A Day For Dollies...

Brynwood Needleworks - Donna and Jamie Making Dolls

My friend, Jamie and I spent most of our time at Nifty 50s yesterday, making dolls to go with Marcy's dresses. Marcy included doll fabric to match each dress, which she tucked into the dress pockets.

Jamie found a template for the doll faces on the internet and, after prepping the fabrics (which I'll explain below), ran them through her inkjet printer for us.

Brynwood Needleworks - Susie, Cutting Doll Hair

My friend, Susie helped by trimming the dolls' "hair" after we sewed the heads up. (She used to be a hairdresser, so this was her obvious calling!)

Brynwood Needleworks - Friends Admiring Dresses and Dolls

There was a lot of interest in what we were doing. I showed off dresses and then we'd elicit giggles each time we showed the finished doll to match the dress.

One group of ladies took pictures of some of the dresses and dolls. I think we may have inspired more volunteers to help in the future!

Brynwood Needleworks - Finished Dolls

Here are some of the finished dolls.

Brynwood Needleworks - More Dolls

Of course, all of them have different hairdos. Some are long, some are short, and some of spikey. All are adorable!

Brynwood Needleworks - Sleepy Face...Happy Face

Every doll has a happy side and a sleepy side on their head. The little girls only need to turn their dolls over to get the other expression.

Brynwood Needleworks - Doll Heads Printed On Fabric

Jamie printed out lots of faces onto different shades of brown and ivory fabric for our sewing day. These are just two of the fabrics she chose, but there were many different shades. Each doll had both faces, one on each side of their head.

Brynwood Needleworks - Doll Heads Printing Images

Here's a copy of the face templates in case you'd like to help with our effort. You could either make dolls themselves, fabric to donate to our project, or print faces onto fabric to send to make more dolls.

We also accept donations of fabric and trims for dresses and dolls, yarn for doll hair, or polyfill for stuffing the dolls. All donations are welcome. (You can send an email to me if you're interested in participating.)

Printing on Fabric Instructions

Start by ironing the fabric to the shiny side of freezer paper. Trim the fabric and paper to 8.5" x 11" (copier paper size) so it will run through your printer. Either run the fabric through your inkjet printer on the copy setting with this template on the scanner bed, or print from your computer (@ 100%).

Leave the faces on the paper until you're ready to sew. Remove from paper and cut around the heads on the lines. We sew the head piece to each body piece (see files on the "Dressed In Joy" page in the Brynwood menu bar at the top of my blog) before sewing the heads together.

Match up the necklines first (right sides of fabric together), and sandwich the yarn "hair" between the head pieces before you sew. Start at one side and sew all the way around the doll, catching the hair as you sew. Leave the bottom open for turning and stuffing.

After turning the doll right-side-out, stuff the head and body with polyfill. Pin the bottom closed and then use a straight or decorative stitch to sew it closed. After sewing it closed, I like to pink the bottom edge for a finish that won't fray. Done!

We'll be doing this again in a couple of weeks. We have more dresses and will have more faces to make dolls. I bet we have more dollmakers then, too!