Sewing For My Dolls... Making Simple Basics!

Doll Friends,

As I have been mentioning recently, I have been bitten by the 'sewing bug' for sewing doll clothes for my lovely dolls. I am a bit of a doll clothes addict and recently have just begun to crave doll clothes that literally don't exist anywhere but my own imagination... However, I dreaded 'pattern sewing' because I know how tedious and time consuming it can be to make just one outfit. So... I started studying the Tubes-O-You for sewing tutorials. If you're curious the ones I have been watching, I've been saving them to a playlist I created so I can find them more easily myself. 

One of my favorite YouTube sewing teachers has become Diane Morello. She's got such a sweet soothing voice, much like a female sewing version of Bob Ross really. She's also a very good teacher and has so many videos she could be your sole teacher and you'd likely learn all you need to know about sewing doll clothes. Reecently, I've been using her basic bodice tutorial to make some of my own and it's been a lot of fun...

Here is my very first prototype. Don't mind poor Carissa's bad fasion choice here, I made her do it. LOL I wanted to show you the top though. I decided it went a little too deep into her arm pits though and so I modified the pattern....

My idea was/is that I would make them all reversable so there would be double the play value in each top. 

Here is my stack of cut out tops. 

Ready to pin!

As you can see, I've been using fabrics from actual clothes, in this case a mens shirt, for fabrics. Fabric is really expensive, I've found (at least to me who is cheap!) and I am finding I really like making doll clothes with these fabrics you literally can't buy in the stores. It's high quality fabric too, from makers like Polo Ralph Lauren. Anyway, I digress. But when you can get an entire shopping basket of clothes for a few bucks (my thrift stores do that once every few months... I love it!) you literally cannot go wrong!

Here is that first top... All I had to do to modify it down was to sew a second seam under that first one... See?

Here is my original 'pattern' and you can see the pencil marks where I modified it. I am sticking with strait lines because I want to share these patterns/techniques with you and so easy even a beginner could do them. If you can make a pillow (one of easiest sewing items to make really, four seams!) you can make this top. 

Here is a finished top with the pattern... Just to remind you not to forget seam allowances!

I got a bit braver after my first ten or so tops and decided to try and make some with straps... I am loving how they are coming out... Here is Juliet-Olivia modeling one of them. (The skirt is an OG skirt, I didn't make that...) Someday!

Here is my messy but happy sewing space. You saw this photo in my little post about my absence but I figured I'd show it to you in context. 

As you can see.... I recently decided to try more traditional bodices... After figuring out the basic procedure from this amazing video from Happy Bankky Crafty Mommy She also gives away her patterns and has written tutorials for this and the other patterns she gives away so she's fabulous! Anyway, I think making traditional bodices is going be something I can get faster and faster at. As you may notice I am all about everything being lined. Two reasons, one, I think it looks nicer and two, I think it's easier, honestly. I hate hate hate having to 'hem' the little area around the kneck on unlined items and I don't think it's very easy to make them look 'finished'. So... Line everything and you don't have that problem. Plus doll clothes need to be very sturdy if they are going to be used by acutal children and I think lined items just hold up better. 

So... I'll keep you posted. I am having a lot of fun sewing actually... Surprising even myself. But being able to make something with fabrics I choose in styles I decide/design? That my prove to be just a little more temptation than I can withstand. Hahaha. As a girl I actually always dreamed of growing up and designing clothes... Until someone told me there was loads of math involved and I ran for the hills! So... A lifelong dream, fullfilled, in doll size. Whodathunk?

Better run!
XXOO
Heather

Upcycling Doll Clothes From Girl Dresses!

                                                                           Doll Friends,

 I am so behind on everything in my life... I feel like this winter has sucked the life out of me and I can't seem to dot all the i's and cross all the t's. Again, let me apologize for being behind on answering comments! I've gotten so many sweet one's recently but as you can see, I am barely getting here to make actual posts... So I am hopeful that I will dig my way out of being behind on all things the same way I've been digging myself out of snow for weeks months years decades? now.

As I said recently and in my last post, I've been doing a bit of sewing in order to try and stay sane. It's worked, somewhat. LOL As I mentioned in that post, I have decided to take on pattern sewing for my dolls. As a girl, I sewed with my Granny every summer and she taught me very well exactly how to sew from patterns. So I knew well in advance how much more work it was than upcycling baby clothes into doll clothes as I've done so often in the past.

In my large bag of items I've purchased solely with upcycling doll clothes in mind were these two beautiful girls dresses. I don't know what compelled me to purchase them because upcycling them the way I've done smaller dresses is impossible. But I never could get rid of them... I guess I thought perhaps I'd make a simple skirt with them or something? In any case, I am so glad I held on to them because I had them to take apart and use the fabric and trims to make doll outfits with.

And here is Dallas modeling the outfit/dress I made over from one of them. I say 'outfit/dress' because I made them as 'separates' in the bodice isn't attached to the skirt. I have always loved 'separates' in fashion because you can change the look so much more easily. Having them be two items means I can put the skirt with other tops and the bodice with other skirts or pants. As a girl who loved dolls, my main 'want' was fashions I could mix and match so I'd have more outfit alternatives. I guess as a woman collector, I feel the same. Hahaha.

