The Flower Children - Carole and Crispin

Carole and Crispin, my two little hippies, made in March. I have to say that so far these are my favourites.

Carole has such a sweet little face.

Crispin. - I found this lovely scrap of orange/green fabric to make Crispin's tiny kaftan.

More details - Briony and Blake

When I made the first two dolls, I tried painting their faces using transfer dyes, painting onto paper and then ironing the image onto the cloth. This wasn't easy as the dye colours are so strong it was difficult to get subtle shades. So when I made Blake and Briony I used fabric paints and painted directly onto the cloth face. I used fine line pens for the details of the eyes and lips. I stuffed the nose slightly to give the face more shape.

With these dolls I also tried machine stitching some of the hair onto the head pieces before putting the head together. This certainly cut down on the amount of time needed to make the hair but made it a little more tricky to attach the head to the body.

Briony's pretty underwear is trimmed with lace sent to me by my cousin, Irene.

I've had a go at making Briony a pair of school shoes but they are still coming up too small and I haven't attempted to make shoes for Blake. Briony's little socks were cut from the top of a pair of children's socks and stitched around her foot to fit.

I've made Blake a school tie. I'm very pleased with this. It was made from red bias binding which is perfect for little ties. I've made it a bit too long but can easily shorten it.

February Dolls - Briony and Blake

Briony and Blake, created in February and dressed in school uniform.

I had quite a lot of red gingham to make Briony's school dress and just had to buy the ric-rac to trim it. There are tiny tucks on the dress bodice which perhaps aren't clear in the photo. Blake's trousers were made from a scrap I had left over from some school trousers I made for my sons many years ago. I think I rather over stuffed these two dolls as they were a bit chubby and the first shirt and dress bodice that I made were too tight and I had to start again. Blake's clothes follow the patterns from Linda Carr's book but I adapted two patterns to make Briony's dress.
I found the tiny buttons on Gregory Knopp's website. I loved just browsing through all the buttons. I'm sure I'll be buying more.

Some More Pictures of Anya and Alex

 I made Anya and Alex in January 2011. I followed the patterns in Linda Carr's book as closely as I could.

The most difficult part was creating the hair. All of the yarn used for the hair was sewn on by  hand after I had completed the dolls. It took several days, especially Anya's. Then with Alex's hair I couldn't decide how short to cut it; I wanted him to clearly look boyish.

Anya's dress was made from some fabric I had cut out years ago to make a dress for myself. The lace trim was sent to me by my cousin Irene.

Detail on Anya's boots. These were quite tricky to make as the pattern in the book wasn't big enough for the doll as I had made her so I had to enlarge the pattern. I'm still looking for suitable material for making shoes/boots.

Alex

How It All Started

I have always loved dolls, especially making tiny dolls clothes. I had a baby doll which had belonged to my mother’s sister; bought for her in 1931. After I had knitted her a traditional baby outfit I looked around for a child doll to dress. Not able to find what I wanted I remember the Holly Hobby doll I had made in the 70s and thought the best thing I could do would be to make my own doll. As I had lost the Holly Hobby pattern I started to look around for a replacement and came across Linda Carr’s book Classic Cloth Dolls. I was delighted with the book and spent six months reading it before I made my first dolls, Anya and Alex.

My First Dolls

Anya and Alex

My first dolls, created in January 2011