Tuesday, September 18, 2012

Jess Brown style doll tutorial part 4

I fold the tops of the arms down on each side and pin them.
 Because the fabric of her body is a looser weave I use these little pieces of wool coating to help keep the thread from pulling through.
 I sew both arms at the same time.  You could do them one at a time.
 And I used heavy carpet thread sewing back and forth several times.
 Here she is all together and ready for her finishing touches.
 For Mighty's doll I made the eyes blue so on this doll I decided on brown.  I just stick the needle in and sew.  You could use a disappearing ink pen to draw them so you had something to follow as you sew.
 A small piece of cotton, salmon colored fabric for her mouth...
 I sew through her head from the back for all her facial features.  This will get hidden by her hair later.
 This is a nice little hand sewn stitch to know for this sort of thing (eyes, center of flowers, etc).  I like to use it for attaching her mouth.
 With your needle pulled all the way through to the front, wrap the base of the thread (right up next to where it's coming out of the salmon fabric) around your needle 4-5 times....
 holding those so they stay tight around the needle, sew through to the back.  Try to get your needle close to where it came out on the front.  The idea is to make a little knot....
 Something like this.  This took some practice for me to get them looking nice and smooth.  It can be hard to get enough tension to make a nice tight knot but allow yourself enough thread to pull your needle through.... 
For her hair I used about 10-12 strips of yellow colored fabric.  They're about 1" wide x 14" long.  I pin them together to create the "part" in her hair and then sew that onto her head first.
I take the strip of fabric on the top and fold it back to cover and hide the stitches.
For the rest of her hair I just sew randomly through different pieces until I have it attached to her head and for this doll I chose to make some little pig tails with ribbon 
She would be fun to make hats or scarves for...or if you crochet, some little stockings...lots of possibilities!





5 comments:

  1. how did u make her clothes? Im new to sewing so I have no idea. Thanks.

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  2. I wanted to thank you for this doll tutorial. The photos and directions are awesome and so is your web site!! i am inspired to go
    buy a sewing machine! Thanks!

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    1. You are so welcome! Thanks for the lovely compliment!!!! I enjoy doing the tutorials when I can (must be my past as an art teacher) and would love to do some more here in the future.... Have fun sewing!!!

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  3. Thank you for the wonderful tutorial, do you have one on how to make any clothing? I am not sure where to start, lol

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  4. I am new to doll making and really appreciate how you kept things simple. Thank you!

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