Clothespin Dolls

One of my nieces just turned 4 and I have almost always made something homemade for her birthday and Christmas gifts. This year I went completely homemade with Magnetic Paper Dolls (watch for a post soon with a girl version and a boy version) and Clothespin Dolls. I got the inspiration from these Disney Princess Dolls I saw on Pinterest. I was originally going to do those but I wanted to use what I had on hand and painting something to look exactly like something else isn't really my specialty. So I dug through my supplies and found clothespins, yarn, scraps of fabric and a wooden box. And Clothespin dolls were born! Here's what they look like:

I think they are pretty cute if I do say so myself! And they were pretty darn easy too. I don't have a true step-by-step for you because I just kind of winged it. But I will share the basics with you. First I started with some clothespins and I painted the face a neutral color and some different colored "tops" that would match the fabric scraps I had.

Then I added the dress or skirt. This really was as simple as cutting and wrapping the fabric and using a hot glue gun to secure it to the clothespin. No sewing involved! You can go very basic or as complicated as you desire. Here's the first one I came up with (kind of looks like a mermaid:)

Finally, I added hair. Again this step just involved choosing a length and a style and hot-gluing it into place. I started pretty basic but as I went on I was able to do some more creative styles:

At the last minute I decided to glue pieces of craft sticks onto the bottom so that they would be able to stand. And there you have it, 6 unique dolls using supplies I already had on hand:

I happened to have a cute wooden box on hand so I tucked them all inside so that she would have a nice place to store them all.

Want some more homemade gift ideas? Be on the lookout for my next post, Magnetic Paper Dolls for both boys and girls.

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