December 2012 Sewing

Final catch up post of 2012 sewing.  When I compiled this list, I realized I must have been busy during the month of December.  I must have been sewing a lot!  That, added to the fact that the kids both got sick twice, no wonder December felt like a crazy month.  I think I figured I was getting up with the kids in the middle of the night, so I might as well sew.   ha!

I was happy that I got some Christmas sewing done this year, though.  And I like that I can use the stockings and the tree skirt again next year.  So, next holiday season, I can make something else to add to the collection of handmade holiday items.  :)

1) Stockings

October and November 2012 Sewing

I’m posting a couple of posts to catch up on the sewing I did in the last few months of 2012.

1) Dragon costume
When we were at the fabric store in August or September, the little guy spotted a pattern for a dragon costume and insisted that was the costume he wanted for Halloween.  I thought maybe he’d forget about it, but he kept reminding me, and then when October came around, he told me I had to have his dragon costume completed by October 31.  Looking at the picture on the front of the pattern was kind of daunting, so I suggested that we simplify it by leaving out the wings or some other elements.  He said, No, the dragon had to have wings. So, I got the fabric and went to work.

It had everything: wings, spiky spine, big tail, big ears...

Something new

So, I decided it would be fun to make a dress for the baby girl for my friend’s upcoming wedding.  I figured if it didn’t work out, I still had a couple of nice dresses that would serve as back up.  Originally, I wanted to make the oliver+s bubble dress, the same dress I made for the baby girl’s first birthday.  I saw a number of bubble dresses in silk dupioni on flickr, and they were just beautiful and perfect for a wedding.  But I ended up changing my mind, because I had been thinking I wanted to try a pattern I had not made before, and then I saw this dress pattern.  I imagined it would be lovely in silk.

Two!

Baby girl was due in May, but she decided she wanted to be an April baby and came three weeks early.  As soon as she was born, she cried out to let the world know she was here, and then she started rooting around for food.  Two years later, she is proving to be just as feisty as ever.  She knows what she wants and has no problem letting us know, too.  She wants to do everything her brother does and loves to play with him in his room.  At one point, he drew a sign that said “no babies” to keep her out, but the next day he took it down, and she was back playing in his room.  I figure she must have charmed her way back in somehow.  And, oh, how she can charm you.  I mean, who could resist that face?

 
We didn’t have a party for her birthday, but since I made her a dress last year, I thought it’d be fun to make one for her second birthday.  She wore it for all of 30 minutes, but it was cute while she was wearing it.

 

More hopeful sewing..

We’ve had rain and stormy weather here lately, so I’m continuing my hopeful sewing series by sharing this little butterfly dress.  I made it a couple of weeks ago, so the baby girl could wear it to the butterfly exhibit.  (I actually got this butterfly fabric last year in hopes of making a dress for last year’s butterfly exhibit.  Hey, I’m only a year behind!)

A little birthday present!

One of our playgroup friends just turned one, and I made this little dress for her.  She’s a real girly-girl, so I can totally see her in this.

Upcycled Valentine’s Day Outfit

I saw a tutorial for making the ruffled heart on this Valentine’s Day dress recently and decided to check my stash of old t-shirts to see if I could make this.  Turns out I had a grey maternity cardigan and a grey t-shirt I could use for the dress.  And then I decided to make leggings to go with it from a pair of black maternity leggings.  I’m loving that this outfit is totally upcycled.  I like being able to reuse old clothes, and I get a kick out of knowing that baby girl is wearing my old maternity clothes.

Asymmetry

I saw this tutorial a while ago and bookmarked it, because the dress was so cute.  I also loved the fabric, so I later got the same fabric that they used in the tutorial.  So, I was a total copy cat and decided to make the dress in the same fabric. 

The dress was really easy to sew together.  I used a pattern for an A-line dress and just cut a diagonal across the front to create the “asymmetric” look.  It turned out pretty cute.

There were just a couple of things that I would do differently next time.

Posing is so blasé

Apparently, posing for pictures is so 11 months, totally incompatible with being 12 months old.  I tried the baby girl’s bubble dress on her so I could get some pictures of her in it, and she was not having any of that.  Lots of crawling, lots of moving in general and lots of blurry pictures.

A wee dress

for a wee girl who’s turning 1!

I know the lighting in this picture is horrible.  But it just epitomizes the experience of sewing late into the night, the excitement of seeing the little dress you’re making take shape, having no one to share it with, so you snap this picture in the dark. 

Recharged

 

Oh my gosh, this working full-time thing is totally exhausting!  I don’t know how I did it pre-kids.  Well, I guess that was exactly it.  It was pre-kids.  When I came home, I could just veg, not worry about getting kids fed and to bed.  And I could sleep soundly through the night, not worry about middle-of-the-night wake ups (nowadays if it’s not the 11 month old, then it’s the 3 year old because something is scary, or he can't find his blanket or his baby panda).

Anyway, I finished a huge project at work last week, and Thursday night, I was wiped out.  After putting the kids to bed, I fell asleep at 8pm, despite the 20,000 things on my to-do list.  The baby girl only got up once that night, so I got 11 hours of (mostly) uninterrupted sleep.  I had the next day off, so I took a nap when the baby girl was napping.  Basically, I slept at every opportunity.  And it was glorious.  I’d been running on empty, and my body just shut down and said, You need to refuel!

The funny thing is despite all the sleeping I did, I felt so productive last  weekend.  I guess I just had more energy to spend time with the kids AND get some cleaning and organizing done.  And I got some sewing in, too!

Busy!

It’s been a busy week!  I started working full-time this week.  I miss the kids like crazy.  And this work thing is seriously cutting into my sewing time, which was already limited to begin with.  Boo.  But it’s only for the next few months, so hopefully, we’ll all survive. 

Ruffles, take two!

Attempt number two at this ruffle dress.  I think it turned out really cute.  Although, I’m still trying to decide if it’s too much ruffle.  Maybe the ruffle on the bottom was too much? 

Ruffles!

While blog surfing one day, I came upon this blog post with a tutorial for this totally cute ruffle dress.  It was supposed to be a Hanna Andersson “knock-off”.  I’d never seen the Hanna Andersson dress, but the dress she made was super-cute, and it looked pretty easy to do.  The dress requires a raglan sleeve t-shirt pattern.  I didn’t have such a pattern, but I thought it would be fairly easy to make one by tracing one of my son’s old t-shirts. 

As soon as I sewed on the first ruffle, I knew this dress would be cute.  There’s something about ruffles that makes any outfit so adorable.