Mind you, these are far from perfect... I am kind of in the prototype making stage of teaching myself to sew again. I want to come up with some really easy methods for you, dear reader, to make some fashions for your own dollies. I'll post more about that when I have more to tell but suffice to say if/when I get some simple patterns and/or ideas put together I will certainly come and share them with you. 

Here we have Alyssa modeling the second outfit/dress. I love love love the fabric and colors of this one. It was actually a dress some seamstress had made for a little girl and so it's wholly original and I kind of liked the thought of remaking some other persons dress instead of it ending up in a rag bag somewhere. 

I closed them with snaps but I am beginning to lean towards using velcro on things. Snaps are so much more work because you have to sew them on by hand. They are more expensive too, now that I've looked into 'new' ones. I was using snaps I'd picked up at thrift stores over the years for next to nothing so when I saw what 'new' snaps cost I almost fell over. I tell you, when you live life as a thrifter who really doesn't buy anything new and/or full price unless I have no other options, sometimes the cost of things shock me. 

This one wasn't totally finished when I added these photos to drafts. I couldn't decide if I wanted it to tie in the back or if I wanted to try and make the straps attached...? As I sit here typing this I am thinking to myself "Which did I end up doing?" Hahaha. I am going to have to go look. I am telling you, the snow has addled my brains!!

Don't mind the silly white thread that I used to make the casing for the elastic. I didn't have any navy thread and I guess I could've used black... But sometimes I just go with that I have and roll with it. Since this dress is for me anyway, it doesn't bother me. I do, going forward, have plans to start making doll clothes to sell (more on that as soon as I am able to find the time to make a post about it but exciting times!) and they will be to much higher standards. 

I better run... Many a draft in this here computer to be finished. I hope this finds you staying warm and enjoying the first couple days of Lent.

Till next time!

XXOO

Heather

Upcycled Doll Clothes... Great Way To Spend Time When You're Snowed or Frozen In

Doll Friends,

We've almost made it! January is almost in the books! Thank goodness. This year has actually been 'not that bad' with regards to me falling headlong into the doldrums during January. Perhaps it's because I've been too busy to indulge in it? Hahaha. Because as whirlwinds go, January 2019 has been a doozy in my 'real' life... 

So. Many. Things. 

Mostly good things but time and energy consuming things So I'll be happy to welcome February, the short month and then March, bearable because you know it's likely the last month of the cold...! Rambling here...

Even though busy, it's also been a pretty cold and snowy year and the kids have had school called off so often in the last few weeks I begin to forget what day of the week it even is anymore! I work from home so it really doesn't do much to change my life when they are off other than I don't have to go make them get out of bed and out the door. So, in some aspects, easier. However, it does tend to keep me from leaving the house as much as I probably ought. I can go days and days without speaking to or seeing another single solitary person other than my family. Not sure how 'healthy' that is? The craziest part is that the less I go out, the less I want to go out.

 It's weird. 

So... I've been on a bit of a doll clothes buying kick lately but I am trying to be good because we, in our personal lives, have made a rather big purchase this month and so are trying to cut out all non-essential purchases... Combine the 'doll clothes cravings' and being stuck inside too much and trying to stay away from Amazon and it's lovely selection of doll frocks and ensembles...? 

Time to pull out the sewing machine!

I have a huge bag of upcycle possibilities I've been stashing away for a couple of years now... When I find a cute baby clothes item I think would lend itself to a doll clothes item pretty well I buy it and into the bag it goes. I actually went through the bag this week and realized I've gotten much pickier about what I'll deem worth of upcycling from and got rid of quite a bunch of stuff. I've gotten to where I only really like doll clothes that look like 'real' and/or contemporary fasions that a real person would wear. You know, that don't look like 'baby clothes'... So, with that idea in mind, I dug through the bag after the weed-out and this is what I came up with. 

Don't mind the little Citi Pal's doll... She came down to the sewing table to be a size model along with Jazz but I never ended up sewing anything for her. Next time! 

I decided to start with these cute little onesies... the top looked like a regular t-shirt and I thought they'd be cute as little tank dresses or tops. 

They were all in newborn size. 

As with the method I've shown you often in the past and gradually gotten better at over time, I hemmed them...

It still seemed a bit too loose and big on her so... 

I took it in a bit on each side...

And perfect!

Here we have the pink one modeled by Laura. I think she looks so pretty with her hair out of braids! 

Next I made over some kind of strange 'rumba' outfits... I can't really say for sure what 'size' they are meant to be, they were only marked 'small'. I suspect for a toddler and they're meant to be a shorts outfit. (You can't really tell but there is a seam in the middle bottom there that makes them into 'shorts'. 

This was a pretty easy makeover/upcycle. I just cut the seam that made them shorts and then removed the last tier on one (to make it floor length) and two tiers on the other (to make it a tiny bit shorter). Then I removed the shoulder straps (with a seam ripper, I just removed the stitches holding them on) and shortened them by 2 inches. And... 

Instant evening gowns for the dolls! I removed the huge bows from both of them because they are pretty over the top even without them.

See, this is the longer of the two. 

Harper looks amazing in it! 

Here is Jazz in the one that is a tiny bit shorter. I think this will be a great dress for Valentine's Day!

Next I made over a onesie that is identical to one I made over before and gave away to a friend... When I found the duplicate I knew I'd have to make one for my own dolls. It's such a pretty print!

In this photo Jazz has the bottom ruffles from her dress on her head as a 'hat'...
LOL

I better run!
XXOO
Heather