A new chair for Jane

You may remember that this is the little chair given to me by my lovely Auntie Mavis many years ago, and I had originally planned on it being in the guest bedroom.  However, since my last post about said bedroom waaaaay back in January, I have changed my mind ~ "oh what a surprise, Sharon!" I hear you say 😉

It really is a sweet little chair made, I think, from oak.  I believe it could be a nursing chair, possibly Victorian or Edwardian.  According to Wikipedia:

"In Victorian times the nursing chair was a low seated partially upholstered chair.  Nursing included caring for children as well as breastfeeding.  The low seat of the chair allowed the mother, who would have been wearing a stiff corset, to interact with small children without bending over."

I hadn't really examined the underside for quite some time, so hadn't realised just how much the old fabric was perishing.  What prompted me to have a good look was all the little bits falling onto the new bedroom carpet!

I don't think this was the original fabric ~ it has more a look of the 1930s or 1940s.  Despite how nasty it was looking when I took off the loose covers, it must have been rather lovely when it was all clean and new.

Although the loose covers were not to my taste, they were made extremely well.  The cover on the back was fastened with a row of hooks and eyes, affixed to cotton tape, down each side ~ no velcro in sight LOL

Ta-daa!  Doesn't the chair look wonderful with it's new upholstery!  The lovely Doris from Orkney Upholstery has done a fabulous job, using a pair of vintage curtains I spotted on Ebay a few years ago.  I never got round to using them in our old house, and the windows here at St Abbs are too tall for them.  They are not an upholstery-weight fabric but as the only person sitting on the chair will be Jane, Doris was happy to use them 😊  

I decided not to do anything about the finish of the wood in the end, other than give it all a good clean and polish before it went to Doris; the wear is part of it's vintage charm and shows how well used it's been over the years.

The underside now looks neat and tidy ~ no more bits of perished fabric falling on the carpet.

And here's the little lady herself 😊 Jane is very pleased with her "new" chair and has a grand view of the bedroom.  Although she still looks like a baby I've had Jane since I was two, so she is at least 59 years old now.  The teddies (Arthur and Fred who I've had since I was a baby, and Archie who was Sam's when he was a baby) hang out on the bed, so Jane has the perfect vantage point to keep her eye on them and make sure they behave themselves 😉

A winter outfit

 

I finished the skirt for Ethel-Maud I showed you previously and as I said, it is a little wider than I would have really liked.  So, as I was getting mightily frustrated trying to work out the best way to make a matching sweater.....

...I decided to just add a bodice to the dress instead LOL  It was simple enough to do and it actually now fits a little better than before.  

And here's the second headband I made.  It's a better fit than the lemon one and looks much better.

I also altered the base of the headband by cinching it in with a few stitches; it fits much more snugly now and the little "knot" sits beneath Ethel-Maud's hair very nicely.  She is very taken with these headbands ~ I can see that I will be crocheting a fair few more in colours to match all the outfits she's hoping I will make 😄  Still, as the headbands make her less self-conscious about her receding hair, I really don't mind.

By the by, it dawned on me the other day that since Norah Wellings stopped production in 1959, then Ethel-Maud is at least two years older than I am! 

Of course a strapless dress ~ even a woolly one ~ isn't the best outfit for winter so I decided to make a frilly capelet to cover Ethel-Maud's bare shoulders.  Again it was a very easy make, done in a similar way to the skirt.

I made a length of chain to fit comfortably over her head when joined into a ring, then did treble crochet stitches (US double crochet) into each chain.  On the second round I put three trebles into each of the previous stitches, and on the third round I crocheted two trebles into each stitch.  I then did two more rows simply crocheting one treble into each stitch.

I think there is a little too much fullness in this capelet, to be honest.  If I make another one (and I suspect Ethel-Maud would rather like a few, of varying lengths, to add to her wardrobe!), I will experiment with the two increasing rows a little. I think I shall either crochet two trebles into each stitch of both the rounds, or do two in the second round and two in every other stitch in the third.

Don't tell her I said so, but every time I look at Ethel-Maud in this capelet all I can think is that if she had a bowl of fruit on her head she would look very much like Carmen Miranda 😄

Winter undies...

