I’ve made shockingly fast progress on this doll.  The head was definitely the hardest part.  Here we have the head inserted into the arms with the legs and torso ready to be sewn on.

Since I took this picture last night, I finished almost all the hand sewing of the body to the arms.  Now I’m actually contemplating having the clothes made by her birthday too!  I’m delaying embroidering the eyes and mouth because I’m having a terrible time choosing the eye color.  Ellie’s eyes are gray blue and I just can’t match the color perfectly.  I’ll come up with something before Saturday!  And yes, the doll will most certainly be bald on Ellie’s birthday (but not permanently).  I figure that this is appropriate because Ellie looked bald for much of her first two years.