PennilessCaucasianRubbish American Doll Adventures: MIA; Making Doll Clothes & Surviving Winter... Introducing PCR Doll Rags!

Greetings And Salutations Doll Friends!

Oh. My. Goodness.

I feel like I've just returned to planet Earth after having been away for...

~~Weeks?~~ ~~Months?~~ ~~Years?~~ Decades?

In any case, away so long I feel like I've neglected ya'll and my little blog here despite all my wanting to get here and make posts the last few weeks. I've just felt like I've been slogging through quicksand or something. At least when it came to my entire grown-up 'To-Do' list of basics...

However, one thing I kept hearing from the Spirit as I was trying to keep my head above the water/quicksand was

"Just do what you can do and do it as well as you can..."

So...

I sewed in an attempt to keep my rattled nerves from coming apart at the seams! Also, to continue to teach myself some quick techniques and inexpensive cloth source options so I could pass the techniques and cloth source option ideas along to you fine folks, my sweet readers..

Another objective of my ~~weeks~~ months (?) long sewing frenzy was to start making a few of said doll clothes to sell in an upcoming Etsy Shoppe!

Or that's the plan...

My Doll Clothes 'line' is going to be called

*insert-drum-roll-here*

Penniless Caucasian Rubbish Doll Rags!

Cos I have a weird sense of humor and it makes me giggle every time I think of it and...

I'll take my giggles where I can find them, lately. Eh?

The idea behind them is to sell very simple basics that can coordinate with other simple basics so, together, the items can help bulk up a doll wardrobe and provide as many style options as possible from each item. Therefore, most of the items will be separates, tops and bottoms or skirts and I want to try and make a great deal of it reversable as well so you can get two looks out of one item! So that's my working concept anyway...

One inexpensive cloth option that I took a bit of a risk with but was happily surprised by...? These 12x12 inch quilters blocks I got on Amazon. You get 50 different squares, no duplicates and mostly small and unique patterns. The only tricky part is that this size of fabric doesn't really lend itself to any manner of pattern sewing unless you're just going to use a 'chunk' of the fabric as an accent to a fabric you have in more abundance... You'll see what I mean by that in an upcoming post when I used one panel to make two bodices with coordinating fabric otherwise...

For now, I wanted to see what I could do in a really simple way to use the fabrics by themselves... And... I came up with a really simple skirt you can make using the blocks.

. Quick caveat: mind you I didn't pre-wash the fabrics... That may be a huge no-no but all I read on the reviews of the fabric on Amazon said that they frayed rather badly when they were prewashed and so I decided I'd sew with them first, using the zig-zag to keep any frays from ruining the finished product. I hope. I haven't laundered any of the finished skirts yet but plan to soon just to see how they stand up... But for now, especially if you're an adult collector like myself and likely won't need to launder your doll skirts very often, this might be a nifty way to get cute skirts in fabrics I literally don't think you'll find anywhere else. Fifty unique skirts, if you're willing to make that many, for less than $22!! (Well, not counting the thread...) That's not bad at all... Eh?

I, of course, fell in love with the kookiest of the bunch and set to work right away!! I literally giggle every time I look at the bear fabric you see above and hate to report I'll probably have to keep that skirt for myself because I just love it.... LOL

That might be a problem actually with my upcoming Etsy store plans;

"Oh I like this one too much to sell!!?"

Just kidding!! I'll be good! I'll post it for sale and if it doesn't sell, it's mine!

Oh wait..... LOL LOL LOL

Can't tell I've been locked in four walls too long can you? I've begun to LOL at my own jokes. Thank goodness it's mid-March.

Actually the winter has thawed but now my whole state is flooded... I am lucky, I am one of the few without problems other than taking on a bit of water in our basement... Pray for Nebraska if you don't mind, ok? I can't even wrap my mind around all the destruction the water has created. Mother Nature can really be a monster sometimes I am telling you. We are supposed to be getting even more rain today... So, yes, please pray if you're so inclined to be a praying person.

(Which I highly recommend because Jesus rocks! but I digress yet again...)

Anyway, so back to the skirts... What I did was...

I cut them in half exactly at the middle which made two 6x12 inch pieces, then I sewed the two pieces together to make a really long 6x24inch piece, see below:

Then pressed my seams open (because my Granny taught me right and it makes the end product much nicer and makes running the elastic through the eventual casing much easier!

Next I zigzagged around the entire outside perimeter to prevent fraying and so that I would not loose as much length in the skirt from having to turn it under twice when hemming and/or creating the casing for the elastic at the top of the skirt. If that makes sense at all. I suppose you could also use a serger (spell?) but I don't own one nor do I know how to operate one and just looking at them kind of stresses me out... How do you even thread all that thread and where? So maybe a serger owner can help me by clarifying it it would work the same?

So here you see the bear fabric all zig-zagged.

All of them zig-zagged and ready for hems and casings...

Did I mention I generally always sew things at least a few at a time. Having been a prior rubber stamper, I got used to doing 'productions' of things and it just seems nearly as easy to make 2-4 of an item as it is to make one... Right? Not to mench, the upcoming Etsy store will not stock itself.

I sewed the hem 1/2 inch and the casing 3/4inch. I used the Dritz Easy Hem I got at a garage sale once... they work like a charm! Well, at least they make hemming a lot less annoying!! YouTube likely has lots of videos explaining how they work so I'll let you check them out if you're interested.

This fabric was another favorite and one I'll have a hard time selling... What can I say? I love kooky and strange and wholly original fabrics and how much more original can you get than these whimisical kitty cats on bright yellow background? I love it!

Here's a better shot of the bear fabric one... I just love it.

Here is Layla showing you the other 'side' of her reversable top... That's what I mean about wish that Penniless Caucasian Rubbish Doll Rags will be able to have as many of the items be reversable as possible. What could be more fun than having two tops in one? Eh? Well... I suppose there could be a lot more fun things than that but... Still, nifty and something I would've loved in my doll clothes as a girl. I had ONE reversable cape my Granny made and it's still an all time favorite of all my doll clothes.

Here are Carissa, Taryn and Harper modeling more tops and skirts.

(The pants Harper is wearing and leggings Carissa has on are ones I purchased, I didn't make them... I do plan to attempt pants soon though...)

I've made a few blunders... If you look at the fabric on Harpers top? The pattern is upside down. Ugh. I did that more than once and on more than one kind of item. You'd think it'd be a mistake you only make once but when I end up cutting like six items out at a time, I sometimes get in a hurry and...

Upside down birds happen.

Oops.

Did I mention I am going to keep my mistakes? LOL

Maybe it's on purpose afterall?

KIDDING!