Sewing for Barbie and Ken

When Spring Break started, I envisioned spending the whole time making quilts.  I was really into cleaning out the scrap baskets and it was going pretty well.  But once the covid-19 craziness started, I started making masks and gowns, and a quilt somehow seemed out of the question.  I just couldn't settle on a pattern, and I really didn't want to cut stuff out when my sewing room was so uprooted by the masks and gowns situation.  But I had gotten one of my granddaughters a Barbie for Christmas, and one day while we were talking on FaceTime, my daughter said that her youngest two would play Barbie for hours.  They had all kinds of adventures.  And imaginary adventures for kids are just my thing.  I really like to encourage kids in that regard.

So I started making Barbie clothes in between mask and gown sessions.  Honestly, I have always hated making Barbie clothes.  Other dolls, OK, but Barbie?  They're just so darned small.  I had made some Barbie clothes for her at Christmas.  And hated it.  All those little pieces!!! But I was lamenting the Barbie situation on Instagram, and an IG friend. said she made lots of Barbie clothes - and there was an easy way and a hard way.  Apparently, I had taken the hard road.

She told me about a Barbie skirt she had made over and over made from a simple rectangle.  She shared her "recipe."  Then she shared a couple of Pinterest pictures of other easy Barbie clothes.  I dug into the scraps from the hospital gowns (of all things!) and started sewing.  First, a skirt.

Then a boxy top to go with it, which is just about the easiest outfit ever!  A rectangle skirt and a rectangle top and two straps (which I have to say I'm pretty good at now after making the ties on masks and gowns for several weeks!)

Then another skirt that coordinated with the top.

Then yet another skirt.  But wait - Barbie needs more tops!

And this top coordinates with all the skirts, so that's a plus.

And let's try putting darts in the top and make another skirt.

And now since I'm getting pretty confident, let's try a dress.  This is the same top as the one above, with a gathered rectangle sewn on as a skirt.  This is pretty fun.

And now let's dig in the scrap bin and find more fabrics to coordinate.  Let's try a strapless dress this time.

And before I knew it - literally in one afternoon - Barbie had a whole new wardrobe for granddaughter's birthday.  And I couldn't wait to sew for Ken. 

Stay tuned!