Repurposing Take 2

Today, I attempted a dress for Janey. I found an adorable white with tiny yellow polkadots shirt that I really wanted for myself, but there was nothing even similar in my size, nor do I actually *need* another shirt. So Janey gets it. Having learned from Breanne's dress, this time I cut off the "skirt" part of the dress first, and left it full. I cut out the top (in the fashion of Made's 90 Minute Shirt), using the original neckline again. The pattern on the fabric is SO light, so I decided I might need a little more contrast in it. I found an old, stretched out yellow t-shirt of mine, and cut a strip out to put in the middle of the top and bottom of Janey's dress. The last step was sleeves, which I was able to cut out of the extra scraps leftover from the top of the shirt. After I pieced it all together, I came out with this:




Janey really likes it, and insisted on wearing it all evening. Once again, though, it's just so-so. But better than Breanne's, I think. Progress. :) I want to take the yellow strip in, make it about 1, maybe 1.5" across instead of the 2.5" it is now. And while I do that, hopefully I can fix some of the gathering. This is really my first experience in sewing with knits, and it's definitely been a challenge. Maybe someday I'll sew with a pattern, and get things that actually come out looking nice... but first I'll have to learn how to do that. :/

In the meantime, Breanne loves her new dress, too... but mostly just likes to make crazy faces at the camera:

T-shirt to Dress Refashion

Yep, that's right, I'm jumping on the repurposing boat. And I'm excited about it. :)

In case you haven't heard, Shade is going out of business. So naturally, I had to go to their liquidation sale here by me, and get a few things for myself. While I was there, though, I noticed that all of their extra large clothing was marked down to $5. Now, that's not an *amazing* deal by my standards, however, for nice, new clothing for the girls (a $5 comfy dress? yes please!), I figured I could spend that much. So, here is my first project using one of the shirts.

I wanted to make Breanne a dress out of this sea-green-ish fabric. I ended up cutting the original sleeves off the shirt, chopping the shirt up into the size of dress I wanted, and re-sewing it all back together.


I added the shirring for a little detail, but I'm not totally sold on it--I think the dress either still needs something else, or needs to be a little bit shorter (maybe a drop waist? I wish I'd thought to do something different with the waist before I chopped it all off and made it skinnier, if that makes sense to any of you). I can't decide what it is, though. I still think it came out pretty nicely:



and Breanne insisted on wearing it all nice tonight (hence the chocolate milk stain down the front... good thing I'm taking pics with my phone so you don't notice it so much... :)), but I didn't think to get any pics until after she went to bed. Maybe next time, since she seems to like it enough to wear it many times.

Ariel in the Pink Dress

So... I was seriously planning on buying costumes for my girls for Halloween this year. Don't get me wrong, I love to sew. I'm just not quite good enough at clothing yet.

Breanne, on the other hand, had different ideas. When I asked her a few weeks ago what she wanted to be for Halloween, she very specifically requested to be Ariel, in her pink dress (she wears it to dinner, when she thinks the fork is a dinglehopper, in case you're trying to remember it). Her response has not varied in the slightest every time I've asked her since then. So, I looked around a bit for the costume, but it's difficult to find such a specific costume for a reasonable amount of money (read--I can't find it anywhere but on Etsy, cheapest I've seen is $240...what!?!). And so... I am now making costumes. Yes, costumes with an "s," because Janey now also wants to be Ariel in the pink dress. Only sometimes Janey's Ariel dress involves purple, too... we'll see what she ends up with. :) In the meantime, I've pretty much finished Breanne's dress--I may add some more trim (it's actually supposed to have some white around the collar and waist, as well as a lace-ish bottom), but if it doesn't get done, it will work as is. I tried to get a decent picture, but someone couldn't stop twirling around the living room in it, so this is what I got:





It's not perfect (obviously), but I wanted to make it big, so she can play in it for a while. Also, the fabric, while slightly stretchy, is not overly so, and I wanted her to be able to get in and out of it with ease. I can't decide if I should figure out something for the shoulder part to make it poofier, or if I should just leave it alone... The important part is that she loves it, which she does. Now I just need to get working on Janey's. :)

P.S. Not sure if you noticed my KCWC button on the side--this week is the Kid's Clothing Week Challenge, and this has been my project for days 1-3. I want to sew some actual clothes for the rest of the week... but we'll see. I feel like I need to get Janey's costume done, too, so she doesn't feel left out. :/

Bumpers!

