Pants !

Well, I was all set to buy one of the three ‘kitchen table’ type patterns I know of that are made to fit ‘Frightfully Tall’ Frankie. . . but I got to thinking about the connection between her and Supersize Barbie. I didn’t know it the other day, but there is some consumer demand for a repro of SuperSize to be released. Could be Gooliope and the FT MH girls are a sort of test market. If so, it’s going well, I really haven’t heard anything negative about them – at least, nothing that didn’t originate from me.

I confess, I have to take back my ‘too expensive’ comment. When a ‘regular’ MH is usually about $15. to $20. – with bonus clothes and accessories driving it up to $25. quite often – I just didn’t see how a bigger one would cost that much extra. Turns out, the FT series is darn near on par with the super-pricey Japanese dolls, joints-wise. Evidently the standard joints on a smaller MH ghoul aren’t good for a 17-inch tall doll, my new Frankie’s are much more involved and probably expensive. She has a chest joint, right under her bustline, like my Tonner Elphie, and her upper arms and legs have a pivot also lacking in the standard-size dolls. She’s also fairly well rooted, which probably takes three or four times more hair than usual – these ghouls got big heads !

And let’s just face it, I’d pay $40. with a smile on my face for a Ghoulia in this line. I’m happy with my Frankie, so I’m retracting that comment about ‘too pricey’ – now that I’ve had time with her, I’m wondering how they’re so cheap !

Now, back to stuffs at hand. Doll clothes ! I’m almost back to normal, health-wise, so I wanna sew. And while the buy-me patterns are instant downloads, I still wanted to see if I could get a decent result without more outlay. Researched SuperSize Barbie and found from one site that her measurements are B- 8.25 inches, W- 4.75, H- 7.75. Well, that’s definitely a Barbie ! Frankie’s were B- 4.75, W- 4, H- 6.5 inches, quite a difference. But possibly still doable. Goss knows blowing up a small doll pattern didn’t work !

Turns out, the venerable CrissyandMe.com site hosted a brief discourse on the ‘big girls’ of the late 70s, including Ideal’s Tiffany Taylor, and even offered copies of multi-sized patterns McCalls 6317 and Simplicity 7210. I wanted some pants, so I tried Mc 6317, View A, the ‘karate gi’ style outfit. My blouse fail was heavy on my head, so I used the crappiest scrap fabric in the bin – stained, thick, burlap-like, and I didn’t even change the navy blue thread from the shirt. Since they’re elastic waist pants, it was easy to get them to fit Frankie, as-is. They still look sort of big, so my next attempt will be about a third of an inch more narrow on both legs. But, since I used trash fabric and slapdash methodology, of course they came out quite nice.

So, if you’re contemplating obtaining a Frightfully Tall doll in the near future, but worry about clothes, I can tell you that Mc 6317’s View A pants will work right out of the package, with about four  or four and a half inches of elastic. And we’ll soon know if taking about a third of an inch out will look even better. Next, though, I wanna try the blouse from View G, and I already know that’s gonna be much too big. I’ll probably tweak the pattern before I even cut out fabric.