Falilla gets a makeover

Well, hi howdy hey, look who’s back. It’s only been {cough, cough} a month. But, uh, nevermind that, let’s look at nice pictures!

Many of you may remember Falilla, the fairy doll I made for Granota’s 4th birthday. I gave Falilla lovely recycled Barbie hair which creeped Granota out to such an extent that she threw the doll across the room. They warmed up to each other, though, and became good friends. Falilla got carted all over the place and slowly, ever so slowly, began losing hair. It finally reached the point this spring where poor Falilla was actually hideous to look at.

After having made yarn hair for the Axl Rose dolls, I thought we might have better luck going that route. So Granota and I went to Michael’s and I let her choose new hair for Falilla and she settled on Patons Grace in a light lavender (I’d have to look to find the exact color name). It took one evening with a seam ripper to remove the wads of hair still on Falilla’s head. Then we had a hideous bald fairy doll. It took another couple of days to get all the hair wefts sewn together and then sewn on to her head. Granota was rather patient, considering.

Falilla is looking much better these days with her magical purple hair. All ready for new adventures with Granota and Axl. Oh, didn’t you know? They’re friends, too.

Granota’s Fairy Blog

You may remember how proud Rana was to share her unicorn & rainbow picture here a few months back. Well, Granota has been pestering me continuously to contribute her own blog entry. She colored a few fairy pictures last week, so now we’re putting them up for everyone to see. From here on out, I’m her scribe.

I love my fairies. And I love it very much. I don’t know why she has that, but it’s very funny.

 

It’s a beautiful butterfly. Butterflies are beautiful and pretty. Their wings are very pretty and colorful. Different colored butterflies are very pretty.

 

I don’t know why it’s playing a fiddle, but it’s very funny and I love it. It’s upstairs in my bedroom. I was wearing that shirt with my lily pad ring.

 

I love this flower and it’s very beautiful. I don’t know why bumblebees are talking, but it’s very beautiful. It is part of my fairy coloring book.

 

Me and Miss Darby colored that. I love it and it’s very beautiful. Flowers are talking everywhere and that fairy is lovely. The skin I colored by myself. Miss Darby colored her wings and the hair. This fairy is the queen of flowers. We are done!

 

 

Finished fairy doll part 1

Two weeks ago, I began making a doll for Granota’s 4th birthday. You can see the beginning stages here. This week I sewed up a little fairy dress, embroidered the face, and sewed on the hair. Whew!

The hair was the most interesting part of this process. In the past, I’ve seen little bags of doll hair at the thrift store, so I went trolling back when I started this project and couldn’t find any. I did, however, find one of these big Barbie heads.

Half-brushed

I got it for $1.99, which is a pretty good deal, especially considering that this doll bust has enough hair for at least three other dolls. That is some thick and luscious hair. As artificial hair goes, that is. Next step: hair transplant.

I found this tutorial that explains how to make wefts of hair. After smuggling the Barbie head up to my sewing room, I began cutting off hanks of hair as close to her head as possible.

Oh say can you see my eyes, if you can then my hair's too short

This was going pretty well and I got a few locks sandwiched between tissue paper like the tutorial says, adding more as I sewed along until I ended up with this.

Shining, gleaming, Streaming, flaxen, waxen

I measured around the fairy doll’s head and cut that long strip of hair into sections that I could sew onto the doll. At this point, my sewing room was a mess. There was hair all over my sewing table, all over my cutting table, all over my lap, and the floor, and every now and then, some of it made it to the trash can. Making the wefts wasn’t particularly difficult, but it certainly was messy.

Last night, after Granota was asleep (because it’s not enough to wait just until she’s in bed. Bedtime with my kids is like the Whack-a-Mole game at Chuck E. Cheese) I finished embroidering the face and managed to get most of the hair sewn on. I sewed on the last weft and the part today. This fairy has one thick head of hair! Here she is, all finished:

For the most part, I’m pretty happy with how she turned out. There’s something weird with the lower face. Either the lack of chin or too-long neck. I’m not quite sure. Also, it bugs me that the stuffing wouldn’t stay in the nose. Hopefully Granota is not as picky!

I used purple thread on the eyes (she’s a fairy, why not?), but it doesn’t really show up now that they’re done. Oh well.

Two-tiered petal skirt

The dress was made from green and teal shimmery polyester of some sort that I snagged out of the remnant bin. I had to line the bodice of the dress with a thin piece of pale blue cotton because the pink of the doll showed through the green too much and made a rather putrid color. The silver wing fabric was also a remnant bin find. And, now that I think about it, the doll itself was made out of an old crib sheet. So how about this for a cheap project, huh?

Tomorrow is Granota’s birthday, so I will post part 2 after she opens her gift. I really hope she likes it!