Making mini American Girl items!

 This spring I made lots of American Girl canon items for my mini-Kirsten and mini-Josefina. Fun times!

Speaking Rain

I don't know if you have read Kaya's books, but she has a blind 'sister' who lives with her and is her friend. I've always wanted American Girl to make a Speaking Rain doll when they were making Best Friend dolls, but they didn't.

Recently I had come across a Magic Attic Club Rose doll and after she became part of our dolly world, I still didn't know who she would be. Then it dawned on me -- she could be my Speaking Rain!

I purchased a real piece of suede from etsy and began drafting a pattern for a dress and moccasins to fit the slim-bodied Magic Attic Club physique. That took quite a while. Then hand stitching each piece together with fine hemp cord was an ordeal! I copied her dress embellishments from the book illustrations and the paper doll set.

I found some old buttons that were obviously made from shell, so those became her hair ties.

 
The moccasins gave me all kinds of fits trying to make them fit and closely resemble Kaya's.

I also used a leather tie to hold her dress together on the back at the top rather than the Velcro that AG uses. I thought that was more culturally appropriate. I had an extra belt from Kaya's Adorned Deerskin dress, so I resized it to fit Speaking Rain's narrower waist.

While I didn't have the appropriate shells for the beading, I think her outfit & necklace turned out pretty close!

Kaya and Speaking Rain

And yet another rescue....

I don't know if anyone here has heard of or been to a Goodwill Outlet, but it's a place where the stuff that did NOT sell at area Goodwills ends up. There are loads of huge rolling bins with random stuff thrown into them. Not sorted or organized in anyway. Just the Goodwill left-overs. People just line up and rummage through bins. The bins are rotated out every hour (?) and new bins are rolled in.

These items are sold in bulk prices of $1.29 per pound. Look who I found recently? This undressed, dirty, PM revised #6 in a bin. At $1.29 per pound she cost me $2.58!

I washed her skin with a cloth, brushed her hair, added a very slight face coloring and a pretty outfit....

Meet Serafina!

 

A new Bitty Twin here!

When American Girl released the various ethnicities of Bitty Twins in 2008 I was mostly drawn to the Hispanic girl twin, but I thought her hair was just too long for a toddler doll.

I was very pleased to finally locate a little Latina Bitty Twin with a professional hair cut -- 

Look how cute she is!!

Meet Leyla!

Betsy McCall by Robert Tonner

We actually have other dolls at American Girl Rescue besides American Girl dolls. Most of the other dolls are by Robert Tonner. We have an 8" Betsy McCall, Dru & Charlie Bucket all part of the Tiny Betsy Collection; Flutterby Izzy & Hamish from the Amelia Thimble collection; Autumn Days Trixie & Ann Estelle from the Patsy collection; and lastly, DeeDee Basic Brunette and Tyler Wentworth that were gifts from the Tonner Dolls 25th Anniversary Convention in 2016.

(We also had here at AGR in the Tonner collection but have since gone on to other homes: Gale, Peeta & Katness from the Hunger Games collection. And Wigged-Out Prudence, Essential Ellowyne 3 & Wigged-Out Lizette from the Wilde Imagination Ellowyne Wilde collection.)

Getting all of that out of the way just to introduce to you the newest doll to arrive here! This 1996 14" Betsy McCall designed by Robert Tonner arrived this week at our house nude and in pieces. Learning how to restring this type of doll was a must. Then after I located original McCall patterns for the Robert Tonner Betsy McCall, I made our new Betsy a dress.

Hello and welcome to this new girl!

Her pretty brown eyes have turned orange with age, so I purchased a replacement set of eyes from an eBay seller in Spain and proceeded to learn something else new about this doll: How to replace her eyes! 

The Dolls' Room is ready!

It took several months to get the Dolls' Houses put back together and all of the dolls and their things back out of storage and into their new room at the new house, but here they are!!

 The Dolls' House takes up one side of their new room. 

Many of the mini-dolls live on top of the Dolls' House.

Kaya and her things, as well as Kendall and the 

Bitty Babies are situated on the next wall of the Dolls' Room.

The built in closet in the Dolls' Room was just the right size to hold 

their wardrobes as well as many other pieces.

The Dolls' Treehouse is on the next wall of the Dolls' Room.

And finally as we complete the 360 in the Dolls' Room we have the mini-doll houses.

It's so great to finally have all of the girls & boys out and about in their new room at AmericanGirlRescue!!

Mini Blaire

 Yes, so American Girl did make mini Girls of the Year for a few years, but stopped! So here we are again, making our own version of a mini GotY. Here's mini Blaire along with her mini pet silkie, Dandy.

It's Girl Scout Cookie Time!!

As I was getting the standard AG Girl Scout uniform onto Yajaira this year, I remembered that I had always wanted to make a Girl Scout uniform that looked like the one that I wore as a GS (in the mid 1970's). However, the one I had was a hand-me-down so it was actually what a Girl Scout would have worn in the late 1960's-early 1970's.

I found a vintage 60's uniform and cut it down to fit an 18" American Girl doll. I followed (loosely) the Kindred Thread's Fifties Shirtwaist Dress Pattern. (www.pixiefaire.com/products/fifties-shirtwaist-dress-18-doll-clothes)

Ivy is wearing the new uniform complete with a sash replicated exactly like my sash from the 70's (that I still have) including my Council, Troop Crest, number & badges! Then I took a bit of liberty and added on badges from things I would have certainly attained by this time in my life!

Little Kendall (Wellie Wisher) is wearing a Brownie uniform that I purchased off of an ebay seller.

 Yajaira, Kendall & Ivy

 I was a bit impressed at how the vintage uniform turned out!

Lots going on at AGRescue!

Lots of changes during late 2017 & early 2018. Many of the Girls at AmericanGirlRescue have gone on to live at other homes. The rest moved with us to a new home. Currently the Dolls' Room is still being renovated, so no pictures of their new location.

But here's a picture of who stayed at AGR:

back row, Left to right: 

Roberta (a Tonner doll), Ivy, Yajaira (#24), Rosco (fka #21), Kaya, Jess,
Taylor (fka Elizabeth), Charlie (fka Samantha), Logan, Kit & Lily (#4)

front row, Left to right: 

Danica (#25), Julie, Dante (#26), Josefina, Kirsten, Addy,
Willow (fka Kaya) & Kendall (a Wellie Wisher)

The Girls of Many Lands also stayed:

Along with three 6" Tonner Betsy McCall dolls (Dru, Charlie Bucket & Betsy)

The Bitty Triplets - Garth, Wayne & Dusty

And the Bitty Babies - Esther & Missy

Collage of the AG Stores we've been to...so far...

It's time to update the collage photo of all of the different American Girl stores that we've been to!