Four Little Dresses

I told you I had been hand sewing and the following two photos were taken before the dresses had their press studs sewn on. However, I wanted to see how they would fit different dolls before completing them.

The pattern I used is this one from La Boutique de Vaniline, but I lengthened the skirt and changed the neckline slightly on a couple of them. Her 32-33cm patterns are designed to fit Corolle Les Chéries, Dianna Effner Little Darlings, Sylvia Natterer Minouches, Paola Reina Las Amigas.

Here are the dresses are worn (L to R) by my Phyn & Aero Patience, Corolle Les Chéries, Tonner Betsy McCall and Paola Reina Las Amigas dolls. The dress is slightly big on Patience as her torso is thinner, but she can get away with it.

As I have quite a few different doll this size I wanted to be able to swap their clothes around when it came to dressing them, but still keep all the clothes together in one box. I have some clothes meant for this size doll that cannot be worn by them all, and that annoys me, so they will have to go.

Knitwear can also be switched, however, shoes can not. Just look at the difference in the size of the dolls feet, especially in the first photo. It's laughable! It really is such a shame doll makers don't make all dolls this size have the same size feet!

Here are the same dresses (L to R) on my Vestida de Azul Paulina, Minouche, Little Darling and IpleHouse KID Irene. If Paulina was going to wear this dress, I would need to make one just for her with only one centre set of buttons, as the front of her chest is wider. The fit on my KID is similar to Patience, so once again, she could get away with it.

Here are the completed dresses worn by the girls they were intended for. Lucy (Manica) in the white and Barbara in the dusty pink. I'm not sure about the bright pink buttons on Lucy's dress, I think I may change them to white and I'd prefer a more appropriate pink ribbon in her hair, similar to the pink braid on her dress.

And here we have Carolina and Nora in the more subtle vintage colours. I'm going to change the ribbon in Carolina's hair to a deeper and more olive ribbon and perhaps add matching green braid above the lace (if I can find some) as I have on Nora's dress . . . what do you think?

Well time has flown by and still without an end in sight to this current lockdown. I do hope those of you in the northern hemisphere are making the most of your sunshine and freedom.

FOR BARB: Here's a comparison between my Little Darling's foot and Tonner Betsy McCall's. As you can see Betsy's foot is just a fraction bigger, but I tried my LD's shoes on Betsy and they went on, but were a tight fit, so they wouldn't go on over socks or stockings.