I don't know how many of you have pacifier babies, but Cailin is definitely a pacifier child. As such, she is constantly throwing/spitting/knocking them behind her crib. I have to try to fit under her crib to fish them out of the back corner, and it's just been a pain. Since I had a bit of fabric leftover from the girls' quilts (just need to be put together, but my machine is seriously BEGGING for a service... weird sad noises and everything... ugh), I decided to try my hand at making a set of crib bumpers to help solve the pacifier problem. I'm pretty ecstatic about how they came out:




I finally finished them last night, and couldn't wait to put them up. I put Cailin in bed when she was almost asleep for a nap this afternoon, but her slightly open eye caught sight of the new bumpers, at which point her eyes flew open to examine her new surroundings. She hung out, awake, just talking to the colors, for about 20 minutes. And when I came back to get her out, she'd moved her head to the one opening in the corner so she could see out. Pretty darn cute.



Linking up to Amy's Sew and Tell. :)

New Skirt

So one of my most favorite creations... a skirt I created pretty much out of my own head. I saw a tutorial months ago on doing a knit waistband, and thought it was kind of genius. When I saw this fabric, I knew just what I wanted to do with it. Because of the thickness of the skirt, though (the fabric itself is actually quite light, and so definitely needed to be lined), I couldn't do a twirly skirt type (tried it, and totally failed, believe me!), and so ended up cutting an A-line based on a skirt I already have and love. And I love it. Maybe someday someone will take a picture of me in it, and I'll post it. But I'm not taking a picture of myself. Today, at least. :)

Linking up to The Train To Crazy's blog party this week.

4th of July Outfits

So... even though we won't be going anywhere this weekend due to the chickenpox, I still wanted to make the girls festive outfits to wear. Maybe Cory will take the older girls to the parade on Monday or something, we'll see.

Anyway, I saw these adorable shirts over on Make It and Love It, and knew I wanted to make them... and then I remembered the Reversible Twirly Skirt Tutorial my friend E. did over at PinkSuedeShoe, and decided to pair the two. I've only made one skirt so far, (because I was trying to change up the pattern, and apparently the way things work in my head is not how they work in real life, so when I tried to take some shortcuts, it.. uh.. did not work and I ended up recutting some things and resewing a lot...) but hopefully by the end of today, I'll have a couple more done. Still, I love the one skirt, and if I don't end up making any more, it'll go on Cailin, with her onesie and baby legs (as long as they don't bother her poor chickenpoxed legs... :( ) and the older girls can just wear some jeans.

My very silly older girls (with Janey sporting the skirt I made):


And Cailin's onesie (she's sleeping a lot today, and I'm not up for waking her up just to show off a shirt, sorry):


And baby legs:


And a closer-up of the skirt--there's a tiny white polkadot red side, and a navy gingham on the other side, very fun and patriotic. The white bottom trim also has tiny white stars. I really love how it turned out, thanks E.! :)


I'm linking up to Amy's Sew and Tell, and to Skip to My Lou's Made By You Mondays. They're part of the reason I was still excited to get these done, even when I realized we probably wouldn't be heading out anywhere to celebrate. We'll just have to come up with some great activities for our house. :)

New Bag

So I bought a bit of fabric to make a bag for my mom for mother's day. It came out pretty cute, I thought, and I was excited to give it to her. She seemed to like it, so I thought all was good.