 

These vintage knitted undies are indeed "dainty" compared to the set I crocheted for Ethel-Maud last year!

It's not easy to find suitable patterns to fit Ethel-Maud; at about 9.5" (approximately 24cm) tall, she is very much bigger than my dolls' house people but conversely is rather smaller than fashion dolls.  She is also a totally different shape to the latter, being much broader and flat-chested ~ very rectangular, really.  She also has extremely "chunky" arms, legs and feet in comparison to the likes of Barbie or Sindy.  I have crochet, knitting and sewing books for both dolls' house people and fashion dolls, most of which at first glance are proving not to be particularly helpful for making a wardrobe of clothes for Ethel-Maud!  My poor brain is going to have to do a helluva lot of computing to rehash the patterns I've got to make them fit her 😵 

But needs must, and poor little Ethel-Maud definitely needed something to protect her modesty (and keep her warm), so this is what I came up with ~ Adrian thought it was some sort of bikini!  I basically just crocheted some rectangles of half-trebles (US half doubles), using a 3mm hook and some Adriafil Azzurra (a 3/4ply yarn) from my stash.  I then sewed them up to make the bandeau bra top and knickers; I also added a simple picot edge to the knicker legs to make them prettier.

To be honest, whilst they serve a purpose for the time being, they are not ideal as they are somewhat bulky.  Both the bra and the knickers could also have done with being a tad less wide ~ although the latter would have been better had they had a little extra length to the body section!  With Ethel-Maud being made from a velvet fabric, the knickers in particular don't slide up her body very smoothly either.  As I say, they are fine for now but I will have to rethink how I make clothes for her at some point.

Whilst I made the undies last year (just about the only things I did make!), I made the headband last week.  I mentioned in a previous post that Ethel-Maud is rather conscious of her receding hairline, so I had made a flowery headdress which has since been lost ~ hence the simple headband to replace it.  Again, I made this a little too big but have now made her a new one ~ I'll share photos in my next post about her 😊

I have also crocheted a skirt, which I've finished since I took the above photo.  I again used a 3mm hook and yarn from my stash: Zauberball Crazy in Grune Woche.  The variegation of this sock yarn worked out really well and has made a very nice pattern for the skirt, although the finished article, like the undies, could have done with being a fraction less wide ~ I'll share photos when I've figured out how to make a matching sweater 😉  

As a starting off point for the skirt I used a pattern from Miniature Crochet Projects in 1/12th Scale by Roz Walters, which is worked from the top down.  Instead of using double crochet I've worked in half-trebles (US single and half double respectively) for the waistband, changing to trebles (US double) for the body of the skirt.  The pattern called for the first row after the waistband to be increased by working three stitches in each stitch; I thought this would be too bulky so just worked two stitches instead.  I then simply worked additional rows with no further increasing until it was the length Ethel-Maud wanted (in this case seven) and finished with the final row in half-trebles to make a nice hem.   

I've never really done any kind of dressmaking (when I was at school, it took me a whole school year to make a very simple skirt!) but at some point, I think I shall have to overcome my fear of attempting to sew some garments for her 😳  One of the fashion doll sewing books I have, Top Outfits for Teenage Dolls by Nesta Hollis (published way back in 1972), says this in the introduction:

"This is a book written for all ages, from eight to ninety-eight.  We have endeavoured to make the instructions simple enough for the under-tens....."

This gives me hope that even I could tackle the patterns, albeit I shall have to adjust them to take into account Ethel-Maud's very different body shape.  Having looked through the book, none of the designs appear to be complicated and the instructions have been written with the hand-sewer in mind rather than a machine ~ another plus point for me as although I do have a sewing-machine, I've never really got to grips with the thing!  Two of my cousins are very good seamstresses and I'm sure one or t'other would've been happy to give me some sewing lessons.....unfortunately, they both live in Devon so couldn't really be much further away from where I live up here in the Northern Isles 😃

Not only do I have a yarn stash, I also have a fabric stash too (nope, I've no idea why I get tempted by fabric when I'm not a sewer!) so I'm determined to have a go at sewing some clothes for Ethel-Maud ~ as they say, watch this space 😉   

Ethel-Maud: the early days, part two

 Before we start, I'd like to apologise in advance for the blurry photos!  As I mentioned in my previous post, I had to have a good old rootle around to find any old photos of Ethel-Maud from back-in-the-day.  For some reason they are all rather on the small side, so enlarging them has somewhat lost their crispness 😕

The first task called for some rather radical surgery on Ethel-Maud's arms.  Unfortunately I couldn't find a "before" photo; the closest I eventually came across was this one during the rather nerve-wracking process!  

