I (heart) Mimi Kirchner and The Purl Bee

... for collaborating to give us all, for free, the pattern to make this wonderful doll.


The pattern appeared in the April 8 post on The Purl Bee. The project journal, with thoroughly illustrated instructions, is here.

Mimi's blog, Doll, shows off lots of her clever, quirky, and whimsical creations. Be sure to check out her Etsy shop, too, for more photos. I'd seen her Tiny World Pincushions at Etsy before, but I hadn't seen her blog until The Purl Bee project.


I could hardly wait to start one of these dolls, and luckily I already had a stash of nice wool felt to work with. All I needed to buy was some embroidery thread and a couple of buttons. Then it was a just a matter of tearing myself away from my yarn for a while in order to sew. The pattern and tutorial are very well-done; I didn't have any trouble at all stitching this sweet doll.

For my first, I pretty much made her just like the originals -- except that I moved the rose from the front of the sash to the back, to camouflage the fact that my sash didn't quite reach all the way around (oops!).




















I do plan to personalize her a bit, though, with a small bit of knitting. I'd thought I would make her a sweater, but I'm not sure a sweater would fit well over this dress. So I think I'll probably knit up a little shawl. Next time around, I'll customize the clothes in order to incorporate a sweater into the outfit. Just had an idea .... maybe turn the shoes into ice skates, keep the nice full skirt, and knit her a sweater and scarf and hat ... can't wait to get started!