Skipper Poncho and Pants

This poncho pattern is one of Michelle Ratman's that is currently unavailable. She does sell quite a few Barbie style poncho patterns on Etsy but I purchased this one a few years ago and found it works well for both Barbie and Skipper.

The pants were made using an out of print House of White Birches leaflet Crochet Wardrobe for 11 1/2 inch Fashion Dolls skiing pattern. A note to myself the Barbie pattern fits Skipper well, the Ken pattern is required for both Barbie and Ken with a few row additions.

Notes:

The poncho was made with the Red Heart Unforgettable Candied yarn I had left over from the Lil Cuties Mermaid project.

I've slowly stocked up not just on Tulip Etimo hooks specifically the red for my lighter weight yarns or yarns like Unforgettable which tend to catch and tangle more easily. I'm still not a fan of them for traditional worsted projects but I've noticed a difference using them for my under 4 weight projects.

I used the 2.75 mm hook which is the C equivelent with the Knit Picks Palette yarn for the pants. While the Barbie pants fit Skipper better I still need to add rows to get the length correct. Not sure if this is because of a change in fiber or the original Barbie this was designed for was different.

When I made this previously for Skipper I used Shine sport and needed a larger hook for the head opening. With the Unforgettable the E hook worked well for the whole project.

Barbie Poncho and Pants

I started picking up Michelle Ratman's patterns for Barbie and the 18 inch dolls a few years ago.

You can purchase the poncho pattern here.

The pants are made using Ken's pants from the Ski outfit pattern found in the out of print House of White Birches Crochet Wardrobe for 11.5 inch Fashion Dolls.

For my own notes this is page 33 and ends on 47. For some reason I was left trying to figure out which pants I had used two years ago. This narrows the hunt down.

Notes:

Poncho:

I've opted to use acrylic for over cotton for her patterns.

I had Unforgettable Gossamer left over from Mermaid projects and I decided to try it out on a poncho for Barbie. I am planning on using the left over Unforgettable Candied I have from making the Lil Cutesies mermaid for a poncho for Skipper.

I used and e hook for the poncho.

My one mistake was not counting each side of the chain 3 points and I ended up pulling out rows which can be a bit challenging with this yarn when I realized the poncho was not even. Once I counted from each side every row it worked out well.

My goal is to continue to use this yarn for the mermaid outfits so there should be enough to continue with ponchos as well. I do like the way the colors work together.

Pants:

The pants require crocheting around an elastic the distance of Barbie's waist for the first row. I recently bought wider elastic as the 1/8 was splitting apart with my hand sewing. While it takes slightly longer to make sure the yarn covers the elastic completely, the wider elastic works better.

This was made with Knit Picks Palette yarn and this year I used a 3.0mm Tulip Etimo rather than my Bates Bamboo C hook as I'm trying to give them a little bit of a break after having broke one of my B hooks and not being able to replace it.

I needed 20 rows to make the legs long enough for Barbie and I finished the legs with a row of ss to help keep the feet from catching in the yarn.

Chelsea Valentine's Dress

Chelsea enters the Valentine's challenge with a pattern that can be purchased from Michelle Ratman here.

Notes:

This was made with Lizbeth size 3 Pink Ice Crochet thread and an e hook.

I changed the sc to hdc and the hdc to dc and this will require reducing the bodice section when I make this again as it is longer than I had planned.

The dc are worked between the stitches.

I would use this color again as I like the blend it makes, I would make it shorter. I have green I may try as a Spring dress for her.

Skipper Poncho and Pants

I don't have lots of patterns specifically designed to fit Skipper. Those that I have aren't always designed to fit the modern Skipper so when possible if I find a Barbie pattern that seems like it would adapt well to Skipper I try to make it work.

The poncho for this pattern is made using Michelle Ratman's design that can be purchased here. The pants were made using an out of print House of White Birches leaflet Crochet Wardrobe for 11 1/2 inch Fashion Dolls.

Notes:

I used Barbie's pants pattern which fits Skipper but I still needed to add rows to the legs to get it to fit. The pants are made with Knit Picks Palette Fingering Yarn and a C hook. I used 1/8 inch elastic measured cut and sewn together prior to crocheting around it for the waist band.

When I made Barbie's poncho I commented that I didn't have any sport weight cotton. I did find some and used it for Skipper's Ski outfit. However it was too light for the poncho. During my search I did unearth a skein of Knit Picks Shine Worsted that I also want to finish off so this became the yarn for Skipper's poncho.

This Skipper with her hair seems to have a larger head than than Barbie or it could be the cotton yarn is stiffer. Anyways I started with a G hook until I went to the mesh where I went back to the e hook I had used for Barbie's poncho.

My Life Artist Print Dress

This is another one of Michelle Ratman's designs that can be purchased here. Just for my reference this is the Military Dress pattern 1101.

Notes:

Generally I love when I don't have to add buttons or snaps because the outfit can slide on and off the doll but after having made another one of her patterns for the Our Generation doll and finding it some what challenging to remove and put and not being able to get it on the My Life doll I decided I needed to redesign so I could add a back opening to make it easier to slide on and off the doll. My first priority is making it easy for a child to use, even though I really do love simplicity for myself. It is a waste if the child doesn't end up using it because it is too hard to dress the doll.

I used an f hook and chose Red Heart Super Saver Artist Print for this outfit. The pattern calls for sport weight 3 cotton yarn but the only place I found was loose after going down to the f hook was the shoulders which I tightened by finishing the back and the top at the end.

I followed the directions for the first 8 rows with the exception of not joining until I completed the 8th row. This created a back opening which made the dress easier to slip on and off. I joined after completing row 8 and continued with the directions as written.

When I finished the dress I finished the back and dealt with a slightly looser top when I reached the top by sc in 3 decreasing in the next across. This gave the top a better fit through the chest and shoulders.

