My first non-Barbie reroot !

It only took most of 2004...

While it's hard to tell from the photo, Beautiful Crissy's somewhat larger than my usual Barbies. She's 18 inches of vintage 70s beauty, but when I got her...what a mess ! She had a glued-on lace tornado dress, her eyes were white with mold, and her 'base' hair was matted and woolly. No way to save it, so I removed it all, base and 'grow hair' ponytail, and rerooted it. When we moved, she got shoved into a box and forgotten, but I vowed to have her completed before 2005. Which I did !

I sort of have a fetish about getting the clothes and shoes my dolls were sold in - she has her orange lace dress, and I finally shelled out $15. (!) for the matching shoes. Learned to make doll shoes because I couldn't afford more than one pair for her ! This blouse used to belong to a giveaway bear - the ad is split down the back - and I made the pants from a vintage pattern. She's a lot of fun to sew for !

My sweet Baby Chrissy !

My Christmas 2004 present - only 30 years late, but...

This is my beautiful Baby Crissy. She's been renamed 'Chrissy', because that's how I found - and could afford ! - her. Amazing what you can find when you slightly misspell the name or terms on eBay.

I don't sew much for her, because she wears real baby clothes. Even with the HUGE fabric stash I have, I can't make her clothes cheaper than I find them at yard sales. I even find stuff that's as old as she is ! Found a cloth diaper just last month, too. And I'm not even gonna get into how many pairs of never-used shoes she has !

This is one I altered - it was a too-long crawler, never used, purchased for less than a buck at GoodWill. It was too new and too pretty for me to leave there, even though I knew it was too big for her. So I studied it for a bit, and decided to cut the legs off and make her a dress from it. The plaid lines made it easy - just a cut and a hem, and she has a perfect fit Christmas dress !

While her original packaging says she's the size of a 9-month-old, in today's baby clothes, she more often fits a 1 to 3 months size ! Have babies gotten bigger since the 70s ?

She does need a 9mos - 1 year shoe size. I guess feet haven't changed as much as clothes ! It's great to have dolls that fit people clothes - you can even use props from yard sales and stuff that's probably too filmsy to give to real kids !

Little Belle and big sister Isabella !

Isabella and Crissy wear nearly the same size, too !

This is a 'Sisters' photo of two Playmates Belle dolls. The smaller is, of course, the "Before Once Upon A Time" Belle, often referred to as 'Toddler Belle'. Released the same year was big sister Interactive Belle. She has interactive clothes and props, responds to pressure to her left hand. Contrary to Amazon.com reviews, mine bought secondhand works perfectly. To avoid confusion, little one is Belle, her older sister is 'Isabella', kind of a contraction of 'Interactive Belle'.

Since Belle is already featured on the 'Disney Princess' page, I'll tell you about Isabella. Bought her mostly to see if her clothes and shoes would fit Beautiful Crissy. Well, it's close - the knob in Crissy's back keeps the 'Village' dress and the gold ball gown from closing completely, but otherwise, they fit. Belle's shoes are a little big on Crissy, but the usual 'tissue paper in the toes' helps.

But once I fixed her hair and played with her, I wanted to keep her. So I tried some clothes I'd made Crissy on her, and they fit great ! Both the Doll Shop Deluxe and the vintage Simplicity 8519 are equally good on her. This dress is a DSD effort, made from a pair of pants I didn't like much. I made doll clothes for every doll I own out of those pants !

You'll see more of Isabella - I just finished a sailor blouse and skirt, and hope to get photos tomorrow !

Finally got Crissy's hair right !

A 'before and after' shot that doesn't tell you much...

Wow. What can I say except that I'm finally happy with Crissy's hair, and thank Everything for Dollar Tree thinning shears !

As you can tell from the 'before' side, Crissy's reroot was nice, but there was just too darn much hair ! It's a classic reroot blunder, but hey, at least it's fixable. I'd rather cut down too much than try to reroot more hair.

In the first photo, it looks like her face is peeking out from under a brown mushroom. Hair was so thick, I couldn't get a comb or brush to even touch her scalp, there was that much hair. I knew it wasn't what I wanted, but was a bit timid about cutting it, as it took forever to reroot in the first place !

Got brave and a little bored this week, practiced on a junker doll with the thinning shears first, took a breath and went for it. A section of her side part was pulled down for thicker, longer bangs, the part was raised a bit, and I made numerous thinning cuts to the underside of her hair all around. It wasn't long before it started looking *much* better. A quick boil perm got the bangs to lie down and put a better curl on her slightly shorter pageboy.

While I've always loved my Crissy, even when she was half bald and had an ugly lace dress glued to her...but now - Wow !

Increase a Barbie pattern 157% on a copier -

get a 'free' kimono pattern scaled for Crissy !

After her stunning new hair look, I had to make what nearly all my dolls get - a kimono ! My fingers hovered over an $8. Buy It Now pattern for a doll roughly her size, but I stopped myself. We have a Barbie kimono pattern, I thought. Why not try to enlarge that first ? If it doesn't work, then you can shell out $8. with no guilt !

So, 60c at a copyshop later, I had Crissy's kimono pattern. This one's made from a failed attempt at a skirt for me, cuttings from of a dress too worn to wear, and a bit of cutaway from other doll clothes. Now that I know it works, I can use the good stuff !

