While cooling off at the beach, Joan tells Maryellen she should stick with the science club if she enjoys it, even if others disagree. Joan also tells her siblings that she really wants to go to college, and have a simple backyard wedding instead of the fancy one Mom is planning. Maryellen suggests that Joan and Jerry live in the Airstream so they can afford college tuition for Joan. They have a simple wedding ceremony and party in the backyard the next Saturday. Joan plans to start college in January.
We wish we had dolls of Maryellen's whole family so we could act out the wedding!
Thanks for reading my blog! In this post I will explain for I made a bed for a mini Addy Walker doll. First, Here is a video of the project too!
Learning our History
Queenie received the next doll in the historical lineup! I was excited to learn about Addy's story. I was so glad for this way to gently introduce the topic of slavery to my sensitive children. We bought the audible book on Audible, and Addy's story is so far, my favorite story of all the historical dolls. Her struggles are real, and I felt the author did a good job of showing the young readers how horrible it was to be a slave without exposing them to too many of the harsh realities of that life. The hardest part for us to listen to was when Addy's father and brother were sold to another slave owner. She was so worried that her work suffered, and she made mistakes. As punishment, she was forced to eat the worms that she missed picking off the tobacco plants. The description turned our stomachs. And while this is a mild punishment compared to other ways that slaves were abused, I felt it was strong enough for a child to understand that slavery was a horrible thing. As Addy's story continued as a runaway slave, the readers are brought along as she and her mother struggle to make a life for themselves. Addy learns that, as Uncle Solomon says, "freedom ain't free." This video from American Girl introduces us to Addy and her story.
We learned so much from Addy's story! Here are the summaries from the children:
(I will add summaries from the children later)
Crafts for Addy
To make mini Addy's bed, I used wooden clothespins, large popsicle sticks, tacky glue, hot glue, watercolor, a drill, and string. I began with 4 clothespins, and cut two of them down to 3 inches to be the pieces at the footboard. Then I cut two large popsicle sticks 5 inches long, and glued them together into the gap between two of the clothespins. Do this twice, to form the head and the foot of the bed.
I also cut large popsicle sticks to form the rails of the bed. I cut 2 three-inches, and 2 five inches. I glued them together with the shorter pieces at opposite ends. Make two rails this way, one for each side of the bed.
Once your pieces are dry, mark on them where your holes will go for the rope supports. Here is a picture of my bed with the rope supports in place.
My holes at the head and foot of the bed are 1/2 inch away from each post, and 1 inch apart. On each side, the holes are 3/8" away from each post and one inch apart.
Yours may differ from mine, but it doesn't matter, as long as you mark your drill holes evenly. It's important to drill your holes before you glue the bed together though! I did not drill mine first when I made Caroline's bed, and it was very hard to drill them afterwards. Not impossible, but harder.
Now you are ready to make the headboard. I make my headboard patterns by folding a piece of paper in half, drawing half of the pattern on the fold, and cutting it out, to make sure that the shape is perfectly symmetrical. You can draw your own pattern, or use mine. Print it out on regular 8 1/2 x 11 paper or cardstock. (Cardstock is easier to to trace around).
Use the pattern to trace it onto Balsa wood. Then cut it out using an Xacto Knife and gently sand the edges smooth with light grit sandpaper or a nail file.
After you drill your holes, it's time to glue the bed together. I carved a slit in the posts to have a space in which to glue the rails. Wood carving tools can be helpful for this step. I bought a cheap set at A.C. Moore, found in the wood crafting section. Next, glue your headboard into place. You may have to sand it a little, or add a little extra glue to get it to fit just right. I also added some little bracket supports made from balsa wood to my bed structure, glued in just under the holes for the string.
When you have glued the side rails, supports, and headboard into place, your bed's structure is complete!
Now it's time to stain the wood! I bought a little tube of watercolor. Play around with it on scrap pieces of balsa and popsicle stickes and clothespins. Each piece of wood is different, and so the watercolor shows up differently on each surface. Play around until you get the shade you desire for your bed. Mine came out darker than I would have liked. I probably needed a different shade of brown paint. But OH WELL!
Addy's Mattress, Pillows, and Bedding
To make the mattress, print and cut out the pattern on cardstock.
Then trace it onto fabric and cut two pieces. Transfer the marks for where you will sew tufts into the mattress. Sew all the way around the edge with a 1/4" seam allowance, leaving a space open for turning. Then fold the fabric like shown in this picture.
Mark a line 1/2" long at each corner.
Sew along the line at each corner. When you open the mattress fabric and turn it right side out, you will have created a corner which will give the mattress 1/2" thickness. Stuff the mattress with pillow fluff or several layers of batting. Then you can hand sew or machine sew the stiches on the dots to create tufts. To machine sew, I use the button sewing feature on my machine. It's so much faster than hand sewing!
This is how the corner will look before the mattress is stuffed.
This is how the mattress looks after the tufts have been sewed.
I found a good picture of Addy's quilt and used it to make this document of squares. I then printed it on printable fabric. Once printed, I took a piece of clear plastic and cut it into a 2 1/2" square. Using this, I traced around each picture, making sure it was perfectly centered in the square. You are welcome to use my document to print your own squares. Addy's Quilt Squares
If you look closely you can see the clear plastic square in this picture.
Cut out each quilt square. Also cut strips of fabric (I used red with white dots and circle to look like Addy's red quilt) that are 1 inch wide. Take one strip and sew it to the bottom of the first square. Continue to sew the second and third square to the strip. Do this for the first and third rows of squares. Leave the middle row alone.
When finished, trim the strips so they're even with the squares.
Then sew the squares in the first and third rows to another strip, this time on the upper side of the squares.