Barbie Poncho and Pants

I have written about several of the Michelle Ratman patterns I purchased for both the Barbie and 18 inch doll donation. I'm slowly working my way through them adding new items to the doll bags.

This outfit combines Michelle's poncho pattern that can be purchased here with a pants pattern found in an out of print White Birches leaflet Crochet Wardrobe for 11 1/2 inch Fashion Dolls.

Notes:

While the pattern calls for cotton 4 weight yarn for the poncho I went with acrylic because I either have "kitchen" cotton or sport weight for my ami's on hand. I don't have a brand or color because this was a great project to work on using up a left over ball of yarn from a previous project.

The worsted acrylic required a change to an e hook to fit this Barbie model.

The last time I made the pants from the House of White Birches pattern for Barbie in 2021 her sister Skipper ended up with them and I made a note to try Ken's pants to see if the fit would be better. Barbie sizes change over time and this Barbie fits the Ken size better than the pattern written for Barbie. I'm hoping to make the complete winter sets for Ken, Barbie, and Skipper in the near future.

I used a C hook for the pants crocheting over an elastic band. The pants are made with Knit Picks Palette fingering yarn.

Our Generation Monet Dress

A while back I stumbled upon Michelle Ratman's doll patterns on Etsy. I picked up some Barbie and 18 inch doll patterns that were easy to make and inexpensive to buy. A wonderful combo for someone looking to make stuff to donate. While I do like a challenge occasionally to learn something new for the most part my goal is to complete as many outfits as possible for the dolls I donate that kids will enjoy using with their new Christmas dolls.

This was a really straight forward pattern. This is a one piece, no buttons or snaps required. In the future I may experiment with that to see if I can get a better fit for the My Life doll but it worked really well for the Our Generation doll as written. I'm thinking if I don't join I might get a better fit for the shoulders with the My Life. I plan on experimenting with this later to see if I can get an outfit from this for the My Life doll as well.

The pattern does not come with shoes. The shoes are from an out of print Sweet Silver Creations pattern.

Notes:

I used an F hook for the Our Generation Doll.

I mention the Monet Red Heart Super Saver because I've been using lots of striped yarn and this requires more of a variagated yarn than striped. I wanted to remember what color worked for this project.

As with many of my projects I needed to add rows to get to the knee length.

Chelsea Mint Dress

I mentioned in last week's post that I was experimenting with the pattern I used to make Chelsea's Valentine Dress. I haven't had the outcome I wanted but no loss as Chelsea now has more outfits for her donation bag.

You can purchase the pattern for the dress here.

Notes:

As I mentioned in the St. Patrick's Day post I moved to using Thread Art's size 3 crochet thread rather than 2 strands of size 10 crochet thread together for these last two dresses. Just for the record while I called this a mint dress, when I checked the color on the website it is Aqua.

After making the St. Patrick's Day dress changing the stitches I decided to go back and try a single colored outfit using size 3 crochet thread rather than 2 strands of size 10 thread together. I have never achieved the texture shown in the picture for the pattern, but I've liked the look of the dresses for Chelsea and they have the benefit of being easy to play around with and quick to finish to add more outfits to her donation bag.

Chelsea St. Patrick's Day

I've been experimenting with the pattern I made for Chelsea's Valentine dress. You can purchase the pattern here.

I was trying to achieve the texture found in the original pattern so I decided to use hdc and dc instead of sc and hdc. I crocheted between the stitches and came a little closer to the look found in the picture for the pattern. At this point I've decided a few extra dresses for Chelsea aren't a bad choice.

Notes:

I used Thread Art's size 3 thread to avoid using two size 10 crochet thread strands together. It also allowed me to use the variegated garden greens yarn to give me a bit of holiday colors for St. Patrick's Day.

The hook for this project was E.

Skipper Dress

After making this dress for Barbie and liking how it came out I decided to see if it could be adapted for Skipper.

Going down in hook size was not an option with Sinfonia Cotton yarn I had used as a substitute for the Grace Patons the pattern suggested for the outfit. I tried using a smaller hook for Skipper but it was bulky and large.

Thankfully over time I've acquired a large selection of sport cotton yarns for making amigurumi's so I decided to try Schachemayer Cantania for Skipper and once I got done to a D hook the dress fit her.

You can purchase the pattern here.

Barbie Dress

I'm always on the look out for new patterns for the doll donations and lately I've been in favor of ones that have the look of something that would be easier to finish rather than challenge patterns. I have binders of patterns in the challenge range but for the donation it helps just to have some patterns I can finish and get some items in the donation bags.

This is another Michelle Ratman pattern you can purchase here.

This pattern calls for Grace Patons cotton yarn. I've been trying to use stash yarn on hand for doll projects when possible. I settled on some Sinfonia sport cotton I had previously purchased for ami projects. I believe this is forest green but since I no longer have the paper cover I can't confirm that.

Notes:

This pattern starts out feeling like it will be way to large for the doll. However my suggestion is before changing hook or yarn wait until you make the arm holes to determine what you wish to change.

I ended up changing from a g hook to an e hook and the fit was better for the doll.

This pattern makes a dress that slides on and off so it requires no butttons or snaps.

For those who don't like working with thread and want a quick outfit for Barbie this is a great little pattern. I will continue to use it for the donation as it works up quick and it is easy to get on and off the doll.

Chelsea Pink for Valentines

I like to look around to see what's new in the doll pattern market and I came across Michelle Ratman's designs on Etsy. There are a variety of doll sizes and I picked up a few to try but I decided to start with the Chelsea dress. You can purchase the pattern here.

I used an e hook and 1 piece of pink and white Aunt Lydia's size 10 for the holiday blend I was attempting. I think I might try a plain size 3 to see how it looks.