agree that the answer is super adorable!

However, after examining both of my Mansions, I was unable to find the little spaces to which the commenter referred. The only slots I could find underneath the porch roof are the slots for attaching the gingerbread trim. Of course, the commenter may have a slightly different Mansion than either of mine. I have noted in several posts that various small things seem to have changed over the brief Precious Places production period, and it certainly is possible that we have just discovered another one.

Also, I wanted to clarify that, according to all of my research, the only furniture the mansion originally came with was the grandfather clock and the piano that is attached to the living room wall. In fact, I have the box for the Magic Key Mansion and it says right on the front "Furniture Sets Sold Separately".


While most people probably did buy the furniture sets to furnish the Mansion rather than the Cottages, it is interesting to note that they were marketed as being for all the PP buildings. To illustrate, here is a picture of the back of the Living Room furniture box:


While I still wish there were a spot to hang the basket in the Mansion bedroom, it is nice to know that there is at least one spot where the basket can easily be hung and look great! And thank you to both of my anonymous commenters for your suggestions!

The Pretty Penny Wishing Well Box

Hello everyone, I'm baaaaaaack! I'm sure anyone who ever checks this blog thinks I forgot about it a long time ago, but that is not the case. I have a whole bunch of things that I've been meaning to write about, but first I had to take pictures of some of my PP sets and that's what the hold up was. But now I've taken the pictures and we're ready to go.

On to my post for the day...

Back before the new year began (yes, that was a while ago) I was fortunate enough to acquire a new in the box Pretty Penny Wishing Well. I was particularly anxious to get this set since it is one of the most rare PP sets, so rare in fact that the listing for it on the very thorough website ThisOldToy.com is labeled as "Missing Information or Given Details Have Not Been Confirmed". Well, folks, I'm here to fill in the information and confirm all the details.

In this first post, I'll just be covering information on the box. Here is a pic of the box front:



The front of the box says "Fisher-Price", "Pretty Penny Wishing Well", "Ages 5 and up" and "This package contains small parts which are not intended for children under 3 years."

Here is the top flap of the box:



It says "Precious Places Pretty Penny Wishing Well", "Bring Michelle and the Wishing Well to life with your Precious Key." Notice also that it is labeled as 5186 (its set number) as well as 5185 ASST. which means it was part of the Outdoor Scene Assortment. The price tag on my box indicates that it was originally priced at $6.99, although I suppose the price may have varied some between stores/regions of the country. You can't tell this from the picture, but on the top of the box it says "Welcome to Precious Places, a special collectible village where you control the fun with your own Precious Key."

Here is the bottom of the box:



It says "Proof of Purchase 5186 Pretty Penny Wishing Well", "1988 Fisher-Price, Division of The Quaker Oats Company, East Aurora, NY 14052. Figure made in China. All other components made in Macao. Product specifications subject to change without notice. Package printed in Hong Kong." and finally "Fisher-Price products are made to the company's traditionally high standards of quality, comply to all applicable government safety regulations and conform to the Safety Requirements of ASTM F963."

Sorry, I know that wasn't very interesting. The back of the box is a tad more exciting:



It says "Fisher Price 5186 5185 ASST.", "Precious Places" and then "Welcome to Precious Places, a special collectible village where you control the fun with your own Precious Key. Use your Precious Key to walk Michelle to the Pretty Penny Wishing Well. Can you help her make a wish? Includes Precious Key, Michelle, wishing well scene, arbor, watering can, bucket and ladle."

The labels on the photos say (from top to bottom): "Precious Key moves Michelle around the wishing well." "Includes watering can, bucket and ladle." and "Precious Places Village - Collect all the Precious Places and create your own special village."

The sides of the box don't have any text or photos on them.

Okay, so I know this isn't the most thrilling post of all time, but since the Pretty Penny Wishing Well is such a rare set, I wanted to give all of you collectors out there very complete information. In the next few weeks I'll be writing several Pretty Penny Wishing Well posts in which I will cover what was inside the box (including a little surprise I found) as well as the mistake in the ThisOldToy.com parts list for the set (yes, there is one). Stay tuned for more!

New in the Box Magic Key Mansion

So was anyone else watching the new in the box Magic Key Mansion that was for sale on eBay this weekend? Final sale price: $250.99! Wow! I knew it would go for quite a bit since I've never actually seen a new in the box Mansion up for auction, but that was even more than I expected. If the winning bidder is out there reading this, I would love to hear from you. Did you find any surprises? Anything the Precious Places collecting community needs to know about? Let me know!

The Magic Key Mansion and the Mysterious Hanging Basket

As most of you probably know, this is the flower basket from the Precious Places Bedroom furniture set:



The top of the basket has a sort of two pronged plug that looks like it is intended to attach to something. Question is: what is it supposed to hang from?

If you look inside the bedroom of the Magic Key Mansion, there is no obvious place to attach anything to the ceiling. There is the ceiling fan of course, and I tried to see if you can unscrew the fan and put the basket in its place, but the fan didn't come off easily and I didn't want to force it.

My best guess about this (and it is only a guess) is that the basket was intended to attach somewhere in the Mansion's original design, but before the Mansion actually went into production, that attachment point was removed.

It's pretty clear that the Mansion underwent some changes between the prototype and the actual set that was sold to the public. To illustrate, here is the picture of the Mansion off the back of the Living Room furniture set box:



As you can see from the photo, this mansion has several differences from the Magic Key Mansion that was sold in stores, most notably, the covers for the attic rooms and the center support on the base. If those large things were changed, it is possible that something small, like a place to attach a hanging basket, was also removed.

The other thing to consider in this case is that the Bedroom set was only in production for one year, after which time the Canopy Bedroom replaced it. The Canopy Bedroom has no pieces that look as though they ought to hang from the ceiling, and perhaps part of the reason the Bedroom set was replaced by the Canopy Bedroom was because of the hanging basket that doesn't hang from anything.

Just some guesses and speculation on my part. What do you think? Have you ever figured out what to hang the Bedroom flower basket from? Please leave your ideas in the comments section of this post. Thanks!

The Tip Toe Gymnastic Show Parts List

If you haven't looked at it yet, you should check out thisoldtoy.com. They have all of the Precious Places sets listed by set and by individual parts. The site should be a huge help to any Precious Places collector.

However, I have found what appear to be a few minor errors. In this post I will address two such mistakes. These particular mistakes are in the "Twirling Toes Gymnastics Show" listing on the This Old Toy (TOT) website. I was fortunate enough to acquire a new in the box, never been played with Tip Toe Gymnastic Show on ebay a while ago and when I opened it, I noticed that the set included the three small white trophy cups pictured below.


The TOT website does not have these trophy cups listed on their parts list for the Tip Toe Gymnastic Show, so I thought that as a collector, you might be interested to know what set the cups belong to if you've ever run across them in your collecting.

The other mistake in the listing is the name itself. The TOT website has the set listed as the "Twirling Toes Gymnastics Show" and it states that the sign that comes with the set has a litho that says, "Twirling Toes Gymnastics Show". However, both the original box and the sign that comes with the set actually say "Tip Toe Gymnastic Show".

In future posts, I will be discussing the other possible errors I have found on the TOT PP listings. In the mean time, let me know if you have any questions about the TOT lists. I'd love to know if I've missed any pieces that I should have in my collection.