Yesterday, I realized I didn't have a gift for bunco last night, and I didn't feel like going to buy anything, so I decided to use my leftover fabric from my mom's bag to make into my gift. Now I just have to apologize to my mom, because this bag came out so much better than hers... Sorry mom! If you want me to make yours better, I totally will.

I've been wanting to participate in amylouwho's Sew and Tell for a while now, but rarely have anything great to post. I'm excited today to actually have something to add. :)

A few pics--

Smocks

So ever since I saw these smocks over at Make It and Love It, I've wanted to make some for our kids. I wasn't sure about the cotton material, though, or the ruffle. Seemed like those things would cause it to hold on to paint/playdoh/whatever else they were using for their creations. Then when my friend E. talked about making a raincoat for her daughter out of a vinyl tablecloth, an idea struck me. What if I just made my smocks out of a vinyl tablecloth? So I did. I bought the tablecloth at Walmart for a whopping $4, and have enough to make a ton more stuff, as it was a 60"x84". The more expensive part would've been the bias tape I used around the edges, but I already had that (and have NO idea where it came from, it's just been in my stash for a while now). Other than those two things, the only other stuff I needed was a little velcro (about 6 inches total for 2 smocks) and some ribbon for a tie, which is totally optional. So now, for just a couple dollars and a half hour each, I have 2 smocks to keep my girls' clothing clean while they paint/sculpt/craft to their hearts content. I'm pretty excited about them.

General size and shape (I decided to do this differently than the smock at Make It and Love It--I wanted one that I didn't have to pull over the girls' heads--if they get gunky paint or whatever on them, I don't want to have to pull that up over their heads.):


Simple Velcro fastener:


I changed up the pockets, too:


and this is how I attached the ribbon (I went over it at least 5 times for some security, since this will get the most pull of anywhere on the smock):


And the smocks in action:


(And in case you're wondering, we are having a jammies day over here, what with the rain outside and everything. Normally I don't like them, but I'm being productive this morning, so it's going ok. And I know it's hard to believe, but I really do actually do my girls' hair every now and then... and I usually make Janey wear pants... and Breanne generally wears pj's that match... just not today. Oh well.)

Who has a diaper bag they love?

Me!! And I made it myself! I'm pretty ridiculously proud of it, sorry. :)


The exterior is corduroy, for two reasons. One, I love corduroy, and two, it's so durable! You're supposed to use a home decor weight fabric of some sort, but most of those are dry clean only, which just doesn't scream diaper bag, to me. So thus, the washer and dryer friendly corduroy. :)

It has an outside pocket for papers and such,



an inside pocket divided into three sections, meant to carry three sippy cups or bottles, or other snacks,



and an inside pocket for my keys, phone, wallet, and whatever else.


I've been wanting a bigger and nicer diaper bag for a while now, but just couldn't find anything I loved, and everything was so expensive! So, I finally got up the nerve to make one myself. I got inspiration from this tutorial, and this tutorial, but ended up making it how I wanted it. I still need to sew on another piece of velcro, but because I broke my sewing machine needle (first time for everything, right?), it will have to wait. But I am excited, and I love it. And, it cost me less than $20! (and one sewing machine needle...) Pretty great. :)

Carseat Cover

So after the whole RSV thing, I've been a little bit protective of Cailin... I really, really don't want her to get sick again. So, everytime we go anywhere, I want her covered up. I was using a blanket for a while there, but finally decided to just make a carseat cover--and I LOVE it. It's been so nice to not have to worry about it falling off/blowing away/becoming a baby doll blanket and getting more germy... I love that it's stuck to the carseat. So nice. I used a tutorial from A Wednesday Afternoon, though I saw tons more when I was researching it, and may have tweaked it some to fit my needs. I still need to add some details to the handle thing to make the ribbon prettier, but for now, it's wonderful and functional, and just what I needed.

Another Project...

...and perhaps my last before the baby is born? I suppose we shall see.