It will look like this:
Trim the strips so they're even and lay out your pieces like this.
Then begin to sew the middle row to the strips.
After that, sew on the strips going vertically.
When your quilt top is sewn together, cut a piece of fabric for the back. I used small black and white gingham to match Addy's blanket. Sew them together good side to good side. (If you want the blanket to be thicker, you can add a piece of felt or batting. I did, but I'm not sure I like it so stiff. However, it does give it some dimension when the quilt stiches are added). After that I machine quilted "in the ditch" around each square. I used red thread so it showed up on the back, but you can use something that blends in more if you like.
To make the ruffled pillow, I cut a strip of black and white gingham fabric into a 1" strip. I folded it in half and sewed it lengthwise. Then I gathered the fabric into a ruffle. I cut 2 pieces of fabric for the pillow. I layed the ruffled around the one piece of fabric and stitched it with the machine. You might find it helpful to used a zigzag stich, or another stich that encases the seam. Then I layed them good side to good side and stiched around, leaving an opening. Turn it, stuff it, and sew it closed either with the machine or a hand stich.
Don't forget to run your string through the holes you made in the bed! This will support your mattress!
I hope this tutorial inspires you to create for your Mini Addy Walker doll!
With our newfound love for American Girl Dolls, my daughter and I anxiously awaited the announcment and unveiling of the 2016 Girl of the Year! Since we are collecting the mini dolls, I was watching Amazon for Mini Lea Clark to be available. But when she didn't show up on Amazon in the first several weeks of January, we were very happy to find her, and her first two books, at Costco for $25.00! I felt that was a good price, since the books themselves can retail for up to $9.99 and the doll for up to $25.
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AG's Rainforest House for 18" dolls.
With doll in hands, we began watching reviews of Lea's Rainforest House and Lea's entire collection on one of our favorite You Tube Channels, American Girl Ideas. The American Girl version is a fun playspace with with so much potentional for creative play. But, it's made for the 18" dolls, and costs $400!
My Mini Rainforest House!
I began to form my idea of how to construct a mini rainforest house for mini Lea. I have been inspired in my crafting by the "Fabsome" creativity of Froggy from My Froggy Stuff and some of my ideas for this craft came from her videos. So, if you'd like to save money by constructing a Rainforest House for your Mini Lea doll, here are a few pictures and some instructions describing how I made mine.
My list of materials used are as follows:
cardboard boxes
white contact paper
wood grain contact paper
hot glue gun and hot glue
glue sticks
wooden dowels of varying sizes
popsicle sticks
recycled paperboard (like from a cereal box)
scrapbook paper for the floor
scrapbook paper that looks like barn siding or wood siding
bamboo skewers
burlap
acrylic craft paint
watercolors
polyurithane
fabric and stuffing
Buttons and beads
pink or coral tulle
Printable background for the shower (which I'll make available here).
Step one: Make the walls.
The rainforest house has three walls. I cut two layers of cardboard for each wall and the floor, and hot glued them together. I used my mini doll and photos or videos of the AG rainforest house to help find the correct size and scale for the mini doll. For example, I knew that the house needed to be at least as wide as the doll laying down, since the bed fits that direction. However, I did make the side walls a little longer than the AG version. This was not intentional, however, it's not a big deal in our mini version. My dimensions are:
Step Two: Make the Window.
Cut out a square in the back wall to be the window. Plan out where the bed will go when you're deciding where to cut the window, so that the bed will fit above and below it. Be sure to take into account the mattress and pillow.
Cut popsicle sticks to fit into the window and frame it. Fit them in, but don't glue them in yet.
Now comes the hard part....I decided to use wooden dowels as my "bamboo." So, I created a frame for the window out of wooden dowels. I cut 4 pieces that would fit around the window. I cut notches in each end of the four dowels that framed the window, so that they'd fit together, and I'd be able to slide a picture in the window. When I glued the pieces to the window, I placed the side pieces underneath, and the top and bottom pieces on top. Before glueing on the window frame pieces, paint or stain them to make them look more like bamboo. I used a mix of light yellow and a touch of brown watercolor to stain mine. I also painted brown stripes around the dowels at intervals to look like the joints on bamboo. I also polyurithaned the wooden dowels (optional). After they were dry, I glued on the window frame and the popsicle sticks into the window. The popsicle sticks creat a sort of windowsill that hangs slightly over toward the outside wall.
This shows how the window looks from the outside. This picture was taken after the project was completed.
Step Three: Stain and polyurithane your wooden dowels for bamboo if you wish. You need 2 as posts, 2 glued across the top of each side wall, one connecting the two sides, and one for roof support. The roof support is held up with bamboo skewers. In the front, the skewer is glued to the horizontal dowel, and in the back the skewer is stuck into the cardboard in the middle of the back wall.
Step Four: The Bunk
I made the bunk using a piece of cardboard, which I covered in wood grain contact paper. Then I used bamboo skewers to create a little railing and edge around the bunk.
Step Five: Build your shower
I used buttons and beads and bambook skewers to build the parts of the shower.
This is a close up of the shower knob. I used a 3 way bead, with round beads glued on the each end. I mounted it on two buttons using a toothpick inserted into the bead and one of the button holes. I glued a tiny button on the top. This makes the knob able to turn, just like the AG version!
Here are some pictures of the shower after it's completed and painted and put together. If you'd like to used my pattern for the back of the shower, you can download it here.
My daughter wanted a ladder for Lea to reach the top bunk so we made one using bamboo skewers.
That is the basic structure of the rainforest house! I will address some of the other details in my craft review video! Below the video you'll find printables. If you print them as a 4x6 photo they should be the correct size!
