This post is for Little Jenny Wren…

If you have ever visited her blog, you would see the beautiful dolls she creates. Not long ago, she posted a vintage pattern for a Holly Hobby Doll , and it looked so wonderfully familiar.

My grandmother sewed most of her clothes from a young age. She made beautiful taffeta and organza masterpieces for her only daughter, my mom. And when my sister and I were young, she made many of our very 70s style clothing. She would come for long summer visits, we would pick out fabrics and materials, and she would begin a sewing marathon: everything coordinated – jumpers and shirts and skirts that could mix and match.

So I learned to sew from her, even inheriting one of her machines for my first sewing projects. I made my confirmation dress of a white dotted swiss material. And my first dress was made for the first day of junior high. I loved that dress, and I still have both of them. It took me 3 tries to make the collar of the junior high dress because I kept clipping through the seam when I tried to clip the curve.

But even though I was 13/14 at the time of this dressmaking, I still enjoyed dolls. Not so much to play with, but I appreciated them, enjoyed having them.  And I made the very doll that Little Jenny Wren posted the pattern for. I think I enjoyed the wardrobe aspect of the doll the most, and this doll had lovely dresses and aprons and underwear and shoes.

With things packed up for the move, it took some doing to dig these out. And there wasn’t much time for spending on pictures, but I snapped a few – they are not great, but I wanted to share my doll.

Her head is made of a white child’s sock. This is very similar to the way we make Waldorf dolls here. We use a gauze tube, or an old childs sock, or a bit of torn pantyhose to shape the head and hold the stuffing, and then we place the “skin fabric” over this bit. This doll simply has a head made of a sock. And the body is made of cotton. Waldorf doll bodies are made of the same knit skin fabric. My doll was stuffed with the only thing available to us at the time.. a hideous chunky polyester stuffing. This stuff was in cube like shapes, and one side of the cube had a smooth, shiny, stiff surface. Which means the stuffing is sort of boxy. When I learned to make Waldorf dolls, I was so in love with the wool stuffing – no hard edges when you go to give your doll a hug.

I was making this purely on my own, with only the instructions as my guide… no course, no previous experience, no one to help me. I think she turned out okay overall, but today, I can look and see where my mistakes were.

This doll has button eyes, which is also different from Waldorf dolls. Usually, they are embroidered on, very simply. This doll has embroidered features – mouth, nose, eyebrows – much more detail than you see on a Waldorf doll. You can also see I used pastels to color her. I think I was always a bit disturbed by her paleness – she is so very pure white. So a bit  of chalk in a peach color for blusher helped make her look more alive. To my grownup eye, it makes her look  a bit gaudy. And I was fascinated by freckles from an early age, often using my mom’s eyebrow pencil to freckle my own nose. This doll has a smattering of freckles too.

She had bloomers and a slip with lovely beaded edging with a blue satin ribbon threaded through it. She had an everyday blue dress with white pinafore with tiny buttons for trim. And a fancier green dress with tatted edging and a peach pinafore. She also had some accesories borrowed from my mothers old dolls. Like the umbrella – wooden handle, opens and closes, and still looks lovely almost 60 years after my mom played with it.

She had a stole, which also came from my mother’s things. And black felt shoes which I made. One shoe stretched a bit over time, and kept falling off. I could not find it for the photo, which makes me wonder if I lost it a long time ago, or if it just somewhere at the bottom of the large trunk where she lives.

Stitches were made in the hands to delineate fingers… another detail left off in a Waldorf doll…

Her only current shoe, with a button for a buckle.

I would love to find the pattern for the doll at my mom’s house. And someday, I think I would like to either try again with the pattern, or perhaps simply renovate this doll.  On the other hand, I also think I would love to make another Waldorf doll and dress her up. (I know so much more about doll making now, although I am certainly no expert. Getting the stuffing packed in firm enough is still one of my weak points… I always wished I had made it just a bit firmer later on.)  Make her a wardrobe. I made dolls for all my boys, and they are very clearly loved and bedraggled. I sometimes think I just need to freshen them up, but on the other hand, all these dolls in their battered state represent love and care and childish joy. To remake them and make them pristine again seems wrong somehow…

So maybe, in my new house, in my new sewing room/office, I will make my very own grownup play toy – and use all my scraps of lace and trim to make her a smashing wardrobe. Who knows…