How to Sew a Basic Doll

Hey there! In this instructable, I am going to show you how to make a doll.

The style is one that my siblings and I use whenever we make dolls, I have perhaps fifty dolls made in this way. Making them is very fun to do and they last a long time. We, my siblings and I, took our dolls out into the snow, put them in the washer, made them collect things outside and build a mud/stone wall, and they still are in good shape!

Let’s get started!

You will need:

Felt - for the skin and hair

Thread - you may want to use colors that match your skin tone and hair colors

Fluff - for filling the doll

A needle

Scissors - thread and/or fabric scissors

Note: The doll I am making in the instructable is modeled after a fictional character of mine. You can make yours somewhat different by changing the hair and anything else you may want different.

First, cut out your head, arms, and body, like in picture one.

A good body size is five and a half inches tall, and three and a fourth inches wide. The arms can be one and a half inches wide and three inches long. If this is too short or small, feel free to customize the sizes to your own liking. I attached the pattern below.

Tips:

Make sure your doll’s head is not too big for the body (unless you want a big head doll). A good way to make the head perfect sized is to cut out a square that is about half an inch skinnier than your doll’s body width. Then just trim off the edges until it’s a round circle.

Also, if you cut your doll’s arms the same length as your doll’s body, they should fit nicely. Don’t do this tip if you intend to make a tall doll with very short legs.

First, choose one leg and scrunch the bottom of it. What I mean by that is, just do the running stitch at the bottom, pull the thread tight without popping it, and make a knot so that it doesn’t come undone. (Picture one and two)

Next, stitch up the leg just until you reach where the legs meet. Sew a few stitches up the back, then sew down the leg that isn’t sewn. (Picture three)

Scrunch the bottom of the leg and knot off.

Starting where the legs meet, continue sewing up the back. When you reach the top, knot off and flip your doll inside out.

Stuff your doll’s body and legs with fluff. Make sure to get the fluff to the very bottom of the feet, or else the feet will feel empty.

When you finish stuffing the doll, scrunch the top so that no fluff will come out.

Sewing the arms is really easy, but it’s one of those things my siblings and I dread doing.

First, scrunch the bottom of the arms, then fold it in half and sew up the side of it. When you get to the top, don’t cut your thread unless you’re basically out. Instead, flip the arms inside out with the thread still on, fill them up with fluff, and sew the arms to the body.

Do this for both arms.

Start by scrunching around the whole head. Pull it tight and knot the back. (Picture two) Now, feel free to add a face to your doll’s head!

To sew the head on, start by stitching around the head (Picture four). After you finish that, wrap the thread on your needle around the head. This gives it a neck look.

Lastly, sew on your doll’s hair. Feel free to do yours however you want. Like I said earlier, the doll I made for this instructable is actually a fictional character of mine, so I already had an idea of what he was supposed to look like.

However, for his hair I took a strip of brown felt and fringed it. Then I sewed it to his head, and cut it shorter in the front.

Note:

My siblings and I have three main ways of sewing hair (which are the three other pictures to the side). We call them styles the Fringe (picture two), the Cabbage (picture three), and the Boxy (picture four). These are all easy styles that are fun to do.