Lazy Sunday morning.

I'm finally getting around to roofing the dollhouse. It's so close to being complete.

Life with dolls...

Well hello there!

It's been awhile. I'm still collecting dolls, even if I've been super quiet online. So much is new! New house, new job, new dolls! So let's start with this girl I just purchased off of EBay. 

She's a Himeno 1/12 Picco Neemo and should be a perfect fit for the dollhouse I'm building. I wanted a doll that was cute, didn't feel cheap and had a noggin that felt in scale with the dollhouse rooms. I spent 5 months searching for the perfect doll. 

My other new doll is an adorable tan Pukifee Luna from Fairyland. 

I missed out on the Fairyland tan event as I was busy purchasing our home - which was one of the most stressful moments of my life. I will never sell and buy a house at the same time. I lucked out and found this girl on DOA's second hand market. I love the feel and color of Fairyland's tan resin. Dare I say even more than Bambicrony? She still doesn't have a name. The wig is a Liv doll wig.

Deciding on direction

Selling on EBay is such a hard work! I'm in the process of purging down my Pullip collection, and cleaning out my daughters toy room and it's difficult to decide what stays and what goes. I'm the kind of person who gets very sentimental about belongings. And some of the dolls I'm selling I really like. But I haven't played with them in awhile and it's good to have the space.
And in our tiny house space is sorely needed.

Steamy Kitchen...

Waiting for breakfast to finish baking. I am making Egg and Toast cups from Steamy Kitchen (her picture above)

http://steamykitchen.com/16983-bacon-egg-and-toast-cups.html

This is the second time I"ve made them...they are SO good. So simple and so not greasy. I want to try the Egg Nests next:

http://simplyrecipes.com/recipes/egg_nests/

I really recommend this site, my skills are basic in the kitchen, but all the things posted are so yummy and easy to make. I'm just in love.

New dresses...

Did some sewing this weekend. Chai and Marzipan have some halloween dresses. The pattern for it can be found on the Flickr LittleFee group.

http://www.flickr.com/groups/patternsforlittlefee/discuss/72157626346962700/

LittleFees

I love my girls. Eclair, Marzipan and Chai in their new clothes.

BJD Headbands:

Here's an easy tutorial I posted on DOA for BJD Headbands back in July of 2011. These are fun and super easy to make:

Supplies:

• Small metal bracelets (Marzipan is holding - those are what you want). Mine were a gift from Walmart and came in a long tube of 50 bracelets for $10. You can also find these at the thrift store. They are just cheapie bangles.


• Jewelry pieces. I search thrift stores looking for small and sometimes broken costume jewelry. Earings, necklaces, charms and pins all work great. You can also use buttons, really anything that you can imagine so long as the back has enough space for glue.


• Styrafoam ball in your doll's head size.


• Tin Foil.


• E-6000 Glue Clear Transparent.


• Wire Cutters


• Painter's Tape (I LOVE this stuff for BJD sewing and crafting because it's not super sticky and doesn't leave a residue)


• Chop Stick


• Not shown glass cup that is not too short but not too tall for support.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Steps:
  
  1. Skewer the bottom of the styrafoam ball with a chopstick.
  2. Cover the ball with tinfoil. This is super important as the glue reacts very VERY badly with the styrafoam.
  
  
  3. Drop the ball on stick into your cup for support. This now free's up your hands.
  
  
  
  
  4. The bracelet will have a section where the metal has been fused together. You want to cut this section out.
  5. Using the wire cutters cut out a small section so that the headband is the size you want - I kind of eyeball this. For a Littlfee I usually cut off a 1/4 section, I may leave a little extra for a larger head.
  
  
  

6. Shape the head band so that it's got a smaller curve.



7. Then try on the headband to make sure it's the right fit. If needed clip off more of it or reshape it.



8. Pick the piece of jewelry you want to use.
9. Remove all unwanted stuff off the piece using the wire cutters. Snip off earring posts, pin posts, charm loops. You want a flatish back for glue.



