I made two dolls, one as a gift for my little niece and one to keep at home for my own kid. (If you can't guess which is which I'll tell you - my kid picked out the blue hair!)
I made both dolls from a nice firm cotton broadcloth in a light skin tone. When I went to Treadle to pick this up there was a broad array of skin tones to choose from, dark brown all the way to light beige. Although this fabric wasn't specifically for dollmaking I liked all the human-colored options!
The first time around, I sewed a side body panel upside down. After that I found it helpful to mark the top of each piece with a small T.
The first doll I sewed had sort of squarish corners to her face (left). On the second doll (right) I tried to make the face rounder.
Instead of following the seam's shape exactly I rounded off the sharp corners. This meant that I was sewing at about 3/8" instead of 1/4" around the corners. You can sort of see this below. I think it made a difference!
I managed to avoid a gap at the top and bottom of the body by sewing each stitch line 1/4" shy of the edge, then having the next stitch line just meet the previous one.
When the body was together, I trimmed all the seam allowances with a pinking shear (to avoid having to cut tiny notches). I clipped into the seam at the neck.
I was not happy with the splayed legs on the first doll (left).
I used a ladder stitch to draw the front of the leg up a bit and straighten out the angle.
This made a weird fold in the leg but whatever.
After (left)! For the second doll (right) I overlapped the leg centers about 1/2" and also eased the top of the leg into the body. This also helped to straighten out the legs. If I make this again, I will shape the top of the leg pieces to create this same effect with less fuss.
Played a bit with the angle I sewed the arms on each doll.
The eyes were a bit too wide-set for my taste so I drew them in a little closer together.
I used a satin stitch for the eyes. I first outlined the eye with stem stitch, then filled it in with sort of random straight stitches. This helps pad out the satin stitch and also serves as a backup layer if the outer stitches get damaged. (I also decided later, after finishing, to add pupils.)
I saw this method here on Pinterest for making looped bangs. I sewed one side and made the loops around pins as I went, then sewed across the loops on the bottom too.
The finished bangs!
I sewed the front hair to just cover the edge of the bangs.
I gathered the hair from the center part into pigtails and tied them up with yarn and embroidery floss, then trimmed evenly. As the directions suggested, I spent a lot of time putting tacking stitches throughout the hair. This is a great tip - DON'T SKIP! It adds so much to the feeling of the doll and keeps everything so tidy and secure!
Here she is, hair done!
Buns tied, but before tacking the hair everywhere.
After tacking.
Second dolly is done!
I tweaked several aspects of the pattern but the bottom line is Wee Wonderfuls patterns are amazing and I will always love using them. This was 12 bucks well spent!
Again, pattern is available here.
Clothes and accessories are in my next post here!
