Yarn Dolls
I just love making these little dolls for friends and family. They’’re so simple and beautifully come to life when you put them into the hand of a child. They don’t need much equipment and really provide a huge wealth of imaginative play, creative thinking and tactile awareness. It’s a old homesteading skill for children and a whimsical activity for parents and grown ups to relive their childhood.
Give these as worry dolls, keepsakes or even add a little yarn to turn them into Christmas decorations. Make them big or make them small, there are so many possibilities for these. Begin with this basic design and the sky is the limit.
Materials Needed:
Scissors
A piece of cardboard the same size as you’d like the finished doll to be
Chunky yarn
Gather your supplies and have them ready to go. You might need an extra pair of hands if you’re working with little ones. It can get a bit fiddly.
Start by cutting a rectangle of cardboard the same length as you’d like your finished doll to be.
Then take your yarn and wrap it around the cardboard template. You want at least 20 strands showing. This will give you plenty to work with when you start making the doll.
Slide the yarn off the cardboard and cut one side so you have a length of yarn strands bundled together.
To make the head.
Find the middle of your length of yarn, twist it 2 times and then fold in half. It might need a little jiggling around to make it look as you’d like the head to look.
Tie a little piece of the same colour yarn around the bundle to create the head shape.
It should now look like this.
*Tip
When you tie the thread to make the head shape, use long strands which can then be tucked in to the body/arms.
Next you’ll make the arms.
Take 5 pieces of the yarn and plait (it’ll be an uneven plait but it’ll give you 5 fingers at the end) until you can tie a knot.
You’ll need to cut the yarn at the end so the arms look the right length and you tidy up the fingers.
Then repeat the same on the other side. You should now have 2 arms!
Next take a piece of string and tie it to make a body.
You should then have something which looks like this. Hurrah!
You can either leave it as so or…
Give your person legs.
Give your person hips buy tying another piece of string and legs by dividing the bundle in two and plaiting each section. Tie a little piece of yarn to make the feet.
And there you have it, two perfect little bundles of yarn turned into gorgeously soft dolls. Bundle them into your bag and take them on adventures. Even better, they can be popped into the washing machine if they get a bit muddy… but remember to put them on a cool wash or they’ll probably shrink… hmm, but that might be nice too?!
