Happy Halloween!

Another post from the file of "finally using fabric I bought ages ago."  This precious Riley Blake orange fabric was purchased last year for a Halloween dress, but never got around to getting made. Which, by the way, I'm glad occurred because it didn't result in another pillow case dress.  As I said previously, I'm getting bored with those.

So I made this adorable peasant dress from Sew Like My Mom.

I was going to put black pockets on the front, but the pattern is so adorable, I didn't want to cover it up! This was actually a pretty easy dress to make. She also has a short sleeved version on her site, so I can see more of these coming along in the future. :)

Then, I found this precious remnant of alien fabric at Hancock. So I put my pillow-making skills back to work and made these.  I had a hell of a time getting this to work. First I realized I didn't have enough alien to make a whole pillowcase body out of it. But my smart hubby suggested I make it half-and-half, and it came out so cute! Until I used the piece I cut for Berry's pillowcase body to cut the strip for Monkey's.  Oops.  So I had to Frankenstein both of them together a little bit, but you can't even tell (and I thought it was appropriate since it is Halloween and all!).  So they have alien with green on one side, and green with alien on the other! They have both been sleeping on them and I've even seen them flip the pillows over to get a taste of the other side!

I even used a bit of white quilt binding to make that cute stripe between the two fabrics. I think it just adds something to it.  AND! I got to use my overlock foot a TON, so that was fun!

I have a BUNCH, and I mean a bunch, of remnant Halloween fabric. I'd like to make some pillowcases to donate to the hospital for sick kids who have to be there during the holidays.  Hope I can get it together for this year!

Animal Hang Out

Monkey has this thing for stuffed animals, and they are everywhere in his room. There was just enough room for him in the bed to sleep at night - the animals took up the rest of the space.  Then they somehow ended up on the floor for a very long time, and a select few graced the bed. 

He won't let me get rid of any of them, and there was just no where else to keep them. So I did a Pinterest search and came up with this great sling idea!

Saved the day! They are off the floor, Monkey has room in his bed, and he can still get them whenever he needs to.

Sleep Tight My Angel

There are three things that Berry loves in her life: her lamb (Mamlie), princesses (fen-cen), and Dora (Do-wah!).

I had picked up a remnant of Dora fabric at Walmart months ago; whimsical blue background with Pegasuses (Pegasi? what's the plural of Pegasus?), Dora and Boots with tones of pink and purple. I had plans to make her a pillowcase dress with it, but I'm getting bored with pillowcase dresses, as easy as they are to make.

A couple months ago, Berry had been begging for a "Dora bed" (read: sheetset) so we broke down and got her one. I decided this fabric would make an excellent pillow case, as I had been wanted to try out pillowcase making for a while.

So today, as a birthday indulgement for myself, I finally did it. It was as easy as anything (once I got the machine to cooperate...it kept wanting to jam for some reason).  I even used one of the fancy stitches that the machine came with.  I hope she likes it!

Hunting Fairies

I finally took some pictures off of the camera after almost two months and found a few gems that I'd forgotten about.

Another elastic waist skirt for Berry (these are becoming way too easy to gen out).

Complete with fairy wings and crowns in her favorite: purple.

Here it is in action!

Monkey spent at a week at "camp" at my mom's, and while he was there he made me this awesome plant stake! I know it's not one of my crafts, but it is a craft and oh so loved!

Monkey was also starting to notice that I was making a lot of clothes for Berry and he wasn't getting anything. He pointed this out to me, so I asked what he wanted. He replied, "a hunting shirt". To him, hunting means camo. So I had the challenge of 1) finding knit camo and 2) figuring out how to make a t-shirt.

Making the shirt wasn't that hard. Finding the camo he wanted that was just right was the harder part. The fabric ended up being this poly kind of knit, so it stretched a little, but it wasn't traditional t-shirt material. I don't really care for it, but he doesn't seem to care.

The problem I had with sewing this fabric was that I made a strip of bias tape to use for the collar (so proud of myself for this tape/collar combo!) but it didn't stretch very well when it went over his head. He wore it one day and some how ripped the tape right off the collar in one part. So I ended up cutting out the collar (partly to make a bigger neck hole) and replacing the tape with fold over elastic for the collar.

