TUTORIAL Mexican Girl Scout Uniform for Thinking Day (Girl Guide, Guia)

I searched long and hard for a tutorial to make a Mexican Girl Scout outfit for our American Girl Doll for this year's Girl Scout Thinking Day. It didn't seem to be a thing, so I came up with one...you're welcome the internet!

 After some intense pinteresting, I found this sweet picture of some Mexican Girl Guides (Guias in Spanish).

photo from ourcabana.org

 Interestingly, newborn size onesies make perfect no sew t-shirts for 18” dolls….who knew?? Check out this blog for other ideas on AG no sew shirts. Read on for how to take the onesie method and make a no sew Mexican Girl Scout uniform!

 Mexican Girl Guide Uniform for 18" Dolls -You Will Need: 

• One plain white newborn size onesie 
• Fabric scissors or sharp kitchen scissors 
• Fabric pen or Sharpie marker 
• Piece of cardboard approx 5 ½” x 7” (a flattened GS cookie box works well!) 
• Glue gun 
• Scraps of ⅜” ribbon 
• Tiny buttons or scraps of felt 
• One 1” safety pin 
• Scrap of red fabric at least 24” x 9” or use a fat quarter 

Shirt 

Before starting first have a bit of a cry when you realize how small a newborn onesie is and that your babies aren't babies any more (unless they are, in which case kudos to you for crafting with a newborn around!), then on to today's business!  Make sure the fabric on the onesie doesn't have any wrinkles...you can iron it or just smooth it out really well so the front and back are flat and equal

1. Measure 4” down form each armpit and make a small dot on the shirt 
2. Take a ruler and draw a straight line between your marks 
   
3. Cut across your line making sure the front and back are equal 
   
4. Place the cardboard inside the shirt so that the marker doesn't leak through the fabric 
5. Starting at the back right shoulder, start writing the word “GUIAS” in letters about ½” high in a straight line across the shirt
6. Leave a ½” space and then write “GUIAS” again 
7.  Repeat until you get to the other side of the shirt 
8. Leave a space of about ½” and start a new line, keep repeating until you run out of room 
9. Turn the shirt over and repeat on the front 
   
10. For the arms, I started at the front, near the neckline with the sleeve hem facing towards me...there's not a lot of space, but the idea is to make it look like printed fabric so just write partial words and keep the same spacing you used for the main part of the shirt 

*Optional: you can hem the bottom edge of the shirt if you want to, but it's up to you since t-shirt fabric won't fray (yay!)

 Neckerchief 

1. Cut the red fabric into a diamond shape approximately 24” x 9” (it doesn't need to be exact) I used pinking shears to prevent fraying...other options include “fray check”, hemming the raw edges or doing a zig zag stitch across the raw edge...or you could just leave it 
   
2. Heat up the glue gun 
3. Cut a piece of ribbon about 2 ½” long 
4. Make a loop with the ribbon and glue the end down 
   
5. When the glue is dry, fold the red fabric in half long ways and roll it into a tube, bring the two long ends together and loosely pull the ribbon loop through the ends of the fabric 

 Insignia Pin 

1. Cut a piece of ribbon about 2” long 
2. Cut the ends into a point (you can seal the ends of the ribbon with fray check or a lighter...be careful!!)
3. Pull one end of the ribbon through the safety pin 
4. Glue the two ends of the ribbon together so that they form a loop around the pin with the ends of the ribbon hanging down 
   

Optional: glue on some little buttons or scraps of felt to look like Girl Scout insignia


 Done! All you have to do now is get your doll dressed and she's ready for Thinking Day! We dressed our Josefina doll in some cute leggings and sparkly sneakers from Hobby Lobby, but you could have her wear any kind of pants or a skirt.

 Happy Thinking Day!

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