Ok, I was up in the Carolina mountains for two week and what an enjoyable time that was. My friend Elaine and I drove up to Burnsville where our other friend, Shirley has a cabin.

We quilted, made custom pillow cases, I made doll clothes and blocks and cooked etc.

Here is a pic of the slopes that I walked up and down every day.

I had two friends who accompanied me everyday. Going down the mountain wasn't bad but coming up was another deal. I would have to stop and breathe and the dogs would run up and wait until I reached them and then run up and wait until we all got back. Then I would sit on a rock like a toad and relax for a few and give my new friends a treat. I can't decide who they liked best, me or the treats. I never found out their names, I called them puppy. If I wanted to see them, I would yell out puppy, puppy and they would come tearing down their mountain lol.

I was told that these dogs were abused and they didn't go to anyone easily. Here is what awaited me every morning when I opened the door. The bottom pic is a view going down to town.

My friend Shirley is such a kind and generous soul. She made us each a handbag and a bear. Here is Jackson. The pic got exposed a bit but I have better pics of Jackson. He must be about 32 to 34 inches tall. He is made out of mohair and he is just stunning and elegant. I tied one of my painted wooden doll beads around his neck. He likes dolls. He looks great in my dinning room chair doesn't he? lol

Here is one of the dolls she gave me. Head, arms and legs porcelain and body cloth. I think her name is Kahlie.

Here is Jackson and Kahlie. He likes Kahlie.



This is Hilary, she is another present from my friend Shirley. I took the clothes I made for her off so I can sew the buttons and snaps on. I will post pics of her dressed, later.

Here is a close up of Hilary. Shirley is a beautiful face painter.


This is Jennifer, another present from my friend Shirley. She is also a large doll. I will wig and dress her later. Shirley supplies all the wigs, shoes and accessories too....don't hate me. I can't help it if I'm sweet. lol.

I love the pigion toe look. Her legs can be made straight too. Here is a close-up of her lovely face.

More later.....

I made these cute little dolls...

I am so disappointed that blogger has lost over 2 1/2 years of my images and a lot of them were tutorials and I don't have the time nor the know- how to put them back.


I have started another Maggie Bessie to replace the tutorial of the last one and also because I miss the pink one that went away. This MB is enlarged to 24 inches and the pieces parts of the arms and legs are joined as one. The rest of the pattern remains the same.


I sewed up the legs, arms and the body. I stuffed them all halfway and sewed a line accross the point where they were seperate pieces. The body, I sewed a containing seam accross to keep the stuffing in. Then I mixed, modeling paste and gel medium (Liquidtex) half and half. I basecoated and waited 2 hours. I then applied five more thin coats after an hour or so of drying time. In the last coat I put some more gel medium to give me more time to blend the strokes. She is drying in the sun now....

I am using the same pattern from Bradly Justice that you can get here:

E-mail Address(es): shawstein@aol.com

Somehow by changing templates in blogger, I lost two years worth of pictures. I replaced my last post but I just can't deal with the rest. I have switched back to my old template but the pics haven't come back. Maybe they will, I don't know....

Maggie is ready to travel to Houston tomorrow. I made her stockings and her shoes. I altered her dress a bit. I made the sleeves longer and put pin tucks in her drawers and slip.







I made her shoes out of wool. I fused two pieces together and put a cardboard sole inside and they look good.


The stockings are out of some real stocking looking material that I picked up a long time ago. I tied some of that thin rolled elastic at her knees and rolled the stockings over it.





I am pleased with her now



If you just love this doll like I do and would like to make your own, get it here: shawstein@aol.com

I have finished the Maggies. Here they are all naked and fat.



Here they are wearing their long underwear.




Here they are in their slip...



And taa dah! all dressed with bonnet. I am making the other bonnet as we speak....

