"Boyfriends" Shirt Dress Upcycle from Baby Sized Shirt

Hi Doll Friends,

I've been on quite a roll lately with upcycling doll clothes!! My latest project? This little 'Boyfriend's Shirt" dress I upcycled from a baby sized dress shirt.

As you can see, it's 'dress' length and the sleeves are still a bit too long and so I rolled them up. I used to live in my boyfriend's shirts when I was in High School because I thought it was cool and so that was the inspiration for this project. 

As you can see, all I did was take the shirt in by a bit both on the body of the shirt and the sleeves. The size of the shirt is a 3month size. 

I think it came out pretty cute. Still not sure what I am going to do about the 'too long' sleeves but for now I think they look cute rolled up. When I dress a doll in this outfit, I will add a belt at the waist to make it a bit more stylish.

Upcycling doll clothes from baby clothes is so much fun and so simple!! I have been working on a Fashion Show of all the items I've been making lately... I am hoping to get that finished up by the weekend so stay tuned! 

Better run! 

XXOO
Heather

Upcycling Doll Clothes From Baby Onesies!!

Greetings and Salutations Doll Friends!

Recently, in one of my favorite doll groups on Facebook, a few people have been posting photos of their upcycled doll clothes projects... I'm not sure if you realize this if you have just recently started reading this blog, upcycling doll clothes was kind of the 'thing' that pulled me into writing this blog in the first place. Doll clothes can be incredibly expesive and I know when my daughter was into them, the idea of spending even $10 an outfit seemed impossible to me! So in my search of other options, I went to Pinterest and found an idea to make doll skirts out of the bottom of a pair of jeans (don't judge the horrible photos in the old blog post... You learn as you go, eh?) The rest, as they say, is history... 

One of the reasons I stopped sewing was, well, as you can see in this post about my Doll Room, you can see my doll closet is stuffed with clothes and that's with all my (I literally don't know how many) dolls all fully clothed. It's madness. A hazard, I suppose of writing a doll blog.... Do I have too many doll clothes? No. I need a bigger doll closet. Yes. That is the answer. *giggles*

So, inspired was I by the people posting thier creations on Facebook group, that I decided to dust off the sewing machine. Then to pull out my mammoth sized "bag-of-stuff-to-be-mad-over" that I've been collecting for, I dunno, over a year (or two?). I'd see something cute and think "that would be so cute as doll clothes!" and into the bag it would go. Let's just say the bag is chocka-block-full-up!! I knew eventually I'd sit down the machine again. My only trouble is that the place I have to sew is our dining room table and I end up making us eat elsewhere when I get on a sewing jag and that's no good either. I need to just set up a little corner of my basement and sew down there. I digress. This weekend, being a long one, I took over the dining room for the weekend and set to sewing! 

Here are a few of the baby onesies I made over into short dresses or shirts. They are all either premie sized or newborn sized. I find any larger and it doesn't really fit like I want in the shoulders and I am too lazy to alter them more than hemming the bottom. Luckily the newborn sized are pretty easy to find second hand. Premie sized? Not as easy and for a pretty one I'll even pay as much as a $1.00. Don't laugh, I basically won't even look unless price is that low... Twice this summer I found a 'stuff a bag for a $1.00 sales where I got like 15 onesies for a $1.00 so... Consider that when you laugh at a dollar being too much money. That's what's so great about making them over, they are easy to find and don't cost much... Also the newborn and premie sizes usually look pretty new because babies grow so quickly, don't they just? 

I love love love the little flowered one with the monkey on it. It was a premie item and I think it was brand new. Isn't it adorable?! The other two are cute too of course but the middle one is my favorite. 

I've gotten better at this making shirts with them than I used to be. I did have sucess when I had a few that were less stretchy knit when I made them into doll dresses.  I am almost too embarrased to post my older one but it'll help you gain courage about sewing too because you'll see it's all a learning process. Right?

All you do is turn the onesie inside out...

This one was a premie onesie.

I forgot to photo the next step, you just get a ruler and draw a line across the bottom so you'll cut strait. (trust me, draw the line! you think you can cut strait until you try it on cloth, I know... I've tried... A couple of times. Because I am stubborn. Haha)

Then iron your onesie. This doesn't sound important but it makes a huge difference. Then I take some seam binding (I like the lacey ones best) and, using binding as a guide, I pin up the shirt hem around it. If that makes sense. 

See how I am tucking the seam binding into the hem as I go? Why do I need the seam binding you ask? Because knits, in my opnion, are the dickens to sew on their own. The binding gives the knit more 'stablity' under the needle. It's still a bit tricky to sew but once you get the hang of it, it gets easier. 

See? Here I am about to meet the ends up in my pinning. Then iron the seam again. work in around the pins so as to not melt their little heads off. (I am not really sure if that would happen but just in case). It helps. Trust me. It's like it makes your fabric behave better if that makes sense. 

Then you sew carefully around, starting a middle of the back of the shirt or dress you're sewing. (I forgot to photo this step with the little monkey shirt) Why the back? Because that's where the seams meet and if you accidentally don't match them up perfecty, at least they are at the back. Make sense? 

Most people are making doll clothes for little girls and I've never heard one complain about wibbly stitching yet. They just love having variety in their dolly wardrobe... So... Imperfections are no big! 

Here is the finished product. I love it. So cute! 

Here is a ballet shirt. 

And compared to a pre-made shirt I took off one of the dolls I was using as a fit doll. The yellow shirt is one from Creatology. They tend to run on the very small size (the dolls are like 17inches even I think) and so you can see where the upcycled onesie shirt is pretty much spot on for size.

