Two little dollies forming in my hands in the same time, a boy for my son and a girl for my nice. Finishing the eyes of a doll is a key movement of dollmaking for me. When the facial features are created, the little personality reveals itself. This is a precious moment, when somehow a doll comes to life. That is my favorite moment of creating cloth-dolls. So intimate, so touching moment...
But if the features doesn't work out, the eyes remain cold, that is everything, but my favorite. Sometimes it happens, and my beloved moments change into the most annoying and frustrating ones. And it happened again, of course when I'm making the first doll for my little son. It seems, when working for someone real close, dolls make me to take a roundabout way.
Eye-embroidery was always a mystery for me. I could plan the position of the eyes, the color and the approximate size, but the exact shape, it was determined by someone or something else, maybe by the doll herself. Embroidering on such an elastic, and unforgetting fabric is no picnic, but it belongs to the magic of these handmade natural dolls, I think.
While creating the face of my son's doll, after the long-long eye-positioning procedure, I pulled in the fabric, to create little pits for the eyes. I wasn't happy with the pits, but I couldn't tell what was wrong, since I liked the positioning, so I went on. I embroidered the eyes, and I couldn't see the personality. Such a frustrating thing to happen. I decided to re-do the eyes. And I realized, I accidentally cut the fabric with the threads. So I had to cover the head again. Since the tubing also broke, I decided to restart it from the very beginning, I was completely finished with a head, but I had just a big pile of clean, soft wool before me again.
So I was struggling with eyes, when something marvelous happened, the help came from Fabiola Perez, who is a gifted dollmaker (Fig and Me), in form of this great blog post. She shares sometimes here experience in great mini tutorials, which I'm really thankful for. This time the idea of embroidering the two eyes simultaneously meant the breakthrough for me. I tried two follow her method when creating the doll for my niece, and it worked! I love her eyes! I also found super little, and flexible embroidery needles, with which these satin stitches are much easier.
However, the little boy triked me again. I tried this method when redoing his eyes, but he insisted on me to add one more layer embroidering since he wants to have round eyes. But working with to needles, creating the two eyes simultaneously gives me much greater control forming them.
These two little dolls are being created based on a brand new pattern. They are going to be approx. 20 cm high, and will have simpler body-structure and hairstyles, to fit better in the hands of the smallest. Wish me luck, so I can find more time to sew, to be able to finish these dollies soon.
p.s.: Besides eye-embroidery, as you can see, I tried out myself in hair-embroidery for the first time, and I love it!
While creating the face of my son's doll, after the long-long eye-positioning procedure, I pulled in the fabric, to create little pits for the eyes. I wasn't happy with the pits, but I couldn't tell what was wrong, since I liked the positioning, so I went on. I embroidered the eyes, and I couldn't see the personality. Such a frustrating thing to happen. I decided to re-do the eyes. And I realized, I accidentally cut the fabric with the threads. So I had to cover the head again. Since the tubing also broke, I decided to restart it from the very beginning, I was completely finished with a head, but I had just a big pile of clean, soft wool before me again.
So I was struggling with eyes, when something marvelous happened, the help came from Fabiola Perez, who is a gifted dollmaker (Fig and Me), in form of this great blog post. She shares sometimes here experience in great mini tutorials, which I'm really thankful for. This time the idea of embroidering the two eyes simultaneously meant the breakthrough for me. I tried two follow her method when creating the doll for my niece, and it worked! I love her eyes! I also found super little, and flexible embroidery needles, with which these satin stitches are much easier.
However, the little boy triked me again. I tried this method when redoing his eyes, but he insisted on me to add one more layer embroidering since he wants to have round eyes. But working with to needles, creating the two eyes simultaneously gives me much greater control forming them.
These two little dolls are being created based on a brand new pattern. They are going to be approx. 20 cm high, and will have simpler body-structure and hairstyles, to fit better in the hands of the smallest. Wish me luck, so I can find more time to sew, to be able to finish these dollies soon.
Have playful days!
p.s.: Besides eye-embroidery, as you can see, I tried out myself in hair-embroidery for the first time, and I love it!
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