UPDATE: I have finished the clothing for the Maggies, except for the bonnets. I will make those out of buckram. The clothes are sooo cute. I really love these dolls and it will be hard to part with one but I must.
Here is the underwear:
Here are the dresses:

I sprayed them with a matt varnish and put them in the parlor to cure for a couple days before stringing them up and dressing them.

I am dying to make a bigger one. I will make a life size Maggy, I just decided that. One would think that I really like this doll wouldn't they?

For full instructions and complete pattern to make this doll, get it here: shawstein@aol.com

I have been working on two Maggies Bessie dolls. Most of you know about this antique and much desired cloth doll. It's wonderful to be able to get a pattern and make her yourself. I have been waitng months to get this pattern and finally I have it in my little piggies lol.

I have been lucky enough to hear about Bradley Justice, who has done extensive research on this doll and finally he has drafted the most authentic pattern I have seen up to date. It is exactly like the Maggie Bessie with all her pieces parts.

I have some pics to show you so far. Here they are with all their pieces parts. This doll is made very different from any other rag doll. The arms and legs are in two parts. The head and shoulders are attached in a unique way also. Here you can see that the fingers are molded. They are made in Kona peach tone cotten.

Here, one coat of gesso has been applied to the lower arms and lower legs and the head and shoulders. They are on a drying board in the sun. You can see that the toes are now molded also.


Here, they have been sanded down smooth (actully rubbed down with a very fine sanding cloth, just enough to take the grain down. ) A second coat of gesso has been applied.

I am showing the sanding cloth and the nice large brush and liquitex gesso. One must have the correct tools to work with lol.

I have put them in the sun again while I mix the flesh colors. I will give them two coats of the flesh and wait 24 hours for the acrylic to cure and then I will proceed with the painting of the face and hair. Hopefully I will get started with the dress and underwear while I wait lol. I will keep you posted of the progress.

If you make your own dolls and would like to purchase this pattern, you can order it here.

mailto:shawstein@aol.com

Another short little post. The group I belong to was talking about also making something for boys. We found a cute Sumo Wrestler and I found this cute cowboy by EPB. I made him up real quick today. He is about 7.5 to 8 inches tall....soooo cute.

He is made with stips. Just a strip for all his parts, cut and sew and stuff...pen and ink features and color cheeks and done.....

This is another pic. The camera did a wierd thing. It took the cheeks and made it 3-d, like it's floating.

This is Twirl, she is not quite done. I still need to make her two horns for the side of her head lol.

She is a wall or hanging doll. I hung her in the tv room, it matches her perfectly.

Ok, I'm back and I finished my little project. This little cutie is called, "Dollscape" It is a little fairy in her swing, sitting inside her own landscape.

Here is a close-up.

First you cut out a picture frame shape, backing and two piece of batting. Sew it all together and do a little quilting. Then you make the inner landscape with crazy patch (well, that's what I did) and then add beads etc. In my case, I added fabric beadz and glitter paint etc.


Here is the inner landscape:
Then you sew the inner landscape to the background frame, add the swing and the hanger. I used the beads you buy by the yard. Set your fairy in it. The fairy is so small that you just wrap her in wired ribbon or anything, underwear and all to make her decent lol.

I am uploading a rose for you today so you don't think I have deserted you. I am working on something really neat and that will be up today maybe...This rose is out of my garden.




On another note: Here is a 1920 antique doll from an old McCall pattern. I had her all sewed up and just laying around for some time. She she is pen and inked and then put together and stuffed. I love her look. She would be a great inspiration for a 3-d doll.

I have been playing around with sculpting faces and they all look like trolls lol. Anyway, I had this doll pattern of a long skinny wall doll. I decided to enlarge her and sculpt a face for her. I didn't like the face or the doll one bit, so I decided to just mess her up good. Here she is.

A sewing lesson: When changing a pattern and enlarging or reducing, some minor hands on alterations must be made to the pattern also. For instance: her hips were way too wide but too late for that now. I took a piece of muslin and bound her hips up, just like they used to do in the olden days when you had a baby lol.