Anyhoo I got them both re-attached the right way round, much to EM's relief 😉 ~ previously one of them (after all this time I can't remember which one it was now) had the thumb pointing backwards.  They had both been sewn back on at some point before she came to live with me.  Even if I do say so myself, they look a whole lot better now that I've had a go at them even though I admit it's not a perfect job by any means!  

To be honest, I was a tad perplexed as to how the arms should be re-attached, as I wasn't sure whether or not they had been correctly sewn back on previously.  It was also quite a difficult job in that the fabric at the top of EM's arms had become a little delicate over the years.  In the end I decided to turn in a tiny fraction more than had been done before just to give myself a little more fabric to sew through.  I guess arms on dolls, especially those made of fabric, do tend to get rather a lot of wear and tear ~ I don't think she minds that they are now a teensy wee bit shorter than they were!  

this photo shows Ethel-Maud's arms before her surgery

With Ethel-Maud being made from velvet, it wasn't as easy to wash her as it would have been had she been vinyl or plastic ~ and I certainly couldn't have given her a dip in the washing machine!  But she finally had a session in the dolly spa 😊

I think she definitely looked a little lighter in colour afterwards, and her eyes seemed brighter too, but the changes don't really show up well in the photos.  I certainly removed at least some of the 50-odd years of surface dirt, judging by the dirty patches on the wash cloth.  I was pretty nervous about cleaning her head because it is made from something very firm beneath the fabric ~ perhaps some sort of moulded card or papier mache.  I took great care not to saturate any part of Ethel-Maud during the cleaning process and thankfully all went without mishap.  I also chose a day that was nice and warm, so she was able to dry naturally and quite quickly.   

I had mixed results with the pen marks on her leg; the red came off nicely but the black is still visible, albeit much less so than before.

As you can see, I didn't have much success in removing the smudged marks from around Ethel-Maud's mouth.  I don't know if someone tried to colour in her mouth for some reason or if the original colour somehow got smudged.  The whites of her eyes look brighter now, although it's a shame that the brown of her right eye had worn away before she came to live with me.

Still, at least she and I know that she had a good cleaning session in the dolly spa, and that made us both happy.

EM seems to be somewhat conscious of her receding hairline, so I made her a pretty headdress a la Frida Kahlo 😊  Unfortunately said headdress has been lost so I will have to make her a new one at some point.

  

I also made her a simple new outfit to replace the hankie-held-together-with-a-brooch ensemble 😉  The dress is simply a very small piece of crocheted ripple; a set of four "peaks" was enough to create the simple sheath.  I crocheted a short length of chains to thread through the front and back peaks, which created a halter-neck effect.  I made the matching shawl using a 7mm hook and treble (US double) crochet, with a simple chain edging. 

Her shoes were another make-it-up-as-I-went along effort.  They aren't the prettiest of footwear but at least they are rather nicer than her old black boots/feet!  I also made a simple little bag for all her bits and bobs using the same yarn and matching ribbon.

All-in-all, I was very pleased with how surprisingly well Ethel-Maud's spa session turned out.  Now I just need to expand her very limited wardrobe.....and perhaps make/find something to keep all those future new clothes in!

Ethel-Maud: our early days together...

Ethel-Maud, with her friends Misty and Bridget, in the craft room

When I happened upon Ethel-Maud all those years ago I simply thought that she was a very sweet-but-sad-looking anonymous little cloth doll, but when she dropped through my letterbox she had a label on her foot from a maker called Norah Wellings.  I confess that I'd never heard of this lady before, so turned to the internet to see what I could find out.  During my trawling I came across a blog called Norah Wellings Journal  by Gillian Trotter, who has apparently also written a book about Miss Wellings.  I decided to email Gill to ask if she could tell me anything Ethel-Maud and this was her response:

"She looks like one of Norah Wellings Islander Dolls. You do not say what size she is but looks to be the smaller size of 8 to 12 inches? Norah Wellings was very well known for her wonderful Islander dolls and they were made wearing a mixture of different national clothing but most commonly grass skirts. However as yours has black shoes she would not have had a grass skirt as that particular model had bare feet. They came in sizes 8 to 36 inches , earliest having glass eyes, later painted eyes. Looking at the label on Ethel-Maud she would have been made from 1940 to 1950's (Norah Wellings stopped production in 1959). The same models were used for many years."

