Head and shoulders, knees and toes

Granota’s 4th birthday is coming up in early September, so I needed to get started on making her birthday present. I’ve had in my head for awhile to make each of the girls a fairy doll for their birthdays. Back in December, I was the recipient of tons of sewing and crochet patterns and part of the haul was this great stuffed animals and dolls book:

For being from the '70s, the toys are surprisingly cute.

There are no fairy doll patterns in here, but really all I needed was a doll body pattern; I can figure out the dress and wings on my own. I chose the Alice in Wonderland pattern because it looked to be about the size I would need.

This is why I save all tissue paper.

In the past, the thought of turning these tiny pieces right side out once sewn would have turned me into a sullen grump. But! I discovered a new tool. Maybe you’re already aware of these fabulous inventions, but I only just got one a couple of months ago. The hand-dandy tube turner! Even Mr. Gren knows that one of the things I hate most in life is turning tubes. But with this thing, it’s positively fun and my fingernails stay intact during use.

Insert blue plastic tube into fabric tube and poke it through with the stick.

Ta dah!

Twenty seconds later, I have a freshly-turned (albeit rather wrinkly) tube. I think this one was an arm.

Have I mentioned yet that this is the first real doll I’ve ever made? I don’t think there’s a tremendous learning curve, but you can tell by looking at these two finished arms that I had already made improvements from the first to the second.

Teeny weeny little arms

Pretty soon, I had lots of teeny weeny body parts. I felt a little like Dr. Frankenstein.

"Why would a man leave his apartment three times on a rainy night with a suitcase and come back three times? "

The head is now attached to the body and all body parts are stashed in a bag of fabric where Little Miss Snoopy won’t find them. Coming soon: embroidering the face and making a teeny weeny fairy dress with teeny weeny wings.