American Girl Doll Clothes and Sewing with the 7 Year Old

We got our 4-year old a Julie American Girl doll for Christmas. We had a 6" Julie, but she somehow she got lost in a pile of laundry and went through the dryer, which melted part of her hair together. The 4 year old had been so good to little Julie - except for the dryer - that we thought we'd get her a big Julie. Big Julies don't get lost in the laundry pile, right?

So, of course, the first thing Julie needed was some PJs, and I had an old T-shirt that was the perfect color. We couldn't find butterfly ribbon, but picked something the 4-year old liked.

I used and modified a PJ pattern from All Things with Purpose.

As we went through fabric scraps, we found an old bandana from a cowgirl birthday, and thought it would make a great cowgirl dress. After debating, I used a peasant dress pattern from Call Me Crafty Momma (I found the instructions to be overly confusing, but the shape/size is right). The little dress needed a belt, so we made one out of felt. It still needs a belt buckle.

Then, I was just messing around with scraps and made some little Christmas skirts, 2 for my girls and 2 for our little friends and their dolls.

As we were sewing along, our 7 y.o. wanted to sew, too. Calling her crafty is an understatement, so I thought we'd give it a try. She really liked it. (Wow my chin looks really pointy in that picture!)

I thought it would be easiest to start with a tube skirt.

Then we moved on to an a-line skirt, but I goofed up my measurements and it didn't work out.

Then we moved on to a pillowcase dress.

She wanted to make one for her friend, but I was helping her pick out some stitches, pulled the fabric and it just fell apart. I think the fabric was pretty old (or else I'm really strong, ha).

Instead, she just made her friend a skirt from a leftover Christmas goody-bag we had, just like the red one up above.

Her next project is a peasant shirt, but I think she's a bit bored of sewing for now.

My next project is a corduroy A-line skirt and then a sailor dress.  And maybe to clean up the sewing room.

I've been keeping a Pinterest board of the patterns I'm finding, so check it out!  There are lots of great links (including free patterns) out there!

And P.S. I read somewhere out there that if you use a little bit of water on the doll's curly hair, it helps, and it TOTALLY does!  Then if you curl the damp hair around some sort of tube/dowel it will curl it (10-15 seconds) - and that works too!  Looks great!