Gill has got photos of some lovely dolls on her blog; they made poor little Ethel~Maud look very shabby and down-at-heel 😟 She was in a somewhat battered condition when I got her, with pen marks, dirty and worn patches and re-attached arms (one of which had been sewn on back-to-front!). She also has a very receding hairline and a rather disfigured face; her eyes are wearing away, her nose is non-existent and her poor mouth has been very badly coloured in. My Sherlock Holmes-like powers of deduction lead me to suspect she was a plaything as opposed to a collector's doll 😉

The photos on Gill's blog also show dolls dressed in lovely outfits but Ethel~Maud arrived absolutely stark naked.....

.....for quite some time she floated around in a rather fetching hankie-held-together-with-a-brooch ensemble!  (By the way, sorry the photo above is a tad blurry.  I had to have a hunt around to find some old pictures of Ethel-Maud, all of which are somewhat on the small side, so they have lost their crispness somewhat with being enlarged!)

Despite her sorry appearance ~ or perhaps because of it ~ I really do love sweet little Ethel-Maud and as you will see in my next post about her, I have tried to smarten her up as best as I can 😊 

2022: a year with Ethel~Maud

Ah, my beloved Ethel-Maud ~ one of my favourite dolly companions 💖  She is named after both my Grandmothers and was one of the first dolls I bought for myself as an adult.  I came across her whilst I was whiling away some time on Ebay ~ oh, it must be getting on for perhaps 12 years ago now, possibly even longer than that!  I know that she wouldn't have appealed to most folk ~ especially my more dolly-phobic friends 😉 ~ but I thought she had such a sweet little face, and looked so sad to find herself up for sale, that I decided to put in a bid for her.  Actually, if I'm honest, after all this time I can't really remember if I did bid for her or if she was a "buy it now" sale.  Either way I know she wouldn't have cost much at all.

When she first came to live with me, Ethel-Maud initially spent her days with all the other dolls in my collection, in the house, so she had lots of company with the baby dolls, fashion dolls and plushies.  It seemed to me, though, that she was a little shy and didn't feel that she really fitted in with any of them.  So she started to spend more time with me and seemed much happier.  I confess that she quickly became my sweet little mascot 😍

Before we moved I knew that I would have to drastically downsize my doll collection, as there just wouldn't be enough space to display them here at St Abbs.  Those that now live in my craft room are all that I allowed myself to keep (apart from a handful that lounge around in the bedrooms) and for some time little Ethel-Maud was out there with them, too.  Now, though, she is back in the house with me and we both couldn't be happier.....oh dear, you don't think that makes me seem a little weird do you 😲

Well, weird or not, I've been thinking that it would be rather lovely for you all to get to know my sweet Ethel-Maud a little better so I'm hoping to include lots more posts about her over the coming year.  To stretch my limited creative capabilities, I have plans to expand her somewhat meagre wardrobe and have already made a start on that.  It would also be nice to take her out-and-about (adhering to whatever Covid restrictions are in place, of course 😉) for some photo-opportunities ~ even being out in the garden would make a welcome change for Ethel-Maud, I'm sure!

Let's hope that 2021 turns out to be a very much better year than 2020 ~ and despite the fact that we don't intend to do anything terribly exciting or adventurous, Ethel-Maud and I are both rather looking forward to sharing this little project with you 😊

I originally published this post about my lovely Ethel-Maud on 1st January last year.  Well, we all know that 2021 turned out to be a pretty duff 'ole year so far as I was concerned and I did nothing with poor little EM at all!  She simply spent the year lounging about on my craft table by my armchair, patiently waiting for me to actually do something with her ~ alas, to no avail 😩

This year, though, I am determined to make a proper effort both with expanding her wardrobe and taking her out-and-about for some photo shoots.  So if you should come across a late middle-aged woman (yes, I am still considered middle-aged at 60.5 years old, apparently 😄) who appears to be playing with/talking to a cloth doll.....that'll most likely be moi!   Don't worry, no need to call the authorities ~ I'm perfectly sane and perfectly harmless, too.....but probably best not to let my kids know you've seen me out with Ethel-Maud, let's just keep it between ourselves, eh 😉

   

I had a chat...

