Dolls for a birthday.

Nearing the end of what has been a big birthday season for us over here, I just finished up some gifts for two cousins of ours, B + A.  One is turning 7 and one 3, both seemed to like playing with Abby's 18" doll, so I thought to myself, why not get them each a doll and sew a few dresses for them?  Brilliant, right? 

 

 

First up, I made a Sofia Blazer intending for it to go to B, but then I realized I would have to make bottoms and a shirt to go with it... so I ended up letting Abby have it as she beeegged me for one just like it.  (Also, there was a mistake or two)

 

Cah-ute, right?  The whole time I was thinking to myself, I wish Oliver and S would just come out with a blazer already!!

You're supposed to be able to add a button to the front, but this particular doll has hair that "grows" so she has a knob on her back that makes it impossible to close the blazer. 

I made the pants a while ago, the deets can be found here.

 

I love making doll clothes because they use those "too big to throw away" kind of scraps.  Like this gray?  From Jack's pants, and the lining is from Abby's maxi dress.

 

Funny story about the blazer.  So, I was all excited to get it finished, right?  I was sewing waaay to late at night, nearly midnight, knowing I only had a few more steps.  You see those teensy tiny sleeves?  Well, you turn them under and are instructed to sew them in the machine if you can- I accepted that challenge.  The first sleeve went off without a hitch, perfect in fact, the second... not so much.  I got a little too confident and stitched a leeeeettle too fast and ended up stitching through my finger tip, ha!! Never fear, dear friends, I managed not to get any blood on the fabric, bandaged up and soldiered on.  The fact that I literally had only a half inch left to sew helped my decision to finish that night.  So my finger tip is still in a bit of pain and is missing a chunk of skin, but on the plus side this time I didn't break the needle off in my finger! 

 

So I pressed it one last time since the iron was still hot and Abby woke me up the next morning with a "IS THAT BLAZER FOR ME?!", I would call that success. 

 



This one is the same pattern I drafted here for a knock-off Roller Skate dress (can't believe I never blogged that dress! hm!) If you follow that link, there is a picture of the back.  It is constructed identical to the kid sized dress, aside from the elastic casing.  For the elastic I just stitched it directly on the inside of the dress after it was completed since I wasn't worried about the doll's comfort, ha!

This yellow is left over from Abby's geranium, which was left over originally from 4 skirts I made for  a wedding reception.

This dress is the Oliver + S popover sundress (free pattern) made from scraps left from this skirt.

I actually made three of the sundresses, two of the roller skate dresses and some headbands to go along.  Abby is keeping the pink one, she thought it would be fun to have "best friend" dresses.

Abby made her doll and B's doll a keychain using charms found on the jewelry aisle.

Our local Wal-Mart has a big selection of doll shoes, jewelry, backpacks, hats, etc (so much fun stuff!) most for $2-3 so we threw in a few pairs of shoes to go with.  In fact, I bought a stockpile and that is now how Abby is rewarded for doing her chores for the week. 


One doll all ready to be packaged and gifted to her new owner, hope she loves hers as much as Abby does!

A day of dolls.

I recently made some doll clothes and hair bands for Abby's 18" doll, and she and her cousin Beth spent the afternoon dressing, posing and taking pictures of the dolls.  (okay, I took the pictures, but the girls chose where to place them and what angles to take them from)

 

All the outfits were made from scraps left over from other projects or fat quarters, love that! 

The tops are the free popover sundress, dolly sized, from Oliver + S and the bottoms are Liberty Jane Skinny jeans. 

The headbands are just felt circles sewn together with a button, then hot glued to 1/4" elastic.

I decided to add a little flair with some pom pom trim.  These pants are the same pattern just shortened some.

You might be wondering what this yellow thing she is standing on in our back yard is... it is what I like to call the puke machine.  It is a Ben made merry-go-round, and yes, it has made kids puke (none of my kids, though).  It goes so fast!  But the kids love it, especially the twins.

Some lace on this one, and a cool idea we saw online (sorry, can't remember the source!) to use a scrapbooking brad as a ring. 

A little flair on the back of the jeans never hurt anyone.  I struggled with the topstitching on these because the pieces were so tiny!

I scored this bookshelf a while back at a garage sale for $10, she was originally asking $50 but I went back late in the afternoon and she just wanted it gone!  So my awesome MIL haggled for me:)  The kids had tons of fun making decorations and using my "special tape" aka washi tape. 

These cool chandeliers are a free printable from here.  We used cardstock instead of cardboard, but we probably should have used the light cardboard as suggested.  Oh well. One is covered in red glitter and one is colored by Abby and Jack.

 

 

Jack drew all the kids in photo frames, while Abby drew the Declaration of Independence, ha!  She cracks me up.  

All in all, a fun, creative day with the kids!  And, um, doll clothes are kind of addictive!