Someone in a doll group on Facebook was wondering what to do with the left over bit... So I thought about it all day yesterday and as I was looking at the leftover part of this brown one, all the sudden it hit me. It could be a kerchief for thier hair! Then the outfits would be more of an ensemble with a matching accessory! Not to mention it doesn't end up in landfill! I just trimmed the edges of the elastic 'leg bands' on one side to make the 'strings' and hemmed up the other side so it'd be more finished looking. I think you could leave the hemming off and just trim it too since knits generally don't fray much. I left the snaps on the bottom of the 'ties' because they add just enough length to the tie to make it easy to tie up underneath the doll hair. You can't see them anyyway and they make it easier to tie them, honestly. 

Here is the finishes "kerchief".

And Florence modeling one of the ensembles. This one is a little mini dress. 

Aren't they cute? If I do say so myself.... They are so easy to make though that it feels almost like cheating. 

So find yourself a baby onesie and make your doll a cute new ensemble! 

UPDATE September 30, 2017:

Please note, if you're making the onsies over in the way I described, by inserting seam binding in the hem of the shirt, it makes it really hard to put them on unless you put them on from the top down, not over the head. If that makes sense. The opening to the kneck is super stretchy and so putting them in feet first from the top of the shirt is easiest way to dress them in these tops or dresses. 

Better run!
Have a great day!
XXOO
Heather

Fancy Spring 18inch Doll Dress Upcycle Project!

Greetings Doll Friends!

Spring is almost here!! Time to pull out the pretty Easter dresses for the dolls! Oh, what's that you say? You don't have a pretty Easter dress for your doll? No problem! If you can get your hands on a newborn or 3month sized baby dress in a pretty spring floral print and, in a few short stitches, you'll have an dress for your doll just in time for Easter Sunday!

Here are the two I made! Both dresses only took about an hour to make, start to finish. Admittedly I have been sewing since I was knee high to a grasshopper and have honed my skills pretty well but honestly, if you can sew a strait seam, you're all set. 

Here is the first dress I used. I. Love. It! It's a Laura Ashley and I've adored her dresses since I was girl. Sure you can't imagine that, me, loving frilly Laura Ashley dresses? But yes, I love it! I knew going in it would be bit more work because it's too long to just use seam line as is on a doll... That smocking made it worth it though! So I plunked down my $1.49 at Goodwill, brought it home and set to work!

First I fit the dress on the doll, much like the procedure in other Upcycled doll dresses in the past. I am getting to where I am learning about how big the dolls are and can kind of eyeball the sizing but until you've made a few, you always want to fit onto doll.

Got to working too quickly on this one because I was excited about it being done and forgot to take as many photos as I should've As you can see in this photo, I figured out where I needed to make my seam (see under the arm hole of dress, there is a white seam? That is my sewing lines. I fitted it on doll, pinned it at the right place in the arm hole and then literally just took a ruler and made a line down to make my pin line. See the red line on the top, from under the arm hole? That's the line I made and I pinned and then sewed right along that same line. Then I measured again to determine how long it should be and hemmed it up. When hemming, one of the button holes ended up being covered with the hem, so I simply made a little hole in that spot to allow the button to come through, if that makes sense. 

Here is final dress. I didn't cut off the bottom to hem and might should have as it makes the skirt a bit poofy but my daughter said she liked the look and far be it from me to not pull stitches out when she is happy and I am happy enough, right? 

Here is dress on Saige. I always try to have an American Girl Doll model the dresses too because body types are a bit different and so many people ask "How does it fit on an AG?"

Here is dress number two! It's just perfect for Easter with it's bright colors! This one had several layers to it, it was lined... Which can seem kind of daunting but really isn't that big of deal as long as, when you pin it, you make sure all the layers are laying flat with one another! This way you won't end up with puckers in the cloth when you turn it right side out again!

So, as you can see, I followed same procedure as above, making a line down from arm hole and sewing down that line. Since this one was so many layers, zig-zag stiched it to make sure all layers stayed in place. Then I turned it inside out to make sure I liked how it looked (because if I needed to rip out stitches, I didn't want to have to rip out two layers!) and then turned back inside out and zig-zag stitched it again. As you may have surmised from other posts, I like my doll clothes be very durable in the hands of little girls so I finish off seams very particularly! It's not necessary though, so if you just wanna sew it once, it would be fine I am sure. 

So, now that I've made my seams, I turned it out and fit it on doll. The extra cloth makes it look a bit strange on the doll but it will give you one last chance to make sure it fits before you...

Hold your breath and cut off the extra fabric past the seam. Leave a generous seam allowance! Better safe than sorry I think. 

Here they are!! All ready for a Spring Party!! They've gotten all bathed and primped in our new Doll Bathroom! If you didn't see the post about that, you'll have to check it out!! Just click here: 

Doll Bathroom

So that is it for my latest doll clothes upcycle! To think it all started with one jeans leg skirt?! I was hooked! I made doll clothes with my Granny as a child and to get a dress it was seemingly hours of pinning patterns and pinning hems etc... So to have a dress nearly make it self, it's just too much fun! I digress but my whole objective to show you how totally do-able this is! You can do it! If you mess up a few second hand baby clothes in the meantime, it's a small price to pay for learning to make a snappy wardrobe for your dolly! Remind me to tell you of the gorgeous smocked dress I totally ruined myself not so long ago... I kept it, hoping to give it a re-think but I suspect it is toast. So, it happens.

I have to run because, alas, the real world never lets me stay long enough in the Doll House...
Thanks for stopping by!! See you next time!