Birthday Girl Doll with FREE Gift Pattern

Hello Friends,

It's PARTY TIME!

This is my latest design for a Birthday Girl Doll. You may see she is a little different from the other girl as she has a 'built in' skirt, however you can still use the simple skirt to go over the top if your little lady wants to change up her outfit. Her hat and sash are removable, so she can turn into a regular doll once the big day is over.

This doll would be perfect for a daughter, grandchild or niece's birthday. Or how about making one for your daughters  friends when their birthday comes around. I bet they would love to have their own little mini-me dolls who could be best friends too!

You can buy the Birthday Girl Doll sewing pattern in my

Webshop & Etsy Shop (instant download)

And don't forget she has to have her own little birthday gift to open. So I've created the birthday gift as a free pattern so you can use it as an accessory for all of the ELF POP patterns. Just click below for the free pattern.

I know my pattern releases have been a bit sporadic of late, thank you all for being so patient with me. I do have a few designs I'd love to get made. I'm in my last ever semester of Uni before I go on placement all summer and then qualify in September (ekk scariness). Unfortunately this seems to be eating up all of my sewing time. My next release will be a birthday boy design, but I'm not too sure how soon I'll have him out, I don't want to make promises.However I promise I'll add any updates to the Facebook page when I him ready to go. So if you haven't already joined us over there then Please do like us. I love getting your feedback and seeing photos of all your finished dolls.

Dress Up Fun

Hi all,
Hope you are all well and having fun preparing for the holidays. Today I've just popped on with a little snippet from the life of the ELF girls. Recently I've been crazy busy with preparing for my last ever exam  for my degree, eek! However being a parent waits for no exams and it's been nice having a break from study to do one of my most favourite things in the world..... letting my kids play fancy dress! I really love planning and creating their outfits, and often get a bit carried away with myself, can anyone say over-achiever. Well this month Lois had a 'people who help us' dress up day for the end on her primary one (Kindergarten for the US folk)  school topic, and Evie had a fancy dress themed birthday party invite.

Last year when Evie was in P1 she dressed up as a Midwife and she won' best costume'.

I thought I could perhaps get away with using the same costume for Lois this year but she had other ideas. Her request was for someone who wears a skirt. Ok so my first thought was a Nurse, but this idea was poo-pooed by Lois as she "won't win because everyone else is going to be a nurse!"

WHAT HAVE I CREATED!

I racked my brains and thought perhaps a cute Shirley Temple style sailor girl? This idea was poo pooed by their father who was horrified by the short skirted costumes on offer....

BACK TO THE DRAWING BOARD.

I thought about it for ages but could not find a suitable idea, I types the topic into google, pinterest etc. and eventually stumbled across a clip art of a librarian.

LIGHT BULB

I hatched a plan, off to the charity shop to find an old lady skirt. I found the perfect wool checked skirt in the British Heart Foundation for £3. I also got a little jewelled scarf clip for £3, perfect as I was a bit weary of placing a brooch pin so close to her neck. I measured it up, cut, hemmed and resized the skirt to keep the original zipper. The skirt was teamed with a plain white round collared school shirt and a little cardigan. I actually ordered these  Mrs Claus style glasses on-line as an accessory but they didn't come in time, although glad they didn't because they were pretty wide and would've been huge on her face. Luckily i bagged a simple pair of reading glasses from Primark for £1 and on the off chance a mini hair doughnut for 50p, what a bargain. I finished off with a pair of thick white tights and her regular school shoes. You can't really see it too well but she has the little scarf brooch in between the collar at the top button of her shirt. One thing we wanted but couldn't find in time was a spectacle chain which I thought would have been a nice little detail, but hey ho they don't call  us Virgos perfectionists for nothing!

Not that I'm being bias but I think she looks adorable (sorry for the super crappy lighting my house is super dark in the mornings). And guess who won best dressed? Librarian Lois! The best thing is she loves this costume and always wants to play libraries with Evie.



So onto Evies costume, and although I didn't make this costume I just wanted to show off the results of this video hair tutorial I found by Mindy at Cute Girls Hairstyles. If you've seen Disney Brave you'll know all about Merida and her wild ginger curls. Although Evie has naturally curly hair they tend to be more wavy now her hair is really long. I didn't want to put a wig on her as I knew she wouldn't keep it on. So we gave this tutorial a bash and hoped for the best.