I had to send Marzipan away for this next bit because I am a Klutz and didn't want to get glue on her.

10. Put glue either on the back of the jewelry piece OR on the headband direcly. I usually like putting it on the piece unless it's tiny.
11. Put the piece of jewelry on the headband.


12. Use the painters tape to help hold the piece down then put aside and let dry. I usually leave it 3 to 7 days to dry and cure.
13. Once dry remove the tape and headband from the ball. It's now complete!

Problems: I've had it happen where a piece either doesn't glue to the headband or glue's crooked. With metal pieces the glue can peel off and you can try it again.

Hello Bloggerverse...

It's been a long time from my last post. Blogging is hard work! But I'm going to revive this blog in order to share tutorials, dolly things and sewing insprations that relate to the pictures I post on Flickr. Because while Flickr is fantastic for hosting the patterns I create, it's not so good for actually writing out the instructions or putting the pictures together in a way that makes sense. And I've shared many of these tutorials on DOA, but they eventually get lost and bumped down.

So thus the need for this Blog. Please feel free to comment or ask any questions if you need to!

Sewing Tutorials I want to try out:

Toddler shirt - only doll size:
http://www.prudentbaby.com/2010/05/snappy-toddler-top-free-downloadable.html

Fabric Basket:
http://ayumills.blogspot.com/2008/05/tutorial-fabric-basket.html

Messanger Bag:
http://pm-betweenthelines.blogspot.com/2009/11/messenger-bag-tutorial.html

Clock Pillow:
http://www.sillypreciouspiggies.com/2010/07/craft-tutorial-and-guest-post-clock-pillow/

Kitchen Towels:
http://kleiosbelly.wordpress.com/2010/01/04/christmas-prezzies-6-1-for-you/

It amazes me the things people throw out - especially things that put a lot of work into to creating.

Take this for example:



Someone put a ton of work into that, didn't frame it and dropped it off at the thrift store. I love the colors they used. Though I haven't decided if it fits with my shabby house or will head to etsy.

Then there's this quilt:

It's not perfect; in fact it's quite flawed and weird. But someone worked really hard on it. I imagine they got rid of it in embarrassment as their quilting skills surpassed the quality shown in the quilt - they wanted to hide their shame. I love the vintage fabrics, the colors and how quirky it is. It's going in my car.

La-la-la the fun of thrifting....

Found a few pretties last week thrifting.


I can't pass up anything with an L or an E. This will go on something - or maybe just my inspiration board.



Pretty vintage trims. Love the yellow zig zag one the most.



More vintage and lace trims for dolly clothes.



Pretty vintage Holt salt and pepper shakers.



This little girl looks so sweet.

I have not been very consistent with blogging in this blog. I am much better with my T1D blog. This year when packing away Christmas I decided to archive my vintage collection with pictures. These belonged to my grandmother and were my mom's favorite X-mas decoration. She used to play with them a lot as a child and as a result a few of the little candle holders have broken arms. I wish I knew who made them.

Just a little post. Nothing huge.
I wanted to share a picture of my recent thrift outting:



There's a couple of shiny brites in there, a scary faced Santa from Austria, and a couple of handmade ones from broken jewelry bits. Not bad for $3.
I also picked up some lovely vintage pillowcases for a project, and lucky for me the new dryer arrived this weekend so that I could wash them.

I'm sorry I haven't been blogging here much in the last two months. A couple of days after my last post Bean was admitted into Children's Hospital and diagonised with T1D. It's life changing. I started a second blog that is devoted to it and our family which is currently where all my energy is going. If you are interested in reading about our life please feel free to check it out here:
http://t1djillybean.blogspot.com/
There will be no dolly pictures over there. There will be dolly pictures here however.

Here's some eye candy from our recent trip to San Fran.

