Today’s tutorial video shows you how to use rickrack trim, like the trim shown at the bottom of the Greenbrier doll’s dress below:

Today’s tutorial video is actually a re-post, and in fact, I’m planning to take a little time off from these blog posts because it’s my birthday tomorrow. So I hope you don’t mind if I leave for a brief vacation.

While I’m gone, feel free to look over some of the basic sewing instruction videos that you can find on my FAQ’s page. And of course, the Gallery is loaded with lots of patterns and tutorials to browse through.

Wondering what I’m working on behind the scenes?

People like you, who love to sew doll clothes, have a lot of questions about how doll clothes are designed, so I’ve created a book proposal for a book that teaches my followers how to design their own doll clothes.

What do you think about this? Feel free to leave comments. I want my book to fulfill the needs of my followers!

What I’d love to do is write a nonfiction book that connects simple geometry concepts to doll clothes design, and I’d love to write it for students in the middle-grade-to-high-school age range. That way the language of the book will remain simple for the lay person who is new to sewing, regardless of his/her age.

And since I work with middle school children in my job as a librarian, I think I have a pretty good grasp of the kinds of books that interest them.

The library where I work has a fantastic book on Sewing Basics by Choly Knight, which gets checked out pretty frequently. I want my book to be sort of like that one. Knight’s book is designed for middle-grade and high-school-age kids, but any adult could learn from this book without feeling like the author is “talking down” to her.

I want to do something like that, but with the concept of easy doll clothes design techniques.

Let’s face it, children are more likely to be interested in doll clothes than most adults. (Even we who love to sew for dolls, can admit that.) But there’s nothing out there for the doll clothing designer that really simplifies the concept in a way that addresses the needs of kids and adults who want to design doll clothes.

I’d like to be the author of that book.

We have secured the rights to photograph three different brands of dolls, so the book can show my methods for designing patterns to fit traditional 11″ fashion dolls, 15″ girlish-bodied dolls, and 8″ baby dolls. Now we just need a publisher to get the job done!

If you know anyone in the publishing business, and you’d like to see my book get published, please tell your acquaintance who’s in publishing, about this book proposal. Mention my website to him/her!

My literary agent is actively seeking a publisher right now, so any help we can get would be greatly appreciated.