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New Barbie repair adventures ahead

I know I haven’t posted anything for two weeks but now I can tell you something new. I’m going to get a parcel this week with lots of Barbie dolls for repair and the best thing is I haven’t to pay for them. They are a gift from another collector who likes my idea to get repair without paying the repair itself only the shipping and handling costs and material costs.

She asked me to test a new glue for broken necks and I said I’d be glad to test and do a video, although I don’t know if this stuff is available outside from Germany. I’m curious to do the test. I heard a lot. Now I get the chance to do a test.

What else happened in the meantime?

Well I had to work only three days last week and had a long weekend that I used for Barbie, not for doing videos but to continue to develop my sewing and pattern making skills for Francie. I started on May 1rst I think with a pattern for Francie and had problem to make it fit to her size. I had too many wrinkles at the wrong places but this weekend I had an idea how to make it probably work. I tried it and had success with my idea. It’s not perfect yet but I think I’m on the right way to find the pattern. I did a second project yesterday and designed my very first sleeve. The sleeve is definitely something for the next weekend. I saw some progress in my Francie “Let’s Dance” sewing project. It feels good to see some progress.

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Short update for pattern making friends

I can’t believe how fast the last week passed by. Last week I designed my first top pattern for Francie and I was really nervous how this would turn out because the pattern form I got for Francie was very similar to the pattern I did for Barbie. Had I used the right measurements? I was so nervous that I didn’t want to start sewing it. This sounds strange, I know. Again I had the same problem like with the one for Barbie. My front middle part had too much fabric to fit in a perfect way. I had this while doing my Barbie top. After my first Francie top try I already knew where to modify the pattern. I think the next try will fit much better because of the modification. This time I tried to document what I did because I realized that I forgot a lot. Additionally I took the measure from my Vintage Skipper so that I can do patterns for her or Ricky too in the future. Maybe pattern making becomes easier the more often you do it. At least I hope so.

If you ask yourself why I suddenly started to do pattern making for Francie, well this is due to the fact that I was not 100% satisfied with the pattern I used for my “Let’s dance” Francie dress project . So I decided to try another approach and doing my own top to come as close to the original as possible. You know I’m a purist. If you’re not familiar with the topic, just watch the first part of my new video series.

I’m going to insert a pic of my first try here in the next days. I’m still sitting here and write this article.