Need to make her some shoes, too. Anyway, kimonos are quite loose-fitting, so the 'what you want divided by what you have' (11.5" divided by 18") may not always work...but it's always worth a shot, especially if you're broke, bored, and have lots of scrap fabric !

Fun with fabric - and Paint Shop Pro !

It's called 'Still Life with Crissy' !

I have a bad tendency to use whatever fabric's on the cutting table, so you'll often see a run of doll clothes in the same fabric. I'm nearly out of the floral stuff, but there was yards of the navy in that old housedress !

The dress and slacks are from 'Doll Shop Deluxe', the blouse is a free-hand attempt that didn't fit the target doll, but did fit Crissy, and the shoes are from online directions. Yeah, it's hard to see, but I even made matching ballerina flats ! Crissy shoes are usually more expensive than Crissy dolls on eBay, so I learned to make them.

As you can see, I need more practice, on both shoes and princess seams ! I'll add leather soles to the shoes, which should help a bit, and now I know to add the side pieces to a princess dress before I do the neck facing, next time !

Started out as Mandy's outfit...

but it's now Isabella's pajamas !

About time you got to see Isabella again, huh ? :) These are her pajamas - the top was an attempt to free-hand an asymetrical blouse, and the pants were sewn for My Friend Mandy. The blouse fit pretty well, for an early trial - I basically traced the doll on a sheet of paper, added facings and seam allowances. Ran out of the floral fabric, so I finished it with the cream. Looks more asymentrical that way !

Pants had to be taken in a little, and the back closure had to be altered. But, not bad - at least I didn't have to toss out the clothes when I donated the doll. Her slippers actually go to another doll, but I hope to make her some soon. After all, slippers are easy !

Crissy has a cool jumpsuit !

Question is - does she work for NASA or NASCAR ?

Must've been all the Herbie "Love Bug" movies we've been watching for Dearest Son, but I wanted to make Crissy a coverall jumpsuit. It's derived from Doll Shop Deluxe - they have jumpsuit patterns, but I haven't bought the pattern packs. So I studied the patterns I have and did pay for, and this was the result. Not a bad fit - even though I don't know where the original design's v-neck went !

I'll probably add some patches to it later, once I decide if I want to go '70's Style', 'High-Tech', or 'Auto Mechanic' with it. Since I have a pattern for zip-front jumpsuits now, I may make her several, and do them all !

You can also see the blue ballerina flats I made to go with her other clothes. Believe it or not, I still have about half a yard of that blue dress left...

This was a kids' t-shirt this morning...

Now it's part of a beach ensemble !

I don't know about you, but I'm about tired of that blue house-dress ! I've made a dress and a pair of shorts for it, but you've seen enough of it already ! Believe it or not, this swimsuit is NOT made from the house-dress. It was a t-shirt our Dearest Son both outgrew and damaged at the same time. So what was left after the damage was cut out went on the sewing pile.

Today, I wanted to make a swimsuit. And I have some lovely stretchy black knit I just bought this weekend. But I figured I'd better try the pattern out first. Snagged the shirt, and voila !

Of course, that's not enough, so I made her a beach bag that *is* from the house-dress, and a pair of 'sandals' that are really just fun foam soles and heels with lengths of ribbon tied and glued. I need to add another layer of heel so she can stand up unaided. Her feet are made that way.

Everything's recycled, from the thread and lace to the foam and fabric. I'm actually proud of that.

After a crushing contest defeat, only more sewing

can cheer me - finally, a success with "20th Century"

*Finally* got something to fit from 'Sewing for 20th Century Dolls Vol. 2', even if I did have to alter the pattern ! And it did cheer me up after I came in either fifth or sixth at the contest...

The blue is a bodice from a sunsuit labelled as Crissy, but is really Velvet sized. Sewed it twice - once for the outside, once for lining. Even did the flat-felled seam, it's where the buttons are, and it was kind of fun. Never did one of those before ! Instead of adding the skirt, I hemmed it with a row of lace, two rows of stitching. It's actually a bit big, so next time I try, I'll probaby just increase it by 112% or so - this one was enlarged 120%.

Skirt is a simple straight one from Doll Shop Deluxe.

About time Isa got something new !

A good suit goes so far...

It's been a while since Isabella got something new ! And she almost didn't. Her top/jumper was originally a reduced version of the CPK sailor dress modelled by Timey Tell on the B5902 pattern review page. Wanted to see if it'd fit Isa's sister, 'Before Once Upon A Time' Belle, so I figured I'd use scrap fabric. A dress salvaged for its buttons got more use on this ensemble.

But it hung on her like a bag. The back was so large, the shoulder seams fell off her arms. Yet with some minor alterations, it fit Isa pretty well. Still, it needed more - it showed Isa's speaker ! So I made a simple DSD straight skirt from the bodice lining fabric. Then made another from the dress material. I love a skirt that goes from fabric to finished in less than an hour.

Some white salvaged fabric (it may once have been a bedsheet or a dress shirt) made her DSD blouse, and a scrapbooking button became a dancer brooch. If you have some larger dolls, check out some of the neat stuff in the scrapbooking shelves - many of my dolls have some neat pins and accessories from there.