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Getting started

I'm Pam, a full time mum, and this is my doll customising journey.

I've been watching doll artist videos on YouTube for a long time. My favourites are Dollightful and Walkercolours. When Dollightful posted a challenge to collaborate with her by creating a doll to be featured in a compilation video, it was the kick in the pants I needed to get started.

I already had a lot of the supplies I needed - watercolour pencils, wool, fabric, sewing supplies and acetone. The only things I needed to buy were the dolls themselves and, of course, a tin of Mr Super Clear.

The posts in my blog are going to chronicle my efforts to learn how to customise, my successes, failures and things I've learned.

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What do I do with a green doll?

The first Monster High dolls I bought for customisation were a set of two from eBay - Clawdeen Wolf and Venus McFlytrap. As I mentioned in another post, I don't have any pastels or airbrushing kit, and I don't really want to invest in them at the moment. So what was I to make of a green doll like Venus? I had two ideas - something to do with plants or something to do with the sea. I did a few sketches and decided to go along a plant-based theme and make her into a dryad. Her hair was in good condition but I wasn't sure I wanted that colour, so I cut it off and kept it for a future project. After the usual prep (sanding down any lines in the plastic, clean face with acetone, take out hair roots, etc) I repainted her scalp in a dark brown and also painted the ends of her arms and legs in brown acrylic paint. I had the idea that she would have the same colouring as a tree, so I used a brush to get lines in the paint like bark. I fully expect the paint to chip off a littl...
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Making skirts

This week I've been working on drawing out some patterns for clothes and testing them out. My favourite so far is this skirt. I used a factory outfit to get the basic dimensions, then worked out how long I wanted the skirt and how high I wanted the waistband to be. The blue skirt, modelled by Catrine, was the basic skirt design I came up with, with a silver ribbon added at the bottom and a bow at the back to hide the velcro stitching. For Draculaura's skirt (...I think it came undone when I was taking pictures... oops!) I shortened the pattern and added ruffles to the bottom and a ribbon at the top and on the ruffles. I pulled threads out of the tweed-type fabric to give it and frayed edge and I used the thread to sew the beige ruffle and the bow on, so that it all matches.   I'm going to try a few more styles with this basic pattern - making it full length, having a high-low hem, a mini skirt and a petticoat - and then will see it I can modify it again to make a ...
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First attempt at boots

My mini-me needed boots - I love brown knee-high boots, especially in winter. I've drafted a tights/socks pattern that I haven't got around to making up yet, but I used it as a base for a boots pattern. I traced it out, making it a little larger all around, then cut it into two parts - the leg and the top of the foot. I found some lovely faux suede materiel that was really thin and easy to work with. I used it to make the boots, including a fabric sole, adding stitching detail around the join of the two pieces of pattern and along the top of the boots. I deliberately made them loose enough that I wouldn't need a fastening or opening anywhere along the seams. The two boots didn't turn out exactly identical, but for a first attempt they were close enough for me to be happy. The next challenge was finding something suitable for a sole. I eventually settled on using a firm foam that had been included as packaging materiel in something I'd ordered. It was handily cut...
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