Tutorial – How to Make a Cute Sock Doll

Easy to Make Sock Doll

I have been a doll maker for 20+ years and know that it can be quite a challenge when you are a beginner. Making a doll out of a pair of socks simplifies the process in that you don’t have to cut out a million little pieces and sew them together. You do have to do a very minimal amount of sewing which is a big time saver.

In this sample I have used long over the knee white tube socks, but you can use any socks you have. If  the socks have a defined heel that will become the dolls bottom. Tube sock dolls have no defined bottom. You can tea dye the socks to give the dolls some color, or you can buy already colored socks for about $3.00 on Amazon.com. I usually make ethnic dolls and was excited to find brown socks on this site. This sample is a little pale because I was in a hurry to make it and share with you all and didn’t take the time to do the tea dye or Rit dye for more color options.

One sock will be the body and the other will be the arms. First, I cut off the ribbing because this is such a long pair of socks, but if yours is shorter you can leave the ribbing on for the legs. Next step is to mark for the legs and head. Use a marker that disappears after a few days or one that needs water to make it go away. I marked 3 inches down for the head  but again this measurement depends n the size of the socks. Use your best judgment for this. Then I divided the rest of the sock in half to define the legs and body.

Her you see the marked doll with the legs cut and read to sew.

arms and leg marked, legs cut

The arms are about the same length as  the body minus the head. Measurements are approximate because you have a little wiggle room when making dolls. Proportions don’t have to be accurate, it’s all in how you the designer want your finished doll to look. Now it’s time to do a little sewing. Round off the corners of the leg and hands, sew the legs up to the crotch leaving about 2 inches open for stuffing. Sew the arms all the way up, leaving the top open for stuffing.

Stuffed Doll

When stuffing the doll pack it as tight as you can get it. It will soften up later. Pack the crotch with as much stuffing as you can get in. Use a high quality stuffing; I used Joanne’s premium. Cheaper stuffing will make a lumpy unattractive doll. Leave a little space at the top of the arms, don’t stuff too tightly there because you need some movement in the arms. If they are too tight they will stick straight out from the body when sewn on. Now hand sew the crotch closed with a ladder stitch adding more stuffing as you go. Close the top of the arms closed with a ladder stitch also. Use carpet or quilting or some kind of strong thread, and do a running stitch around the neck where you marked earlier. Pull as tight as you can and then wrap the the thread around the neck 2 or 3 times. Take a few stitches in the body, run the thread inside and come out at any point and cut the thread. Sew the arms on about 1/2 inch below the neck so you will have some shoulder but not too much. I always go around the arms 2 times for strength when sewing them on. If you want the hands defined sew a running stitch and wrap like you did for the neck. You can define the feet by folding them up and sewing in place with a ladder stitch or you can leave them as is. 

Marked Face

 See the finished doll body below. The doll body picture should be before the marked face but due to technical difficulties – it isn’t. My sewing skills are much better than my computer skills.

Finished Doll Body

Whew! That was easy wasn’t it? Now it’s time for the fun part; giving your doll her (or his) personality. Take your disappearing marking pen and mark your face. The eyes should be about half way down the face. You can embroider the eyes or use buttons, but not for children under 3. You can paint the face also if you prefer. I used 2 strands of dmc embroidery thread, and I always make a very basic face, because face making in not my forte. You can make a very cute doll without making a complex face. The disappearing marker- or you can use one that washes away with a little water- is your best friend for marking the face.

Embroidered Face

Hair wrapped and stitched

This hair has been stitched on the far end, but it can be cut off the loom and stitched down the middle to make the 2 pony tails described earlier. This hair is ready to be stitched or hot glued around the perimeter of the face. This tool is called “Quick Crafter” and I bought it so long ago that I don’t remember where it came from, but there are other ways of accomplishing the same thing (such as, make your own loom, or wrap around a book, slide it off and stitch with a stabilizer covering the area to be stitched).

Doll hair stitched on Head and pulled back into a ponytail

Tags: cute sock doll to make, dollmaking, fabric dollmaking, how to make a sock doll, quick doll to make, sock doll tutorial

What is a fat quarter?

I was blown away when a couple of people interested in purchasing fabrics from my store, asked me what a fat quarter was. Was I wrong to assume that everybody who knew anything about sewing knew that already? After examining my own sewing vocabulary, I found it was a little lacking too. Especially when it comes to quilting. I have decided that if you in the land of the living, school is always in session. So, I am sharing a few new terms that I have learned just recently which pertain  to quilting.

Before I do that, I must say that quilting is not my area of expertise. However, my children keep giving me quilting books and my collection is such that I feel guilty if it isn’t used.  I may be an expert before the year is out.

