Make a Yarn Doll

Making a yarn doll is a great way to spend quality time doing a child-friendly project with your kid. Not only that, but it’ll give him or her something to play with and be proud of. To make a yarn doll, follow these instructions.

Steps

  1. Decide how tall you want the doll to be. Cut out a piece of cardboard that is roughly the same height. 
  2. Loop yarn once around the cardboard lengthwise. Be sure to use a soft yarn, as scratchy yarn won’t be as huggable. Craft stores has many different styles and textures and sizes of yarn that you can use.
  3. Tie a knot at the top to secure it. Don’t cut the yarn just yet.
  4. Keep wrapping the yarn around the cardboard. You'll need at least 100 loops for a good doll. Remember, the more times you wrap it, the thicker your doll will be. On your last loop, tie it to a previous loop to secure it. the you have tie it
  5. Slide a piece of string between the loops and the cardboard. Slide it up to the top of the cardboard and tie a tight knot. This will gather all of the strings together in the center of the cardboard. For a pretty accent bow, you can use a different color piece of yarn.
  6. Slide the strings off of the cardboard. Tie a piece of string in a tight knot around where you'd like the neck of the doll to be. Don't worry if it ends up being too high or too low; you can adjust it later.
  7. Pull out a few loops on each side to form the doll's arms. Tie a string tightly around the middle of the looped strings where you'd like the waist to be.
  8. Tie the arms at the "wrists" and trim the looped yarn ends. For a different look, braid the arms before tying them off.
  9. Cut across the bottom of the body to make a "skirt" of yarn. (You can also leave the ends looped if you prefer the look.) Alternatively, you can make legs by splitting the middle into 2 parts from the waist down and tying them off like you did the arms; don’t forget that you can braid these as well.


Tips

  • Try some embellishments like ribbon or using two colors of yarn successively.
  • If you want your doll to have hair, make sure you put a few extra loops at the beginning. Then, before you tie the neck piece, pull out some loops for hair. Let them dangle in back while you finish the doll and then cut and braid them into hair.
  • Add clothes or bows to make a unique style. If wanted, you can also add hair. If you choose to add hair put a special braid or pigtails on it. This helps by making it realistic, and one of a kind.
  • If you want to make a one of a kind face keep reading! To make buttons, face, or mouth, personalize these things by sewing on buttons. Two buttons for eyes, one button for a nose , and four buttons for the mouth. If you do not like to sew draw the face that you want on a piece of paper then glue it on. Or, add a smiley face sticker if you have one.
  • To make hair; take string and loop it through the head. Then, take many pieces of yarn together and tie them on with string. Lastly, trim. You can also braid the hair.
  • To make a giant-sized yarn doll, use a string mop instead of yarn. Take the mop off the plastic piece that would connect it to the handle, fold in half, and tie to make head.
  • Instead of cardboard,try a bins cover or for a jumbo, a bin works too.
  • Just make it unique.
  • Corn husk dolls are made in a similar fashion, only from corn husks rather than yarn.
  • You can put a ring of Life Savers in the middle for a more solid body. It's really cute!!
  • Use different color of yarn to make different dolls and make a family.
  • To make a giant doll, you can loop your string on the back of a chair. However, if you do this method, you will need to cut the string off instead of sliding it off the back of the chair. It still has the same effect as the cardboard, and is super cute!

Warnings

  • A large doll can eat through a lot of yarn. Size with care.

Things You'll Need

  • A small book
  • Yarn
  • Scissors
  • Buttons (optional)
  • Ribbon (optional)

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