It looks ok, but I ended up cutting the hole too big so now it's a little loosey goosey. Oh well.  Here's a shot before all that drama occurred. (Excuse all the crap on the floor. I obviously wasn't concerned with floor cleanliness when I took this!)

I will have to say that I won't be afraid of making another t-shirt! When I do, I'll be sure to use traditional knit, and will likely do another tape collar, and it will hopefully stretch a little better over the head!

Ann Taylor LOFT Knock Off

Berry and I were in ATL a few weeks ago, catching one of their great 50% off sale price sales. I found this really cute magenta knit skirt that I thought would be so fun to knock around in on the weekends.

(photo from loft.com)

It was $18. I tried it on and looked at it and looked at it. I just knew I could make the same skirt. I mean it's just an elastic waist. I made Berry's elephant skirt, which is essentially the same concept. I could not bring myself to spend $18 on something that I knew I could go home that minute and make for pennies with materials on hand.

So I did!

I used some of the navy ribbed knit I had left over from the Infinity Dress (which I still need to blog about) and whipped it out. And to my surprise, I had bought (and forgotten about) a remnant of magenta knit I'd bought for about $2! I mean, EXACT same as the skirt in the store!! So I whipped one out in magenta as well. I haven't worn the navy one yet, but I love the magenta one. The fabric curls up at the edges, so I didn't even hem; I just let it slightly roll. Too cute!  Next time I wear them I'll be sure to get pics and update, so you can see my handiwork!

Tie Hem Shorts

These are the most absolutely precious shorts I've ever seen and I actually made them myself! I couldn't be prouder. I used up that adorable woodly creature fabric I picked up as remnants a while back. They even have pockets!

I did run into a few snags through out the tutorial at Craft Passion. The basis of these shorts are from the appropriately named Kids Shorts with Pockets.  There were a few steps that could have been elaborated (such as putting the fronts and backs/sides together) for those of us who are not expert sewists (see how I used that word? Not "sewers" again!). But since I have some common sense I was able to figure it out and push through. I did make notes on my print out, because I will be making these again without the ties, since they were so easy.

The most disappointing part of the tie hem tutorial was the pictures and instructions on attaching the ties to the hem. The words were confusing and she has you turn the ties right side out after you attach them to the shorts. I literally tried this three times and each time it tried to suck the shorts through. I couldn't figure out what I was doing wrong. The tute has all kinds of great comments with people saying they did it with ease, but I just wasn't getting it.

So, I just righted the ties on their own and then attached them to the hem. It left the inside a little wonky, but no one's looking at the inside. Still, I am super impressed with myself.

They are sized for a 3T so I didn't bother to measure against S since she's started into 3Ts. The waist is ok, though they are more like capris than shorts! At least that means she can sprout into them. ;)

Elephants and Triangles

OK, I hit the fabric store again yesterday to return the material I bought for the Infinity Dress that I decided I didn't like. And of course I hit the remnants bin! The manager told me they had been working on remnants all weekend, and it showed. So now I have six more pieces with no plans. But how do you pass up magenta knit and pink princesses?? Something will come of them, I'm sure.

In the meantime, yesterday I was busy with Berry's elephant simple skirt and July 4 triangle dress.

Are those elephants not the cutest!? Berry loved it and wore it over her dress yesterday after she got home from camp.

She wore it appropriately to camp today.

I'm not quite sure of the length on the July 4 triangle dress, since she was being goofy when I was trying to hold it up to her. I left a good sized hem on it, so I can lengthen it as she gets older and get more use out of it! Some of the instructions on this tute were weird, but basically it's a pillow case dress where you cut the rectangles into semi-triangles before you put it together. I love the "shooting stars" on this one!

The Fabric Stash is Growing!

Yikes. I really need to get to making some more stuff. I went to Hancock's Memorial Day Blowout today and got mostly what I went looking for plus a couple of other things. Didn't do too much damage, but as I was putting things away I realized the amount of stash I have with no particular plans for it. I have a ton of Halloween remnants, and several yards of Christmas I bought before Berry was born, I think. I'm sure I'll figure something out. I was able to clear out some scraps, I know I'll never use, so that was good.