Here are my newly acquired quilting fabric definitions;

• Fat Quarter -  a piece of fabric approximately 18 X 22 inches. I say approximately because fat quarters are basically a yard of fabric cut into 4 equal pieces. I sell African fabrics in my ecrater store and many times authentic African fabrics are narrower than others. So when cut into fat quarters the size will be smaller.
• Jelly Roll – a jelly roll is a collection of 40 pieces of coordinating fabrics 2.5 inches wide by the width of the fabric. At first, I thought these are expensive. But when you realize the cutting and coordinating are done for you, they can be well worth it. If you are fabric coordinating challenged like myself, think of the frustration you will save.  If you need inspiration on what to do with them, there is a great book of jelly roll quilt patterns called “Jelly Roll Inspirations  ” by Pam and Nicky Lintott.
• Charm packs – are collections of 5 inch squares of fabric. It’s a popular size for quilters.
• Layer cakes – Layer Cakes are collections of 10″ x 10″ squares of fabric by Moda fabrics, maker of high quality cottons for quilting.  Layer Cakes are available by collection and usually include 42 pieces of fabric, though the numbers may vary.
• Honey buns – Honey Buns are collections of 1.5″ x 44″ strips of fabric. Made by Moda Fabrics, they are available in select collections and are especially helpful for the tiniest cuts in quilting. Honey Buns typically include 40 strips of fabric and are a narrower version of a Jelly Roll.

There are many wonderful books to be found on how to use these fabrics. Amazon.com is a great place to start looking. Signing off for now – in the mean time, keep sewing, quilting, knitting, crocheting – it’s impossible to list them all.

Information for Sewing Beginners

I have been strangely silent on the net for a long time. I am active on facebook though and you can always find me there talking about my latest sewing, knitting, or crochet projects. To catch up on what has been going on in my life, I am happy to say 2 of my daughters have become interested in sewing. It’s something I thought I would never see.  Many years ago when they were pre-teens I gave them sewing lessons with their cousins, but they are just now learning to appriciate the art of sewing.

While surfing the net for looking for fun and interesting sewing sites, I have noticed that there are many people who are just begiining to sew and seem a little lost. I found a free beinners sewing e-book that might be of interest to some of you. It has free projects to practice with, too. I have not read it so I don’t know all of it’s content, but hey! It’s free! Here is the link:

Sewing for Beginners - a free downloadable e-book with 20 different free sewing patterns from super-simple to intermediate, including pillows, clothing and bags. Because every sewer needs a pincushion or two, we start off this collection with three unique pincushion crafts. Pincushions are a great way to use up scrap fabric and add a little color to your sewing room.

In the future I hope to be sharing some great sewing tutorials about pattern making and tailoring. Please join my face book sewing page  to be notified about new posts. In the meantime Happy Sewing and Crafting Everybody!

Three Fast, Easy Small Fabric Purses

Recently I went on a search for small purses to make and found 3 that I loved. They are all easy (maybe 1 is a little more challenging) and require no quilting. I have made one quilted purse, and was excited to use my new spring needle  to stipple quilt the fabric. You can see details of that purse here.

The easiest purse was this cute little number made in African fabric that I sell in my ecrater store. You can wear it on your arm and keep your hands free. Always a plus for me. The pattern is FREE from Butterick.com. It does have a zipper but I think it is easy enough for a beginning sewer to complete. I made this one out of cotton fabric. Cotton is a little bit light for making purses, so I interlined it with organza. This purse could be made with decorator fabric, velveteen, silk dupioni, or light weight wool. Those fabrics have a little more body so interlining would probably not be needed. It only takes 3/8 of a yard for the outer fabric (and about the same amount of lining fabric.)

Small but Stylish cotton fabric purse

Purple and Gold African fabric purse

Sew Simple Bags

My version of Wilson purse

Purse by designer Laura Wilson

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Making a King Size Duvet Cover

Making a king size duvet cover? Sounds very uninteresting. After all, it’s just a big ol’ rectangle with an opening to put your comforter in. I thought it was so simple as to almost be insulting. Wrong!!!

It all started when I heard my son-in-law say to his mother “We only have 1 duvet cover” as if he were apologizing. I thought that will be my gift for this Christmas. Even though I am an avid sewer, I must confess that at first, I looked into buying a set. All the ones I liked were at least $300, which was beyond my budget, even for my dear children. Nothing is too good for our children, right? I can make one, that won’t be too hard.

