Since becoming a grandma, I’ve started a yearly tradition of making personalized ornaments of my grandchildren to give to their parents. This year I made Elias (almost 3) and Eddie (almost 2) dressed in their winter outfits. The dolls were constructed the same way as the 4″ figures in my how-to book, Felt Wee Folk.

The cousins are starting to converse a bit and I’m looking forward to eavesdropping on their conversations as they get older. They are still very much in parallel play mode, which seems perfectly natural to me. In fact, I’ve spent much of life in a parallel state, happily focused on my own thing, while others do their own thing.

Making the dolls

The first step was to paint the boys’ faces on wooden beads. Then, I formed their bodies with pipe cleaners, tapestry wool and cotton batting. Stitching their felt clothing was the most fun! For the Elias doll, I copied a navy blue jacket with red trim that he’s been wearing.

The following Stitch Minute video shows the process of stitching Elias’s clothes.

I used silver metallic thread to chain-stitch the zipper on Eddie’s jacket.

When it came time to sew on the hood, I glued a rectangular felt piece to the top of the bead head. That way it would say put while I fussed with a needle and thread. After sewing the front and sides of the hood to the jacket neck, I trimmed the felt piece to fit around the back of the bead head.

Here’s another Stitch Minute video that shows the process of stitching Eddie’s outfit.

I’m already looking forward to making next year’s ornaments! If you want to receive email notices when I publish new posts, please subscribe to this blog using the form below.

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