How to make dolly-and-me pajamas with a recycled tee shirt @ ChellyWood.com #EarthFriendly #DollClothes

Please visit ChellyWood.com for free printable PDF sewing patterns and tutorial videos for making doll clothes to fit dolls of many shapes and all different sizes.

Recently my niece, Emily, asked me to make her a set of dolly-and-me pajamas for her Consuelo doll and herself. So I was excited to discover Simplicity “Just like you” pattern number 7841 at a second hand store near where I live.

Now when I looked at the pattern for this set, I made note of the fact that it was for an 18 inch doll. Emily’s Consuelo doll is a 14-15 inch doll, but that didn’t bother me because I know how to resize patterns for dolls.

But when I got home, I realized that the little girl’s pajama pattern was also WAY too large for Emily, who wears a size 6. If you look closely, in the left hand corner of Simplicity 7841, you’ll see that it will fit girls in sizes 12 and 14. Ugh! It was so cheap at the second hand store, that I didn’t even pay attention to the girl’s pajama size. I just bought it for the doll clothes!

Here we see a close-up image of Simplicity pattern 7841, which offers matching nightgowns for a little girl and her 18 inch doll. It comes in a long sleeved pajama and a short sleeved pajama style. Both pajama styles are nightgowns with a collar and a peter pan style bodice. — Please visit ChellyWood.com for free printable PDF sewing patterns and tutorial videos for making doll clothes to fit dolls of many shapes and all different sizes.

So when I realized my fatal mistake, I got creative.

Emily loves unicorns, and on a previous trip to the second hand store, I had purchased a woman’s tee shirt that said “Just believe in unicorns.” I had originally thought the fabric of this tee shirt would make great doll swimsuits and underpants.

But when I took this tee shirt out of the closet and really stared at it for a while, I realized I could use another pattern I had for a little girls’ size 6 tank top, to alter the woman’s tee shirt, making it into the child’s sized nightgown you see here:

In this photo, a woman's tee shirt has been altered to become a child's nightgown. The tee shirt fabric was made of a pastel multi-colored jersey fabric, and the front of the shirt-turned-nightgown says: "Just believe in unicorns." This child's nightgown is on a hanger, suspended from a rack of thread spools. Beside it on the floor of the room stands Consuelo, the 15 inch doll from the Hearts for Hearts Girls doll collection. These dolls are similar in size and body style to the Wellie Wishers from American Girl. Consuelo wears a tank top made of the same pastel jersey fabric as the child's nightgown. Her shorts are pink cotton. This photo bears the watermark for ChellyWood.com — Please visit ChellyWood.com for free printable PDF sewing patterns and tutorial videos for making doll clothes to fit dolls of many shapes and all different sizes.

I just cut off the sleeves (which I reserved to make Consuelo‘s tank top/pajama top), altered the sleeve opening to make it smaller, and took it in a bit at the shoulders, so the neckline wouldn’t be too low. My alterations were made where you see the yellow and blue arrows:

In this photo of the tee-shirt-turned-child's-nightgown, a yellow arrow points to the shirt's underarm area, where the fabric was taken in. Two blue arrows point to the shirt's straps or shoulder seams. These were also taken in, to turn the woman's tee shirt into a child's size pajama without sleeves. — Please visit ChellyWood.com for free printable PDF sewing patterns and tutorial videos for making doll clothes to fit dolls of many shapes and all different sizes.

Then I used the tee shirt’s original sleeves to cut out Consuelo‘s little tank top. Now I didn’t have quite enough of the sleeve fabric to make Consuelo a long pajama. So instead, I created the tank top you see below, and made a pair of shorts out of ordinary cotton fabric to go under the tank top:

Here we see a close-up photo of the Consuelo doll from the Hearts for Hearts Girls collection. She wears a handmade tank top pajama shirt with a pair of pink cotton shorts. In this closer perspective, you can tell that her shirt has been made from the material that was once part of the pajama's sleeves (back when the pajama was a woman's tank top). In fact, in close range like this, you can still see where there used to be a seam, and it's still there, but it just looks like part of Consuelo's pajama top now. — Please visit ChellyWood.com for free printable PDF sewing patterns and tutorial videos for making doll clothes to fit dolls of many shapes and all different sizes.

I think Emily was pleased with the dolly-and-me jammies, even though they weren’t identical. But their fabric was clearly the same.

You may wonder where the doll’s tank top and shorts patterns come from, and you can find them at this link.

Perhaps you feel a little underconfident, when it comes to making pattern alterations yourself, but I have good news for you if that’s the case…

My Creative Spark class, which is all about altering doll clothes patterns, is now available for you to sign up for! And don’t worry… if you’re worried you won’t have time to take a class because your schedule is too busy, that’s actually not a problem. For all of the classes on Creative Spark, once you sign up, you have a full year to complete the course.

So you can learn at your own pace.

And all you need are some patterns to work with. Let’s say you own Simplicity 7841, but your doll is a little too tall for this pattern. In my pattern alterations class, I’ll teach you how to alter the doll clothes patterns you already own — how to lengthen and shorten them, how to make changes to the way they fit, and even how to re-size them so they can fit a smaller or a larger doll than they were originally designed for.

In case you’re wondering, most of the commercial patterns I display and talk about here on ChellyWood.com are also available for sale on eBay. However, if you’ve never purchased a pattern on eBay before, it’s a good idea to read the article I wrote called, “Tips for Buying Used Doll Clothes Patterns on eBay.” It will save you time, money, and will likely prevent buyer’s remorse.

And by the way, if you use the links I’ve provided to make your eBay purchase, this website will receive a small commission, which helps fund the ChellyWood.com website, so I can continue to provide you with all the free patterns and tutorial videos offered here.

Disclaimer/Credit/Affiliate Marketing Link:

*ChellyWood.com earns money by linking to JoAnn Fabrics, Amazon, eBay, Etsy, and other online affiliate programs. Links provided above may be affiliate links. For a full list of my affiliate programs, and to understand how cookies are used to help this website earn money, please see my “Privacy Policy” page.

Chelly Wood and the ChellyWood.com website are not affiliated with the pattern company or companies mentioned in this blog post, but Chelly finds inspiration in the doll clothes designed by these pattern companies. To purchase patterns from Simplicity, McCall’s, Butterick, Vogue, or other pattern companies shown and discussed in this blog post, please click on the links provided here. These links below the “Disclaimer” section do not help raise money for this free pattern website; they are only offered to give credit to the company that made these patterns.

Consuelo is a Hearts for Hearts Girl. The Hearts for Hearts Girls, Dolls and Games are owned by the Playmates Company International, which holds the registered trademark for these toys. It should be noted, that for each H4H doll purchased, the Hearts for Hearts company donates a portion of their proceeds to World Vision, a global humanitarian organization.