Ffirst you have to know the size of your comforter. While searching my data bases, I found 109″ x 96″ as normal king size comforter. This is what I’ll go on. Then find a fabric, because width will tell you how much fabric to buy. Many decorator fabrics are $15 and up per yard. If you can find one 110 ” wide, you will only need 3 yards to do the top of the duvet or 6 yards if using the decorator print for both sides. But I couldn’t find any that width that would work for me. There were some at 102″ but you have to piece and double the amount of yardage for one side. So you need 12 yards total and that doesn’t include the shams yet. If the fabric is 45″ wide you need 9 yards for the top and 18 yards for both sides. Three hundred dollars is starting to look better and better. I am signed up to recieve the daily specials at Fabric.com. I have gotten some really good deals from them and they sent a decorator special just when I needed it. A beautiful fabric, pictured below, for $3.99 per yard (a 1 day only special) and 56 inches wide. I was so happy to buy 10 yards (for the top an king size shams only; I still need backing fabric). When the fabric came the print was much larger than I had anticipated, and the fabric had a texture and heavier weight than I thought. Didn’t count on needing extra for matching the print. ARGHHHH!!! It’s no longer on sale! I have been sewing for too many years to get into this kind of delima.

Something told me to look at IKEA’s comforters to check their sizes, because that’s where they bought it. This should have been step 1. All of IKEA’s comforters were 102 x 86 which makes a big difference when calculating the yardage. I cut three pieces 89 inches long and had more fabric left over than anticipated because I bought based on a 96′” length, not 86″ . 

At this time, I have matched the print and basted the 3 pieces together. I found a backing fabric that is 105 inches wide, perfect width, but not so perfect color: white flannel, they only use white sheets. Oh well, who needs perfection? There are 3 nice ways to keep the duvet closed; snap tape, ties, and zipper. The ties appealed to me the most, but I decided on snap tape for convenience and ease of sewing. Ties should be placed every 10 inches and with a king, that’s about 20 ties. Snap tape and zipper are about equal in effort to apply. As this project is not yet finished, there is still more story to tell. I think the ending will be a happy one.

Decorator fabric for King duvet Cover

 I will post pic’s of the finished project as soon as possible. This is the fabric. If you look close at the middle of the picture, you can see the seam where I matched the print with hand basting.

Fast and Easy Crochet/knit Projects

It’s less than 1 week until Christmas and I am working hard trying to make as many gifts as I can without wearing myself out. I beginning to feel worn already. I am thankful to have found some nice easy and quick projects, making my tasks a little easier.

This is a scarf pattern that I made in about 6 hours at the most. It’s stylish ( I think) and free from Lionbrand.com . Just enter crochet scarf in the pattern search section and it will bring up all the patterns in that category. Makes a nice quick gift.

Hand crocheted Scarf

This is the same scarf stretched out

View 2 of quick and easy crochet scarf

I also made a quick tam using Lion Brand Thick and Quick Yarn. It is an oversized tam. I made it for my daughter who has a lot of hair. You can stuff lots of hair in this hat, and it’s warm too. I may seem to be singing the praises of Lion Brand a lot. It’s just a phase I am in right now.  Next week it might be something else. They do have an excellant selection of free patterns. To see more of my favorite crafty links go to Dena’s Sewing and Crafts

Hand Crocheted Tam

Next, I found this wonderful crochet earring pattern at jpfun - stands for just plain fun. It only takes a few yards of  size 10 bedspread weight cotton (such as knit-cro-sheen), shepard’s hook ear wires,  and less than an hour of time. You can make several pairs in an evening. This pair is made in ecru, and I also have some size 10 metallic yarn that I will use to make another pair. Please excuse the fuzzy picture, these earrings just did not want me to take their picture!

Dainty Crochet Earrings

I had to add 1 knit fast and easy project. This dark grey hat is also made in Thick and Quick by Lion Brand as is the tam above.  It took a little longer than the crochet projects, but still less than 36 hours to make.  That’s working at a pretty steady pace.  This pattern is free at Lion Brand.com. To see lots of my favorite crafty sites – many have free patterns visit Dena’s Sewing and Crafts.

I think I am done with knitting  and crochet until after Christmas – it’s time to start baking!

 

Quick and Easy Knit Hat

 

Hello Fellow Crafters!

Welcome to Notes of a Needler at Allcrafts Blogs. I am an avid sewer, knitter, and crocheter, but I love all things handmade. I want to share that love with you.

Right now, it is smack dab in the middle of the Christmas season and I am in a mad rush to make as many gifts as I can before the big day. I always say I am going to start early, and then it comes down to 2 weeks to go and late nights, and I don’t drink coffee.

I am new to to blogging, so bear with me while I learn the system. I will post pictures of my projects as I finish and I welcome your comments, an expert advice and pictures that you may want to send. You can seesome of my favorite crafty links at Dena’s Sewing and Crafts.