This is the curl making in progress complete with her natural hair colour for comparison compare with the finished pics below.

We sprayed on some orange colour hairspray and put on her Merida costume and crown and this is our finished princess.

The whole process literally took around 50 min and that was including 25 min under the dryer. We were super happy with the results with Evie exclaiming that she was "the actual real Merida"and everyone raved at how authentic it looked, so thank you Mindy.

Hopefully this post may inspired some other parents who are desperately seeking ideas for dress ups! If you like this post let me know and I'll try and share other hints and tips for any more dress up days the girls have.

Raynor x

N.B We got the Merida costume in Tesco for £7.50 with the crown, but this is the link to get the same one on Amazon, or there are loads of other cute ones on there and also some cute wee bargain costumes on Ebay.

Olive & Pea Knitted Doll Pattern

Back in 2008 I started out designing toy patterns with my knitted animal pattern shop Jelly Bums. Once I got the sewing bug and started designing the Elf Pop dolls I realised that I'd love to mix my sewing desings with my knitting skills. So for the last few months I've been slowly working away on this pattern and finally finished her over the last few weeks.So here is the knitted version of the Elf Pop Olive & Pea dolls.

Seeing double?

I tried to recreate the sewn version on Olive as much as possible including sizing, so that Elf Pop clothes sewing patterns can be used on the knit dolls too.

Creating a doll was something I've always wanted to do with my knitting but I found the hair can be a bit of a challenge as I don't like the idea of given a doll with yarn hair to a young child. So my main aim was to create everything so it was well and truly stitched in and sewn down so that the doll is suitable for little ones from birth.

You can buy the Olive and Pea doll knitting pattern in my Webshop &  Etsy Shop (instant download).

If you like her feel free to share on Facebook, Twitter or Pinterest.

For the time being I'll be selling the knitting patterns from my Elf Pop ETSY shop, however I may open up a new shop in the future if it gets to hectic. I'll still use the same website, blog and facebook pages to update on both the sewing and knitting patterns.

Over the next while I'll be working away on converting all of the girl dolls to a knitted version so keep an eye out for any updates.

Happy knitting (and sewing!)

Raynor

Snail Sewing Pattern

I've had this little guy on the back burner for a while now that I've been on placement for the last month.  I wanted a boy garden themed doll to match the girly ladybug pattern, and a little snail seemed like the perfect toy. Snipes and snails and puppy dog tails and all that!

We had so much fun taking the photos for this pattern, my little boy didn't want to let this little snail toy go.

  I hope your little ones love the design just as much, I'd love to see some of your creativity using some funky colours.

 

You can buy the snail sewing pattern in my Webshop & Etsy Shop (instant download)

 If you love him feel free to share him on Facebook, Twitter or Pinterest.

 I have two more designs being drafted at the moment, but I'm undecided as whether to bring out some holiday themed patterns instead. I've had a few people ask for Halloween and Christmas themed patterns so I'll get my design head on and the sketchpad out and see what I can come up with. As always I'll keep you all updated with any Elf Pop developments.

Happy Sewing
Raynor

Lady Bug Sewing Pattern

So it has been a lovely summer here in Scotland with temperatures hitting around 30C (86F). This is probably cool for some of you guys but it's like a desert here in our usually freezing rainy country. So recently I've been very garden inspired by spending a lot of my free time outdoors with the kids. So I got to doodling and out popped this little ladybug. Well we actually call them ladybirds over in the UK but i think ladybug sounds cutesy just like this little doll.

This little darling is working those spots!

You can buy the ladybug sewing pattern in my

Webshop & Etsy Shop (instant download)

I can't wait to see what you guys make from the pattern, she seems to be a hit and I'm so glad you all liked her. So if you make a little ladybug then please send on  photos or post them on our facebook page and I'll pop them on the gallery page.

I've missed being immersed in my world of design and sewing whilst back to the day job. At the moment I have two weeks holiday until I start my last placement of 2nd year. Although  I have a yucky  essay to complete I'm trying to sneak in completing my new designs in between. I have an awesome little design coming up next which I'm working away on and hope to have out hopefully by the end on July or start of August. As always I'll let you know when I have any updates on new releases or sneak previews because I know how you love those.

