Handpainted Wooden Dolls

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Okey dokey, for anyone who is coming by for the first time, I'm not mean, I swear.  This is the first post, of what will be a series, of homemade gifts for Christmas.  We don't want anyone's surprise being spoiled by a blog post.

Remember my estate sale post where I showed you all my crafty super scores?  Well one of the bags had some completely random wooden things in it and most of them had been glued together.

Here's another shot in case you missed it:

It looks like some wooden flower pots and balls, right?  I had no clue what in the world they were supposed to be or what sort of project never got finished.  Then, two days after coming home with them, I saw something on one of the blogs I follow, Jane Of All Crafts.  Wooden dolls.  ADORABLE wooden dolls.  I knew right when I saw them what my glued together flower pots were destined to become.  Click here to see the dolls that Andi made.  Her pieces are different than what I had to work with, so if you're wanting to make these, make sure you head over and have a look at hers.

Alrighty then, let's get started.

You'll need whatever wooden pieces you decide on.

As I mentioned, mine were already glued together, so glue yours accordingly.

Or, if you're using the nesting one's like she did, you won't even need to glue.

I didn't realize this when I started, but I had two different sized "people" in my bag.

Once the gluing is done, dig out some paint.

I used acrylics.

I put about three coats on, using a flesh color for their heads and mixed colors for their bodies.

Once they're good and dry, you can start in on their clothes and faces.

I chose to stick with the way Andi did her bodies and use just white.

You can certainly bust into more color choices.

Once I had mine completely done, I sprayed on three coats of rattle can sealer in semi-gloss.

Here's the new family that my 1-year-old niece will be adopting:

And some close-ups of each one:

The only thing left to do is wrap them!

Hope to see you back for more DIY Christmas gifts.