Saturday, April 11, 2015

Craft for the Month of April

This month I'm going to show you Felt Paper Dolls. 


I made these over a year ago.
These were quite easy and inexpensive as I bought the felt from the dollar store and the fabric came from scraps from second hand stores.

so let's get started...

you will need

-skin color felt, (I used a light pink)
-black or brown felt (for hair)
-white felt (for undergarments and backing for the clothes)
-thread
-needle (or sewing machine)
-and scrap fabric (for the clothes)
-scissors
-and some sort of No Fray solution for the edges. 
also you will need a pattern for the dolls and clothes.

I used this paper doll from this website, modified it a little by drawing my own pattern from the paper dolls they had.
 cutting out my patter, I laid it on the felt and went to work. I did black felt for the hair,
and this light pink for the bodies.
 I cut out four, and sewed two together, this makes it a more sturdy doll.
 I cut out my patterns for clothes, but only had time to do dresses and the undergarments. Though more clothes of different kinds would be fun.
 Here I sewed the four pink body pieces together into two dolls and also an undergarment on
 then I sewed on the faces, following my pattern I made for a face, as you can see on my paper
 then I sewed on the hair...
 ...front and back...
 ...though if I was to do it again, I would make this one with her pony tails on the front and back... because I did end up with a little pink showing through.
 you can hand stitch or use a sewing machine. I will say a sewing machine would have made them look a little more professional looking, but mine wasn't available to use at the time I was making these.
 with my dresses cut out, I laid them out on the felt and got the felt cut out for each one...
 then sewed them together... again a sewing machine would have been quicker and easier.
 some day I intend to do some embroidery work or add buttons or lace to the dresses, but for now they are plain.
 I sewed a book for them too.. though I wish I would have had the time to do a sort of quiet book with pages and `rooms' for the dolls to live in... but this was all I accomplished.
 I used plastic sewing canvas (not shown) on the inside of this, two felt pieces, and some fabric. 

 double pocket for dolls and dresses

 save and easy for a 1yr old to play with, but a 2-3 yr old has more imagination for playing with them

Happy crafting!

S.L. Kliever