The biggest finds today were two remnants (of course!). One is a precious seersucker cotton with hot pink, yellow and green tiny flowers all over it. Just enough for a summer skirt or top for S for a mere $1.25. The second is a brown cotton with tiny orange butterflies all over it. And get this, it coordinates perfectly with a remnant I bought there months ago, that's peach with adorable foxes, owls and other woodsy critters. I had to snatch it up because of that fact, besides its only being $1. Now to figure out what to make with it.

I did some planning the other day and figured out four items I want to make in the next few weeks, so keep your eyes open for updates. This was the real reason for my trip today: to get the last batch of fabric for these projects. I did also pick up some adorable patriotic cotton to make Berry a July 4th dress.

Project plans, in no particular order...drum roll please!

• Simple Bow Tie Top by Sweet Verbena (for me)
• Simple Skirt by MADE (for S)
• Tie Hem Shorts by Craft Passion (for S)
• Little Red Infinity Dress by Sew Like My Mom (mine will be gray, not red)

I think I'll use this Tiny Triangle Dress by Purl Bee tutorial to make the July 4 dress. I offered to make something for Monkey, but he was no-go. Oh well.

Quickie Dora Outfit

I went to JoAnn's the other day to buy some velcro to fix Monkey's nap mat for school. Of course I had to check out the remnants bin! I found 1/3 yd of this cute purple cotton Dora fabric, and about 2/3 yd cotton/poly blend yellow seersucker. I had to get them!

Since I was pulling out the sewing machine to fix the nap mat and hem some pants, I decided I was going to whip out an outfit for Berry.

I only had enough Dora to make some shorts, and the yellow was used for the top. I actually made a pattern for the top using another top she had as the basis, and some ideas from this one.  I searched the internet for an easy shorts pattern and used this one.

I had to take a couple of inches off the top of the shorts to make them fit, since I wasn't using a knit like she did.  And I cut the fabric wrong initially, so had to patchwork a 2 inch sized piece in the back, but it came out fine.

I had to be creative with the top, since I realized I needed some way to give her room to actually get into it! I'd used a top that had buttons down the back as the template, and didn't plan on adding buttons to the new one.  So I hemmed up around the arms and neck, and sewed in some hot pink & black patterend grosgrain ribbons to tie it on at the shoulders.  I trimmed the neck, arms, and hem with zig zag stitch in black to give it some oomph. It came out really cute!

And they both fit perfectly! It's hard to see the shorts since the top's a little long, but you get the gist.  Poor Berry was crying for something, who remembers what. But she did have two lambies, didn't she?

I'd totally  make these shorts again, maybe with some knit next time, but the cotton worked well too. They're short shorts, so they're perfect for South Louisiana summers!

I am TWO!!!

At this exact time 2 years ago, my baby girl had been in the world for an hour. And she was perfect.

And I was starving. :)

To celebrate this momentous occasion, Berry has been telling everyone at school for weeks that she was having "Dora Cupcake!". Mommy had bought Hello Kitty.

I remedied this and whipped up (literally - they are so fluffy I think I let them go too long on the mixer) some golden butter cupcakes with chocolate icing. They of course have Dora and Boots toppers.

Dora! D-D-Dora! Swiper, no swiping!

And not to be outdone by the Dora theme, we picked up some napkins, and she wore the pillow case dress I made for her a few weeks ago. I got all "fancy" (as Berry says) and added a coordinating strip to the bottom rather than the one solid pattern I've been doing. I messed it up a couple of times, but it was all good in the end.

"Who's birthday is it today?"

"Berry's!"

Sewing Frenzy

A few weeks ago I went on a sewing frenzy and whipped up these little ditties.  A St Pat's dress and nightie for Berry, and a nightie for me!

The St Pat's pillow case dress was an easy-do using this tutorial from Sew Like My Mom. I saw this tute from icandy handmade on pillow case nighties and thought Berry would look so cute in one, so ran to get some stretch lace and used this fun leftover fabric I had from her bean bags.

This nightie is the second I did using a pattern from One-Yard Wonders, a book I got a couple of Christmases ago. I've marked a ton of pages in it but this is the first thing I've actually made. The first go round was a little short for me (have to wear boxers underneath), so I lengthened this one. I love the contrast of the bias tape on the straps. It's hard to see here but the fabric has a light slate blue floral pattern throughout.