Get your machines revved up and prepare to make a fabulous 36” companion doll. Your Davenport Damsel is designed to perch on the cushions of your davenport ready to share woman gossip and chatter. She neither talks back nor tells you you're wrong. Her place in life is to support, listen and be available to your beck and call. She has a wonderful three-dimensional profile face, layers of skirts and pantaloons and is just altogether charming! On day one we will be getting familiar with doll making techniques and assembling the body. On day two we will costume, style our damsels' hair and paint their faces. Come play, relax and enjoy the process and create a real showpiece!

Making a doll or figure is an encouraging and powerful act. Creating a doll can help us to center, focus, clarify and begin a healing. They often give birth to inner workings and become a visible personal symbol. You will be taught the ancient technique of the African wrap doll and will receive personal step-by step instruction on how to create a paper clay face. As you follow your intuition a doll will make itself through your hands. By the end of the day, you will have a friend from you inner spirit to take home.

Let a doll make itself through your hands! This six-hour workshop begins with the basics of doll making. Participants will sew an original doll from the Quirky Doll collection of Tricia Spitzmueller learning all the secrets of unbreakable seams, quick turn methods, effortless stuffing and fanciful gesture. At the end of the class we will paint on faces and discuss opportunities of how to dress, accessorize and put hair on your doll. Basic sewing skills and the ability to kick back and laugh are mandatory.

This is Part Two to the S.O.U.L. Doll class. Bring your ladies and gentlemen and their bag of fabrics and we will “doll” them up in gorgeous or fun attire. Hats, hair, beads and bobbles, shoes and accessories will complete your doll's look. Tricia will bring her own collection of QUIRKY DOLLS for inspiration. At the end we will have a naming ceremony and let your dolls “tell their story” to each other. Be ready to come and play dolls!

A class at last for those who are timid about putting faces on their dolls. In the morning we will learn how to make strong, sturdy one-dimensional heads and get a good start on constructing as many as you care to paint. In the afternoon, participants will get lots of practice painting faces on their stuffed heads in a non-intimidating way. Tricia will have handouts with suggestions for facial expressions and directions for both realistic and character faces. By the end of the day, participants will walk away with several completed faces and heads ready to be put on bodies. A new Quirky doll pattern that uses this head will be available.

Leapin' Leprechauns is a fun and fanciful entry into doll making. Create a sprightly little figure dressed in leather and acorns or wings and wisps. Students learn playful and simple clothing techniques using strips of t-shirts and layers of polymer clay creating a solid, but cushy body over an armature of copper wire. Basic polymer clay-sculpting techniques are taught resulting in well-proportioned and realistic looking impish faces. This is a day to play and learn a new technique that translates into many areas of doll making.

Quirky Petal People is a fun and fanciful entry into doll making. Create a sprightly little figure that is dressed with silk flower petals with its head turned upwards as if to sniff spring. The pre-made armature of copper wire is wrap with t-shirt strips for a solid but cushy body. Step-by-step instructions in sculpting a polymer face will be taught.

Quirky Pillow People is a fun and easy class to take as an entry into the world of doll making. Pillow People are simple dolls where only two fabrics are needed for the body and garment and one skin toned fabric for the hands and face. The pattern can be used to create angels, fairies, Christmas carolers, gardeners and an array of whimsical characters. This doll is designed with the dual function of being both a doll and a pillow as it fits into the crook of an armchair or sofa. (Tricia designed this doll for the Carson Pirie Scott stores where they retailed for $125.)

Learn the basics of pancake doll construction and polymer face sculpting. We will combine the two to make a beautiful freestanding feminine figure. This is a relaxing, non-intimidating class where you will learn the basics of face sculpting in polymer clay and how to construct and stuff a freeform figure.