Barbie Girl

With all of the publicity I’ve been seeing about the upcoming Barbie Movie, it was only fitting to pull this pattern out and sew it now!

I lucked out for sure finding this pattern in a pile at my local second hand store. It is from 1963 and with a quick internet search I discovered that McCall’s seems to be the only pattern company who manufactured patterns with the official Barbie logo. There are plenty of “Fashion Doll” patterns, or “11 1/2 inch doll” patterns, but having the actual Barbie logo and trademark makes this pattern special!

My niece Lauren, who loves Barbie, and is the right size for this pattern, would be the lucky girl who gets it! I decided to travel for this sew, to Lauren’s house. I packed up my sewing machine and supplies. I looked around and realized I had the perfect travel case. Grandma Doris had this old sewing machine case in her laundry room. Sadly it was empty when we found it, no vintage machine inside, but since it’s sewing related I took it and it’s been sitting in my sewing room.

My new machine fit perfectly, as did my tools! With everything conveniently stowed, I left to go sew!

I had asked Lauren what color outfit she would want, and she said “Barbie pink”. Since the pattern was a two piece, shirt and skirt, we decided to go with traditional Barbie black and white stripes, with a “Barbie pink” skirt.

For reference, here is the original Barbie from 1959. She is of course wearing her iconic striped bathing suit.

I had to make sure the stripes lined up. I laid the back piece on top of the fabric and pinned it good to cut the second back piece.

Lauren, meanwhile, was busy getting Barbie fitted with her pattern!

She needed her measurements taken, of course!

A fun fact about this pattern is that the instructions were missing! I had no guide for sewing it together. It was simple enough but had to really use my past sewing experience to pull it off!

Here the neck and back facing are sewn on, clipped, and ready to be turned.

The shirt took us all afternoon, plus playing with Barbie in between sewing, so I had to just take Lauren’s measurements and head home. The next day I started on the skirt.

I cut Barbie’s skirt out at the same time as Lauren’s.

I sewed the skirt front pieces together. Was I supposed to top stitch the seams? Who knows with no instructions! I went ahead and did it anyways.

How to attach the waist band? Another mystery, so I just did it the way I thought was best and then hand stitched the waistband on the inside.

It was time to sew on the buttons. The shirt buttons up the back. I was glad I took the time to line up the stripes!

I sewed up Barbie’s skirt and ironed it with my mini iron.

Barbie’s skirt is closed with a sew on snap.

Here’s where thinking ahead helped! Lauren and Barbie needed to match, but the stripes on Lauren’s shirt would be too big for Barbie. I found this black and white striped fabric that is a perfect, scaled down match!

Barbie’s shirt was coming together.

It was finished and 1970’s Malibu Barbie was glad to model it for me!

Off I went, back to Lauren and her Barbie for a final try on and photo shoot!

Here they are looking perfect in front of the Dream House!

Lauren and Barbie then went outside for an outdoors photo shoot.

Lauren set them up just like she wanted, to best show off Barbie’s new outfit.

Then it was time for a little playing with Barbie.

Lauren decided that baby Chrissy needed to get in the photo shoot too.

Getting a little distracted from the photo shoot! HA!

All set up perfectly!

Now it was just time to play! Barbie seemed to enjoy going on the zip line with Lauren.

Lots of fun in matching outfits!

Barbie, Chelsea, and Lauren enjoying the swings.

The thing about Barbie is, she can do anything, she can be anything, and that is a powerful message for little girls! Barbie was my favorite toy growing up, and I love her still to this day.

It was fun to make this matching “Barbie and Me” outfit for Lauren. I hope she realizes that like Barbie, she can be and do anything!

Just for fun, here are some more Barbie girls you might recognize. You might also recognize their outfits from past blog posts!

Yes, I will be going to see the Barbie movie. Yes, I have a dress for the occasion! Once a Barbie girl, always a Barbie girl!

As for me, onto the next!