Red Wellies: Original Artwork #3 – Halying Island Rag Dolls
When I was a young girl my Nanna gave me a doll that had washed up on the beach on Hayling Island, off the coast of England. Where she came from no one knows. She was a rag doll and is my inspiration for the dolls I make. She had wonderfully long limbs, a soft body with yarn hair and a painted face. I treasured her and shared wonderful adventures with her. Unfortunately, I don’t know what happened to her, but she still has a very special place in my heart…
That lead me to forming “Haying Island Rag Dolls” and when our older kids were little, I used to make dolls for them, their friends and sell some too.
Each doll was custom made with same hair and eye color as the child who would be receiving them, together with a heart on their bum containing their initial. Body fabric and accessories could be chosen too. Regular boy or girl dolls, plus fairy or pirate dolls were available.
Just before Christmas I suddenly thought “wow, I haven’t made Frejya one?!” She did arrive 3 weeks early and I had fully intended on making her something before her grand entrance into the world, but somehow that didn’t happen…
In this case, I didn’t want to make a “girl” but a kitty for her.
During naptime, I set about making the doll for her with her sleeping along with me in her carrier 😌
I rummaged in my fabric scraps and found enough to make a doll. I’d made a couple recently for our cousins’ twins, and they were cute, but I wanted a larger, longer version for Frejya.
I do use a pattern, but it’s one I create in my head and sketch on paper/card and sometimes tweak it as I’m making the doll.
Once I was happy with the pattern, I traced it on the back of the fabric, marking with dressmakers’ chalk and cut out the pieces.
Pinning the two sides on the reverse I quickly stitched around the edges of the legs, arms, tail and ears.
Upon turning them the right way out, I stuffed them with Poly-fil before pinning them on the inside of the two body pieces and sewing around, leaving an opening at the bottom so that it can be turned the right side out and stuffed.
After stuffing the body and hand stitching the opening closed, I set about looking at what felt I had to embellish the kitty. I found some for her scarf and hair bow and a little extra to make some roses for her neck and the heart on her bum. All these embellishments were then hand sewn onto the doll.
Finally, I could paint her face using “Tulip” fabric paints and she was finished 😊
I wish now that I’d taken photos along the way, but I will do for the next one I make.
The finished kitty is about 20” long.
It’s my intent to return to making them again on a regular basis, hopefully soon.
Why not try your hand at making a rag doll for your little one, both girls and boys love interacting with their very own rag doll friend
Original content by @redwellies
Such a cute Squishy!
Thank you, she really is :)
I absolutely love this. I was picturing the kitty being smaller, so I'm glad you showed what it looked like next to your daughter. It's adorable. I want to make something like this for my daughter. She has a million store bought dolls, but I know one like this would be special. I also had one that was large, handmade and sort of looked like me with yarn hair growing up. I loved that baby doll. Maybe I will try my hand at making a large one like yours! :)
Thank you! I love hearing that you had a rag doll too! And you absolutely should make one for your daughter, she'll treasure it I'm sure.
If you don't want to make your own pattern, there are quite a few free patterns available if you google it... and you'll have to show me a pic once you've made it :)
Yes, I'm glad to know there are patterns out there. I'll have to google 20" rag doll pattern. ;) Hopefully I can find something. I wanted to make dolls for my nieces a few Christmases ago but ran out of time. I always wait until the last minute. ;) I'm going to try to figure something out!
I SO love this. I have a little girl and this post is a keeper! Thank you for sharing!
Aw thank you :). You need to make her one and share the pic with me :) It's so much fun to see them playing with something that you've made for them.
Very cute kitty. I love how it's the same size as your baby!
Thank you! Yes, it's quite funny seeing that it turned out the same size as her.... As I said in my post I wanted the doll to be larger than I've made in the past and I've very happy with the size.... she'll "grow" into it :) I plan on making her a "doll" at some point and will share that :)
You are so creative and talented I love the kitty in which it could tell a story on its own. This is great as I could not even sew a pillow case.
Ha! I love the thought of kitty telling his own story and I hope that Freyja has many adventures with her :) And I'm sure if someone showed you, you could make a pillowcase - all straight lines lol and then who knows what after that :)
Lol straight lines maybe I could do lol. That kitty story would be really cool.
I'll definitely have to consider that :)
At twenty inches, I think the cat is as long as Frejya. I used to make large puppets when I was younger. People puppets. It was very time consuming. Nice work!
It really is as long as her lol! I'd love to see photos of the puppets and process in a post - that's very cool. Did you make them for work or fun?
For fun. I was a teenager. I made them from foam and material. They were pretty good sized. They looked like statler and waldorf from the muppets. I only made two. We bought the others that we used to do shows.
That's so cool! Where did you used to do the shows?
I was fifteen. We were actually a pretty big deal. My brother and I built a stage from PVC Pipe and material. It was lightweight, transportable, and looked professional. We did community parks, malls, and churches. Whoever wanted us to perform. Oh, senior centers and a school for children with learning disabilities. It was fun and rewarding. We didn't get paid, but that was never the point.
That is even more amazing and awesome. I'd have loved to seen pics of them and the show. Now that would make an interesting post :)
I'm not sure any pics exist. I will have to have a look. We made some smaller animal puppets, but the majority of the shows used the human puppets. I think some of them survived.
👍🏻
@redwellies, it is exciting to see how a memory with your Nana has made such an impact on you and your children. Thanks for sharing with us this important family tradition.
The heart on the bottom is a great touch.
Thank you! The little doll she gave me does have a special place in our hearts and without it I probably wouldn't have thought to make any. She also taught me to sew :)