I bought five year old Hollie a spur of the moment pressie the other day; she'd had a fabulous school report and I was bursting with pride, so I treated her to a couple of Disney Princess dolls from a range I hadn't seen before. The 'Sparkling Princess' range has all your favourite Disney Princesses with a twist - they've all been contestants on Pimp my Dress and their frocks have added bling in the form of glitter and tiny jewels attached to the fabric. I bought Hollie Belle from Beauty and the Beast (her ultimate favourite Princess) and Cinderella - surprisingly Cinderella has been her favourite of the two dolls, for a very good reason which will become apparent as you read on.

Belle is a dark haired doll, slightly smaller than Barbie but not to the point where you'd notice unless you had the two dolls standing side by side. She has much the same proportions with never-ending legs, long slim arms and tiny waspish waist but doesn't appear as sexually charged as your average Barbie or Bratz doll. She has a beautiful face; very sweet looking with the modest and almost shy look that Belle displays in Beauty and the Beast, her long dark hair is incredibly shiny and beautifully swept back off her face to in a neat and tidy fashion - it has been styled to create a natural indent so that her tiara can clasp the sides of her head and sit straight without wobbling or falling off.

Belle's dress is absolutely beautiful; it's slightly different to the one you can see above with the top layered section of skirt being a pink mesh, and the shoulders having the same mesh finish rather than the more recognisable yellow puffiness with rose embellishment at the breast. The skirt and bodice of the dress are much more slinky than I'd usually expect to see Belle wearing, it's decorated with a thick spiral of glitter which winds around the dress from the hem to the neckline. It's absolutely stunningly done, the glitter is sparkly enough to gleam and shimmer when it catches the light - the name Sparkling Princesses is certainly true in this case as every time Hollie moves the doll you can catch a glint of sparkle.

But we have an issue. It was Hollie herself who noticed it, which to me just shows how small kiddies spot things that maybe we adults miss. The problem being that without her trademark ruffled yellow dress this could be ANY Barbie-type doll, this Princess is easily recognisable when wearing her usual dress but without it she just doesn't look particularly like Belle. Her heeled glittery red shoes are also confusing for little Belle lovers as Belle is usually found in flat Ballerina style shoes, again this is something Hollie noticed but after comparing this doll to other Belles in her collection I can see she's spot on once again! Anyway, the shoes are surprisingly ill fitting so are rarely used anyway as I'm worried about little David putting them in his mouth - Belle is now rocking the sparkly dress with wellies look.

Aside from the recognition issue, I'm happy with my purchase of this Sparkling Princess Belle. She's superb quality and oh-so pretty, her arms and legs move to a degree and while they don't bend at the joints you can spin her limbs around to coax her into splay-legged sitting position and arrange her nicely to play with the other dolls Hollie has of this type. Belle's head will also move from side to side, although I find her neck joint very stiff in comparison to Hollie's other dolls so she tends to be looking forward at all times during play. Her hair is easy to keep tidy and despite lots of brushing and 'styling' by Hollie it hasn't become ratty or messed up, whenever it gets knotted I just dab a little conditioner onto the problem area and brush it out again - this keeps her hair sleek and smooth with no irritating lumps or bumps to spoil the pristine look of the doll.

I paid £12 for this Sparkling Princesses doll, which I think is excellent value considering the quality and unique design - admittedly it would be better again if they had embellished Belle's official dress (the one we all know and love) rather than giving her a completely new one but they must have done this for a reason, although I can't imagine what this reason could have been unless they happened to find thousands of tiny yellow dresses that needed using up at the back of a Disney warehouse somewhere!