Sweet Lucille, A Porch Person (Life-Size Doll)

Porch People Like Sweet Lucille are fun to make. I made her in an afternoon.

1. Take 2 standard pillows, hand sew them together together (end to end).

2. The lower pillow is split open vertically and sewn up again to make the thighs. Two fabric tubes are stuffed with sturdy but light weight pool noodles. Socks, shoes, clothing are adding during staging.

3. I make a fabric neck tube and stuff and hand sew to join head and torso. The top pillow stuffed is the torso.

4. To make Lucille sit up straight I use a 30" long wooden dowel for her spine. The wooden dowel begins at her bowel, travels up the back spine, and ends up penetrating her entire head. Ooooo, sounds like it would hurt doesn't it?

5. Two stuffed fabric tubes make the arms.

6. Head. 6 eclipse shaped fabric pieces sewn together and filled with poly fluff make a round head--you might use a pumpkin pattern. After the pumpkin head is stuffed, sew small buttons, one at either side of the head where you'll sew on the ears. Use the buttons as anchors. With a doll head needle (a needle that is 4-5" long), wrap end of the thread around one button, then pass the needle through the head horizontally to the other ear button. Cinch the thread tight to draw the head into a more oval shape and wrap the thread many times around the button to secure. Again, pass the needle back through the head to the other ear, cinch, and wrap the thread many times to secure. Take several stitches to firmly secure the oval shaped head.

7. Make "C" shaped ears out of several layers of fabric. Sew ears on either side of the head keeping the buttons behind the ears to hide them.

8. Add wig, hat, glasses, earrings, gloves, and there you have it . . . Lucille, a porch person.