Tag Archives: dolly

Jun2

Wooden Peg Dolls

Posted on June 2, 2014 by TodayWeDid

Wooden pegs.

A friend gave me an old tin full of wooden dolly pegs recently, which are just perfect for making little dolls.

L and A each took a peg, and then went through our fabric scrap bag to find something to make some clothes. A made her doll a dress by wrapping a strip of floral fabric around her peg. I helped her tie a thin ribbon around the doll’s waist. L used two strips of fabric to make a shirt and some shorts.

A’s lovely hair.

They used some craft doll’s hair to give their dolls lovely flowing locks. I had to help A gets her hair glued down so that it only covered the back of the head. L also had a bit of trouble getting the hair onto her doll, as once it hit the glue, it stuck to her fingers as well.

L drawing on a face.

A added some pipe cleaner arms to her doll, and L made shoes out of pipe cleaners for her doll. L decided her doll did not require arms. They both used markers to draw on a face, but A’s went wrong, and she ended up colouring the whole of her doll’s face in black. So we added some tiny googly eyes on, which make the doll look a bit scary, but A was very happy with it.

L also added some details to her doll’s outfit using the markers. She said this doll would be the perfect size to use as a worry doll. L sometimes likes to use a worry doll to help keep herself calm when she knows she will be in a stressful situation, such as going to the dentist or having a vaccination.

A’s doll.

L’s doll.

Apr2

Yarn Dolls

Posted on April 2, 2014 by TodayWeDid

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I remembered making yarn dolls when I was a child, and I wanted to try it with the girls.

Wrapping the yarn around the cardboard.

First I cut some sturdy cardboard up into two rectangles to use to wrap the yarn around to make the body of the doll. I started each child off by winding the yarn around a few times, and then they continued to wind it until it was as thick as they wanted it to be. Once that was done, I helped them remove the hank of yarn from the cardboard. From this yarn we would make the head, body and legs of the doll.

Tying yarn around the body to form the head.

The body with hair, head, body and legs.

L cut a few pieces of yarn off the ball to use to tie around the hank of yarn to differentiate the hair from the head, and the head from the body and the body from the legs. L tied her knots, but A had difficulty, and asked me to help her do this part. Once the yarn was tied around the body at the top of the legs, we split the yarn beneath this into two roughly equal parts, forming the legs. A small section at the base was also tied off to form feet.

Arms ready to be added to the body.

To make the arms, the kids wrapped some more yarn around their cardboard, but this time, around the shorter sides of the rectangle. This hank of yarn was also not as thick as that of the body. Once we had removed this yarn from the cardboard, a small section on each end was tied off to form the hands.

We carefully threaded the arms through the body of the doll, and secured the arms in place using another piece of yarn wrapped around the doll’s chest in a criss-cross under the arms and around the back. We snipped off all the loose threads from our knots, and then the dolls were done. L left her doll just as it was, but A added some tiny googly eyes to her doll, but not other facial features.

Mar30

Bottle Doll

Posted on March 30, 2014 by TodayWeDid

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A is crazy for dolls of all sizes and shapes. She does a lot of pretend play with them, in particular she likes to give them baths…. which are not always so pretend. She carries them around, takes them on outings, and to bed. A asked if we could make some dolls for craft, so we gave it a go. I remembered using a soft drink bottle to make a doll when I was a child, so we started with making a bottle doll.

The doll’s head.

We had an empty mineral water bottle that we washed out, and removed the label from. I cut out an oval of pink foam for the doll’s face, and A glued it to the top of the bottle. A decorated her doll’s face, giving her googly eyes, and using a marker to make a mouth and a nose.

I twisted two pink pipe cleaners today to make one long one, and I helped A to wrap this around the bottle to make some arms.

Then A got down to the very serious business of dressing her doll. She decided her doll should be wearing a shirt and a skirt. She chose to make the skirt from red tissue paper and blue honeycomb mesh, and the shirt from gold honeycomb mesh and pink crepe paper. I helped her to poke the doll’s arms through the mesh and crepe paper of her shirt. I held the shirt and skirt shut at the back while A taped them together. She is getting much better at removing tape from the dispenser without sticking it to itself now.

Adding hair.

Once she was dressed, it was time to “make her pretty” according to A. She didn’t like the bald look her doll was sporting, so she added some curly doll’s hair to the top of the bottle and around her face.

Placing her necklace.

A also used some stick-on gems to giver her doll a necklace, some earrings and a little watch. She found a thin pink ribbon in the craft box and asked me to make her a bow to place in the doll’s hair too.