Charlotte...
My newest doll. She is a Ichigo Heaven who has had her scalp switched out. I rechipped her eyes and now she feels like mine.



The orange mesh wall in the background is all over our front yard. It's been fun for pictures but I'm ready for them to take it down and put in the new fence so that the dogs can play in the yard again.

Kokeshi

I found these beautiful Kokeshi at my local thrift store in a baggie for $2. I love their hand painted faces and delicate cheerfulness. But my favorite is the pepper shaker. There was no salt shaker in the baggie, and how tragic that the pepper will live out it's live alone with out it's mate. Forever searching, but never finding it's other half.

When I find things at thrift stores I like to google and learn the items history. What it is, who made it, where it came from. At times it's a bit like being a detective. In my googling I ran a crossed this site and it's very touching story:

http://retrorenovation.com/2009/02/03/antique-kokeshi-dolls-kevins-entry/

Beautiful.

Sunday at the Beach

We went up to see R's Aunt/Uncle/Mom/Stepdad/and little brother again. It was a wonderful relaxing time. And as it was the reunion of my parents death it was exactly what I needed. We had amazing hamburgers on the grill then headed to the beach with the kids to look for sea glass. Bean has started a little collection and I've given her a couple of glass jars to keep them in.

I discovered a new blog http://ltran.tumblr.com/ that makes me feel good and all warm and fuzzy. It's full of beautiful quotes and pictures including the following link to this video that made me weepy.

My Favourite Things from kidswithcrayons on Vimeo.

LittleFee Skirt Tutorial & Bodice Pattern

Here's a pattern & tutorial for a simple LittleFee skirt. I've also included a link to the Bodice pattern though I haven't created a tutorial for it.

Patterns can be found here:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/melancholywings/3807411991/in/set-72157619751176744/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/melancholywings/3807188884/in/set-72157619751176744/

1. Put two pieces of cotton fabric right sides together. You could use two different fabrics to make the skirt reversible.

2. Pin the pieces of fabric together so they don’t slide.

3. Using a Mark-Be-Gone pen trace the pattern onto the fabric.

4. With your machine on a short stitch length (I like 2 or 3) do a straight stitch along the waist and hem of the skirt.

NOTE: On the pattern this is the red lines. I used white thread on the fabric so that it would show up for the tutorial.

5. Cut out your skirt leaving seam allowences along the edges you sewed (The waist and hem).

6. Clip along the curve of the waist and hem.

7. Turn inside out.

8. Press or iron.You should now how a 'tube'.

9. Tuck in the outside open edges so that the raw edges are hidden in the tube.

10. Press again.

12. Stitch up the open edges of the skirt.

13. Attach either a snap or velcro to the ends on opposite sides so they over lap.

14. Embelish or decorate to your hearts content.

Little Fee Sock Tutorial and Pattern

Spent some time sewing this weekend and wanted to share a simple tutorial and pattern for making LittleFee socks. I like to make doll clothes such as T-Shirts and socks from human shirts. I can never find the correct fabric and scale at the fabric store. But I can easily find stripped shirts on sale at Old Navy. The pink shirt in the tutorial was $2 - far cheaper than what I can find at the fabric store.

Pattern can be found here:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/melancholywings/3806398259/in/photostream/

This pattern is easy peasy when you use fabric from a shirt as you can use the hemmed edging for the top of the sock. You can adjust the height of the sock to be below or above the knee.
1. Using the hem of a shirt fold over right sides against each other.

2. Pin so that the fabric doesn't slip and the pattern lines up correctly.

3. Using a Mark-Be-Gone pen trace the pattern onto the fabric.

4. With your machine on a short stitch setting (I usually use 2 or 3) stitch on the line you drew.

5. Cut out the sock leaving enough room on the edge for a seam allowence.

6. Repeat all the steps so that you have 2 socks.

7. Run the sock under water so the 'mark be gone' lines disappear.

7. Allow to dry then turn inside out.