Toodle pip for now

Raynor x

Pug Dog Sewing Pattern

Our 6 year old Evie is obsessed with pugs and has been for the last two years. Whenever we enter a family discussion about the possibility of getting a dog she is insistent that we get a pug. I don't think we are quite ready to let her have her own dog just yet but I promised her I would make her a little pug softie if she helped me design it. So off she set with her pens and got scribbling and this is how she wanted her pug toy to look.

So I set about refining the drawing and creating it into a pattern to make her dog. After a few drafts we finally had the finished toy and Evie already decided that he was a little boy and called Peanut Butter!

 

I was a little indecisive about whether I would release this pattern as part of the Elf Pop range as it's a little different to the other patterns I have available and unfortunately the clothing patterns will not fit his tubby little tummy and stumpy legs (although I'll let you know how to adjust the new skirt pattern so it can be used for the pug too). However I thought perhaps it would be nice to introduce a few different designs and also I've had a few customer requests for a pug too.
I've decided that since Evie actually designed the toy, that for every pug pattern that sells she can have the money to save up. She has informed me that she is going to save for a pug puppy. I don't think she quite grasps how expensive they are but I figured that as it would take her at least a few years do so this she will (a) be older and more responsible to actually care for a dog or (b) have lost interest in them altogether yet have a little bit of savings for when she's older.

Want to win a copy? Then enter here
 
You can buy the pug dog toy sewing pattern from my

Webshop & Etsy Shop (instant download)

If you are making it for a child who is older than three or an adult then I'd recommend using some plastic toy safety eyes as I think it would give a more realistic look to a pug and their little sticky out eyes. I love toy safety eyes because they are perfect if you aren't comfortable with painting or embroidery, however please don't use them if there is a possibility they will be gummed by a small child or chewed by a pet as they can be a choking hazard.

I hope you like this pattern and if you make any of these little tubby pups then remember to show them off, or if anyone has a real life pug and can take a photo of the dog next to a finished pug toy, it would literally make Evie's (and my) year. 

Oh and one last thing, my apologies for the delay with the boy freebie, I got a bit carried away with this pattern and so i'll be working on it over the next few days and will have it available by next week so rememeber to keep an eye out for any news on a release date.

Happy Sewing

Raynor x

FREE PATTERN: Simple Doll Skirt

Yay, the very first Elf Pop Freebie has arrived! I'm going to share the instructions on how to make your very own simple little skirt for your girly dolls. These are super quick to make and can be whipped up in about 20min. Have an off cut of a fat quarter you've had stashed away but never found any use for? Or how about another excuse to add to your repertoire when questioned 'you're buying more fabric?', well yes darling little Sarah needs at least 10 new skirts for her dolly.

These are the skirts I've whipped up for my girls dolls, they even chose their own fabric. Amber and Violet  are kindly modelling them for me.

 
For this skirt  I used the Light Pink Bo Peep & Miss Muffet from the Nursery Rhymes Collection by Vita Mechachonis which was a medium pattern print. By the way this Violet doll is another version I made to possibly replace the original Violet doll? What do you guys think, change to this one or keep the old verison?
NB Just as a side not if I ever update any of my patterns I will always make the newer version available free to those who have purchased the original prior to the update.

For this white skirt modelled by Amber I used Princess Kingdom Natural by Alexander Hendry which was a large pattern print-(probably a little too large for this pattern but would look so sweet as a child's skirt.

These skirts are perfect for dressing up your little dolls as well a fun way to provide some manual dexterity for little fingers. Be warned your little girls will want you to make as many of these as possible and they will change them often, and they will still fight with their sister over which skirt belongs to whose doll (or maybe that's just my girls?)

So you want to make one right? Click below to access the free pattern (PDF file)

I hope you enjoy making these little skirts and as always I want lots of photos sent in the me or the Facebook page please I want to see all those lovely fabrics.

Oh and before I forget, this freebie is one for the girls but I'll be releasing a boy themed freebie within the next week so remember to look out for any updates on the boys freebie.

Happy sewing everyone
Raynor x