Props, Panties and Pretties!

I had a very creative week. I was able to carve out quite a bit of craft time, so Blythe got lots of new goodies.

I have decided that I am going to make 2 dioramas to photograph Blythe; a bedroom and a living room. Fat quarter were on sale at Joann's for 99 cents, so I picked out some cute fabric to use in the bedroom.

The table that I made with the relish jar and showed you last week is going to go in the bedroom, so it needed a new table cloth. I had some pretty pink fabric in my stash, so that made it easy. The table needed a lamp, so I decided to make one. I save stuff that I think can be made into something, so that's where I started looking for supplies. I had a cardboard core from a roll of tape that would make a perfect shade. I also had some thin cardboard that I traced the outline of the core on and cut out the circle.

I had a large glass bead that would be perfect for the lamp. I glued the cardboard circle to the bottom of the core. I covered the tape core with the fat quarter fabric and then glued fringe around the bottom edge. I glued the "shade" to the bead using the cardboard circle for it to rest on. And here is the finished lamp and table with the new cloth.

The little owl statue is a ceramic bead. He added just the right touch to the table.

Another prop I made utilized an eraser, 2 buttons and a pushpin - weird combination, but great results. Here's the eraser:

Using wire cutters, I snipped of the metal portion off the pushpin and then glued it between 2 different sized buttons.

Several coats of white paint and clear nail polish were then applied. Yes, nail polish. For small items, I use clear nail polish to apply a gloss coat. It gives you a small brush to use and you don't have to by a big can of clear coat. I buy the cheapest polish I can find and it works great. I also use colored nail polish in the same way. I have another project in the works that I used black polish to paint it, hopefully you will see that soon. Anyway, enough of that, here's my finished prop:

Blythe also got her ears pierced this week! There is a great tutorial here, as well as other customization tutorials: My Delicious Blythe. I made lots of new earrings and added them to my web site:  Blythe - The Big Eyed Girl.  Here's just one pair for you to take a sneak peek,

The panties that came with Blythe were not very attractive and I decided that it was time to make her some new ones.  Here are her original undies:

And now, here are her new ones:

Does your doll need some pretty panties? You can get these, as well as some other patterns on my site: Blythe - The Big Eyed Girl

Last little thing I made was a wreath for Independence Day. After all, our girls need to decorate for the holidays too.

Have a safe and Happy 4th of July!

Frugal Furnishings

As with most Blythe owners, I love to photograph my doll. I prefer to photograph her outdoors. Since I live in Indiana where we have snow, rain, heat and high humidity, that's not always possible.

I want to build some sort of diorama or something to take pictures indoors. I have seen some ideas on-line, but haven't quite decided on what I will do yet. In the meantime, I thought it might be fun to make/find some props to use.

The first thing I made was a couch. I took 2 old paperback books and covered them in faux leather. I glued them together at a right angle and added round beads for feet. I have an Ashton Drake doll and she does not have an articulated body. Her knees bend only slightly, so I wanted a couch that would accommodate that 

issue.

This couch cost me nothing to make because I had all the supplies on had.

The next project was a "trash to treasure" project. I used an empty relish jar for a table. I made a table cloth for it by measuring from the bottom on 1 side, up over the lid and down the other side to the bottom. Once I had this measurement, I knew that I would need a circle, with that diameter, to use as a pattern. One of my saucers was exactly right. I traced around the saucer onto my fabric. I used my serger and made a rolled hem around the outside of the circle. After that. I dampened the fabric and put it over the relish jar. I folded the fabric a bit so it draped nicely and then put an elastic band around it. I let it dry overnight and then removed the elastic. The drapes stayed perfectly.

The silver horse statue is a charm glued to a button. I cut the loop off with wire cutters before gluing it. It was not a sterling silver charm, just some pot metal. The statue and the table project were also cost free as I utilized things I had.

 

The last project did cause me to dip into my wallet. I was at my local Dollar Tree (one of my favorite places to shop) and found a magnet that looked like a TV. It was meant to put a photo in. Instead, I covered the screen with a piece of silver paper.

 

The next thing I found was this little desk organizer. It looked like a mini entertainment center to me.

 I stood it on end and added the TV to the top. I plan on filling it in with other things as I go. I may also paint the "entertainment center" black.

This project has cost $2.00 so far, but I know it will be worth it once I fill it in.

Blythe is in the same scale as Barbie, therefore you can use her furniture and accessories too.  Here is a great tutorial on how to make the plastic furniture look like wood: http://www.dolls-n-daggers.com/Dolls/Forum/index.php?topic=297.0 

If you have made any items for your Blythe doll, please feel free to share. 

In addition to these projects, I made some new clothes for Blythe that is available for sale on my web site.

Blythe - The Big Eyed Girl

Blythe, the Big Eyed Girl

Hi and welcome to my new blog about Blythe. Who is Blythe did you say? Well she is a very unusual looking doll with a VERY big head in proportion to her body and she has HUGE eyes too. If you'd like to know more about her, here's her info on Wikipedia.

I first bought my Blythe doll about 5 years ago. She is an Ashton Drake Pinafore Purple and this is what she looked like fresh out of the box.

I originally bought her because I make and sell sell clothing for various dolls. A friend of mine told me about Blythe and when I discovered her popularity, I decide I would add clothing for her to my sales line. When she arrived, I have to honestly say I didn't like her, but since I didn't buy her for my personal collection, I didn't really care.

After making a few outfits and doing more research on her, I have to say she slowly won me over. I fell in love with this Big Eyed Girl and all of her quirky charm. She is now my 2nd favorite doll in my collection. First place goes to Betsy McCall because I adored Betsy's paper dolls from McCall's magazine as a child.

This blog will be a showcase for my doll and the Blythe dolls of others. I will share some things I have made for her. I will also share other sites and resources I have found for Blythe dolls. If you have one of these dolls or one of the "clones" and would like to contribute to this site, please email me at collieann30@gmail.com.