I invented Doll Clothes Factory to gain control of the syndrome called "Mom, Can You Make This For Me Really Quick... It Won't Take Long At All... I Promise''. Whatever doll related game the girls were playing at the moment required a specific (fill in the blank) dress for that particular game. One day they'd NEED a princess dress, the next day they'd NEED a fairy dress, the next time it would be a Robin Hood archery outfit, then they'd REALLY NEED a mermaid costume, etc etc etc. The girls are correct in that doll clothes don't take very long to make, but they do take some time, some planning, and its really annoying to have to take a break from a complicated mommy project to quick whip out a doll clothes item.
So... I instituted the Doll Clothes Factory. It opens, just like a real world factory, and all kinds of fun doll clothes get made in a short amount of time. Then, importantly, the factory closes and no other doll clothes are made until the factory opens again. That could be a time period of a few weeks, could be a few months, only Mommy knows. :) While the Doll Clothes Factory is closed, there is a sheet of paper in the sewing room and they write their requests on there so that they are remembered the next time the factory opens.
The plan has worked fabulously! When you plan and make a bunch of doll clothes all at once it goes incredibly fast - a couple dresses a day. Then, when I get sick of making doll clothes, the factory closes and I am released from the impulse-doll-clothes-sewing by simply saying, "Sorry, the factory is not open today. Write your order on the list."
One more thing before I show you the results of the January episode of Doll Clothes Factory: when I do impromptu sewing I hesitate to use my best, favorite, or prettiest fabrics. I generally let the girls choose what they want, but they are only allowed to look in 'their' fabric (the uglies) and not in my closet of 'good mommy fabric'. One of these days I'd like to pre-plan some doll clothes and open the factory in secret for a day or two so that 1) the clothes are as cute as can be, rather than in gaudy fabric and 2) I can sew them without someone over my shoulder saying, "Are you done yet? Are you done yet? Can I try it on Dolly yet? How many minutes until its done?"
After all that explanation, here is what was made right after Christmas to clothe the new dolls:
Cute pink skirt and shirt
(this fabric did come from my 'good mommy fabric' closet)
Dress from scraps of old Christmas dress with bias tape bound edges
Circle skirt and crossover top from more Christmas dress scraps
'Comfy pants' and a long sleeve white tee shirt
(should do a different, less bulky waistband on this patten next time)
Pink capri pants
(modeled with the gold shirt because Leah thinks they look 'jazzy' together)
more casual wear (made from fleece scraps)
I love the white trim on the sweatshirt.
All the clothes so far were made from patterns from this book by Nancy Zieman. I highly recommend it if you want to make doll clothes for 18'' dolls. It lays everything out very simply and has a decent variety of mix and match outfits. I've even taken those pattens and adapted them to fit other dolls with minimal effort.
These next two I made up off the top of my head. They still need a few tweaks (the backpack for sure) and are made of really terrible fabric, but they were chosen by the girls and I figured first prototypes could be ugly.
Wouldn't this cape be adorable in a tweed or wool with trim around the edges?!
Just try and imagine that rather than wild swimsuit fabric. :)
This is my very rudimentary backpack. The pack itself is a rectangle folded up on itself, with a pocket. The straps are scrap webbing I had laying around and I added velcro tabs so you could unstrap the straps (versus having the twist the doll's arms around at cockeyed angles to feed them through the straps the way we humans do when we're putting on a backpack). The purple ribbon is a loop Leah sewed on as an afterthought so that her doll could hang up her backpack.
I seem to think there was another skirt somewhere and I know I made a short sleeved white tee shirt but I guess we couldn't find those when we did the Doll Fashion Show and took pictures.
The factory will probably open up this spring sometime to make more summer outfits for the dolls. I have to remind myself to plan ahead and get some really cute girly fabric and trim so we can do a little better than digging through the scrap bin. :)
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