...with the lovely Jolly Molly about my dolly dilemma and as I knew she would, she came up with the ideal solution 😉  She suggested that since I was finding it so hard to decide which of the Rosebuds to let go, perhaps I should downsize the dolls in the plastic crate instead.  She reasoned that since they hadn't been out of said crate since we moved up here nearly three years ago, it would seem that I wasn't as attached to them as the Rosebuds.  See, I keep telling everyone how wise JM is.....but they just look at me as if I'm bonkers 😄   

So that's how I kept myself out of mischief yesterday afternoon.  I rearranged the Rosebuds so that my little collection of Tammy dolls can now stand on the top shelf of the dresser with Bridget and Misty; I've moved Dorelia up there too. 

Talking of Dorelia, she is an interesting little doll.  I've absolutely no idea how old she is or where she was produced.  She's about 10" tall and although she doesn't look too bad in this photo, she really could do with a session in the dolly spa.  She is made from fabric hence my prevarication, despite having had her for about 10 years!  She has been very firmly stuffed, possibly with sawdust, and her face has been given a coating of something that has made it feel rather like papier mache.

The Tammy dolls are from the early 1960s; I believe they were the inspiration for the British Sindy dolls who came out a year or two later.  These two are called Elspeth and Gwenda...

and here we have Georgina and Hester.

I think they are such pretty dolls; I'm glad that they are finally out of that plastic crate!

Of course, the Rosebuds all have names too 😉  Mabel and Agatha now spend their days in the bottom tier of the hanging basket.

On the middle shelf, starting behind the basket: Mildred (sorry, you can't actually see her in this photo LOL), Beatrice, Edith and Evelyn.  And then we have little Cora (sitting in the chair), Constance (with her pet sheep, Flump), Lillian, Gloria, Betsy, Grace and Frida.

Frida is a Violet Waters doll, part of the Gene Marshall fashion doll collection.  I have three more of these larger fashion dolls (one of which is also from the Gene Marshall line) which have, for now, gone back in the plastic crate.  I'm in two minds about whether to keep any of them or not; I'll make a final decision when I'm ready to put the other "crate" dolls on Ebay.

And finally we have Lillian, who is a Judy Littlechap doll.  At about 13 1/2" tall she is larger than the Tammys and also has a more statuesque build, hence me having to temporarily dress her in clothes actually meant for the more stockily-built male fashion dolls!  I don't think the line was as popular as the smaller, 12", fashion dolls and was apparently discontinued in 1963.  Lillian doesn't seem to have been played with that much as she is in pretty good condition.  Apart from her hair, that is!  Goodness knows what's gone on there but hopefully, when I get round to it, a little session in the dolly spa will result in a nicer coiffure 😉 

Not for the dolly phobic!

I have a dilemma, namely do I keep all the Rosebuds or do I downsize my collection?  Of course, my heart says keep them all but buried deep in my head is a small sensible voice that says let some go ~ oh, decisions, decisions 😩

Downsizing my collection will be hard...

...how do I choose which babies to keep...

...and which to find new homes for 😟

What I haven't told you...

...is that I have a plastic crate in the guest bedroom...

...filled with other dolls...

...that were saved from the before-we-moved-to-Orkney downsizing operation😡

And, of course, I would really like to get them out of that plastic crate...

...and display them too 😔

Misty (note to self: the poor little mite still needs arms!)...

...and Bridget (who still needs clothes 😮) take up hardly any space, so they will be safe...

...as will Grace (in the blue dress ~confession time: she is one of my favourites!), Dorelia (at the front), and Gloria.

Jolly Molly, of course, isn't a doll and I won't be parting with her despite me being the only person I know who thinks she is lovely 😉  Perhaps I need to have a chat with JM and see what she thinks.....