Anyway, I've been wanting to make a nursing cover for a while now, and a couple weeks ago I bought the for it fabric on sale (at JoAnn's, as usual). I finally had the time and energy to make it today (maybe Janey is going back to her usual napping self... I can only hope!), so here it is:



I pretty much love it, but I wish I'd used a little shorter piece of boning--the original pattern calls for 16", but I think mine ended up being closer to 18, because I forgot to cut it down after I originally bought it. It's probably just not discreet enough. If it ends up being a problem, I'll fix it and cut it down to probably 14" or so--I just don't want the opening quite so big. I do love the fabric, though, and that I did the straps and everything all on my own, and it was so easy. If you want to make one too, there's another great tutorial over at Sew Much Ado. I love that blog, can you tell?

And for those of you that are wondering how I'm doing, I'm still pregnant, and for the most part doing really well, though I'm very tired, and my body is giving me more grief, pain-wise. The baby may or may not have dropped some, I feel like I'm breathing a little easier these days, but moving is more painful. I'm definitely looking forward to having a normal body again, but am still nervous at the thought of having three kids. I had my 37 week appointment this morning, and I seem to be progressing (dilated 2 cm, 70% effaced, for those who care), so she's certainly on her way. I'm (mostly) excited, and very grateful everything has gone so well so far. Only a few more days until I get to meet this little girl. :)

And here is a picture that accurately portrays how I feel like I look:


nice and large and squashed.

Latest Projects

I've always admired women who were able to get things done during their pregnancies--with both Breanne and Janey, it seemed like all I could do was live from day to day, nothing new or extra. For whatever reason, this pregnancy I've had a little more desire to craft, and many more things I want to make, and even some energy to do them, so I've been trying to get them done. I realized the other day when I was getting things out for the new baby that Janey has taken over most of the baby blankets and uses them for her baby dolls. I don't want her to be taking blankets from the baby, so I picked up some fabric a few days ago, and came up with these blankets today:



A few things of note: I love the purple fabrics, and the edges are purposely left unfinished and cut so they'll fray over time, as you can see in this tutorial, which is also where I got the idea for the blanket. One more thing on this blanket--it was my first time using a zigzag stitch on my machine... go me!



And then there's this beauty, which I LOVE the fabrics on:



Using a tutorial from the same site, for this blanket, I learned how to sew on rick rack, which I know seems obvious, but was actually different from how I saw it working in my head. Don't you love this happy fabric? And I think the rick rack makes it just slightly more girly, so maybe people will still realize the baby is a girl when she's wrapped in it... maybe?



And last but not least, I picked up 2 yards of this fabric, which I love and reminds me of my childhood. I intended on just using it front and back for one more blanket... but I'm not certain I love that idea. What would you do with it?



Next up: a nursing cover. I have the materials and everything, just need to get it done. Hopefully in the next few hours, if Janey will EVER take a nap... all of a sudden she has no desire to nap in her bed. So frustrating. I'm pretty sure I'm going to NEED her to take a nap when the baby gets here. If you have any great suggestions on getting her to stay in her bed for naptime, just let me know.

Finished!

The felt playhouse is complete! Well, actually, I still need to sew one piece of velcro onto a piece of spinach, and make some birds for the birdhouse, but other than that, it is done. Yes, I know it is 2:00 am, but I had to post the pics for you, because I'm just so excited it's done!

The front:


The door and mailbox both open:


Side one (the birdhouse is a pocket thing, so birds can sit inside, and you can use the watering can to water the flowers, then pick them--and they have pipe cleaner in the stems to give them a little more stability (though I should've used more, probably). Also, you can open and close the curtains from inside):


The back/garden (you can pick all the veggies, or just water them with the watering can from the other side):


Side 2 (the bone comes off, and the door is a flap you can crawl through to get into the house, also you can pick the apples):


I think in all it took me just over 20 hours from first cut to complete, but I think it will have been worth it--I'm hoping the girls love it.