Here is a close up of her face. I am actually proud of this first good sculpt that doesn't look like a troll. Because it's a beginner face and it wasn't perfect, I decided to glitter her up and make her somewhat of an art doll. First I used several colors of Cray-Pas, they are an oil pastel by the Sakura Company, they also make those great Identi Pens and jelly roll pens which are permanent. I just colored all over her face with the Cray-Pas and blended with a rag on my finger. Then I outlined and did the eyes with the Identi- Pen and colored in with the jelly rolls. I then put Sealer (DAC) all over her face and put the the other goodies on.

Here is a side view of the left side. I used Glamour Dust (DecoArt Americana) (DAC) on that side and did the hairline in Craft Twinkles Writer (DAC). Also the the buttons.

Here is the right side. I used Golden Treasure Glitter (DAC), (from the paper perfect line).

I beaded the tops of her ballet shoes with Fashion Beadz (DAC) and painted the bottom a wine color using the fabric paint line. Then I used the Twinkles writer to make the staps and also did the designs on her arm, hands and legs with the gold Twinkles writer.

Her dress and vest are batik and her bloomers and blouse are some expensive fabric I found at the sewing studio lol. I tied ribbons on the arms and legs and cut two crochet dollies open to use for the lace on her bloomers. Her hair is a fake fur I found at JoAnn's.

FYI: I love Identi- pens. They do not dry out as long as you put the cover on when done. they don't bleed and they have two points. One to color large areas and one for finer detail. You can find these pens and the Cray-Pas at an art supply store or go on the web and just type the name in. They also make a neat glue pen. Just make an outline and add your favorite glitter, like an eyeliner etc. For finer detail like pen and ink and color washes, use their Pigma Micron pens which I also find to be much better than most I have used.

If you are afraid to use paint to paint faces. Use the pens. Anyone can paint a face.

Here is Victoria, all dressed except for her shoes. I used a Pasely fine cord and pulled two color from it for her bow and piping.

I am working on a new doll. The name of the pattern is Victoria by G.P. Jones.



It was a dreary raining day today and I didn't even notice it go by as I was happily doing my dolly. Here is Victoria in her underwear.

Victoria is about 12 inches tall. Her hair is done with pen and ink and color washes (DecoAmerican Fabric Paints). Her face is painted with the same fabric paint line. Here she is in her chemise top.

Her chemise is suppose to be two pieces but she insisted that I make it in one piece and so I did. I didn't feel like arguing.

Here is a close - up of her face. I did the outline of the hair and scratched in some hair and while it was curing, I did the face then went back and did the two color washes and shaded with Burn Sienna.



I will try to work on her lovely clothing and bonnet and shoes tomorrow. It will probably take all day.

I thought I'd get a jump on Easter and make my Rabbit doll now. This doll has been in the making for the past 10 years lol. It started with MaryJane asking me to make her the Rabbit doll so I made two but only finished hers. Here she is naked.

Here she is all dress in her crow dress, wool jacket and lace collar and red bow. The tiny bunny in her lap is a Kate Erbach design, he is adorable.

Her name is Blanch and she is 42 inches tall.

This doll is another challenge with my Yahoo Group. The doll is an Antique pattern inspired by a doll call the Presbytarian doll. One of the members made a pattern from her orginal doll and shared it with us. Here she is in her underwear.

I signed the back . Her hair and face are painted with DecoArt fabric paint. This is a very simple rag body. I had to sew a seam accross the neck to take out the crease that it formed. I stuck to the pattern except for adding a butt and changing the hands a bit.

Here she is in her dress. The pattern for the dress came with the doll, real cute old fashioned dress.


Here she is with her bonnet on.


And a close up. I really like this doll.

I will add in the latest of the Hitties. I did the hair in Curley Chenille and painted the shoes in DecoAmericana fabric paint. I might paint some socks later.









To continue with the Hitties. Here they are all dressed. I dressed then in Vintage Aunt Gracie. Now for the hair shoes and hat....