Every Little Thing Tunic in Action

Last night, I finished this little tunic for my daughter.

(Doesn't the bow look nice? Keep reading.)

 We were going to my son's preschool picnic where, within minutes, someone handed her (scary music) a bottle of bubbles.

 Normally, I love bubbles. But they're quite messy. And it's SO hard to watch something you just finished creating get messed upon. 

(Am I not right??)

 Anyway. I never quite got the perfect shots I wanted before the bubble soap soaked up the front of her dress. The bow, let's say, was very "convenient" as it caught the bulk of the soap.
It had to be removed.

As for the tunic itself, I really do love it. It's Shwin & Shwin's Every Little Thing Tunic Pattern. I'm pretty proud of the results! It's my first dress/tunic and I'm already planning for the second one with this pattern. Here, I used chambray on the bodice and the bottom trim, and a very lightweight print for the middle. 

 Check out the pocket. What a great feature. Love it.

 Can you see the cute flower buttons on the back? And yes, she's still clutching those bubbles.

It was a fun morning, indeed.

Scrappy Little Apron Skirt

 I love this stretchy hounds tooth material, but without enough to make an entire skirt for my little one, I improvised with an old t-shirt of the teenage size.

 See the yellow hem? I just cut off the bottom of the shirt and stuck in the hounds tooth. Well, it wasn't really that easy, because the hounds tooth had already been hemmed and stitched up from another project-gone-wrong. So I had to piece together the waistband, and ended up sewing two seams, on either side of the hounds tooth. But, it turned out well enough. My daughter thinks it's the bomb.

 Especially because now we can be twinners. Should I make one for Dolly with the extra itty-bitty scraps? Hmm, it has crossed my mind.

 Time out for a little window-ledge climbing. Dolly, you with me?

 Yeah, I think it's pretty cool too that we can dress alike. I've become one of those moms.

 There you go. The latest in our fashion arsenal. The Scrappy Little Apron Skirt!

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A Pinafore for Daughter

A couple weeks ago, I went shopping online at LemonTree Studio. Beautiful stuff here! I bought this pinafore and was so delighted with it, that I thought I'd try to make one myself from fabrics I had in my stash. 

I didn't have a pattern. Basically, I laid out the pinafore I bought on a piece of paper and traced the parts. Then I messed with it a bit, trying to figure out to put the parts. Well, it took some time, but I finally got it to work (not exactly in the way the original pinafore was made--there was some extra hand-stitching at the shoulders involved--but it works anyway). And it's reversible!

FRONT

BACK

I'm definitely going to make another one -- or two. And I'm sure it'll go quicker and smoother the next time, now that I have some practice under my belt. I think this pinafore is just so dang cute. It makes me smile when my daughter has it on. :)

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Easter Clothes Part I: A Sweet Skirt

This Easter, I had this urge to make my kids some Easter clothes. When I was little, my parents always bought my sister and me a new dress and a new pair of shoes for Easter. We'd go to church truly decked out in our finest. We'd wear the palest pink or yellow or blue frock along with a pair of dainty, sweet shoes to match.

Well, now that I'm a mom myself, I thought I'd go with this idea, but instead of buying everything, I'd try to make the main pieces myself.

Enter the Market Skirt, which I made following this tutorial from MADE.

I showed you my sneak peak of this skirt a few days ago. So if you guessed "skirt" you guessed right - well done! Today, I found a little blue frilly shirt while I was out shopping and thought that it'd go well with the skirt (but I haven't checked to see if they match yet!).

I'm still looking for shoes...

But I did make this too:

Can you tell what it is? It's a scrappy flower hairclip. Just to, you know, match the skirt. A little top to bottom fluidity.

I also made a scrappy flower and hot glued a pin backing to it. I'm thinking about pinning the flower to the skirt here (above). Or pinning it to my daughter's shirt.

(I wish my pictures were better, but I'm traveling this week and not on my own computer with my own camera. Ack.)

On Saturday, I'll show you what I made for my son to wear on Easter Sunday!

(And yes, it's going to be a little matchy-matchy. Yes, I'm being one of those moms. And I'm loving it!)

Baby Girl Pants

Oh, I wish these turned out better. I used regular cotton fabric for the pant, and quilter's cotton for the cuffs (the same fabric I used for the baptismal dress; see earlier post). The pants were easy to make, but there's no give in the material and my daughter outgrew them after I washed them once. (Oops, forgot to pre-wash the fabric!). Next time, I will try some knit fabric. Still learning the ropes, here.

Oh, and I didn't bother ironing the pants for this picture as I got them out of the wash and realized I'd probably never use them again! Darn.

Another Baby Girl Dress

I liked the dress so much (see previous post), that I decided to make another with my own vintage fabrics (read: old bedsheets that my mom gave me). I used the dress from the kit for my pattern (tracing onto paper) and I used the sheet edging to make the ribbons.

I really like this dress because it's so soft -- the sheets had been washed so many times. The only thing I would've done differently is somehow fix the ribbons because one side of each is fraying (didn't anticipate that). Oh well, live and learn!

The bonus feature about this dress is when my daughter outgrows it, I could use it as a shirt with leggings or with pants underneath! Yay! I love versatile clothing.

Baby Girl Dress

For my birthday, my husband bought me this dress kit from an Etsy shop called Little Fish Big Pond. The kit came with pre-cut designer fabric, ribbon, and instructions. I think the dress came out pretty well!

My Daughter's Baptism Dress

By the time my daughter's baptism rolled around, she was almost 6 months old, and too big to use the dress I was baptized in (aside from that, the gown was in another state with my sister.). So I decided I would sew a dress for her! I'd never sewn any articles of clothing before, but I saw this as a challenge. AND, I had a deadline. So I got to work.

Well, I think it looks pretty. It turned out well enough. But if I were to do it again, I would've made it a lot longer. My daughter kept flashing everyone while we were on the altar (very squirmy!). I used just a regular jumper pattern, which worked fine, but several extra inches would've helped. Also, I now know that 100% cotton is not the same on all fabrics. This was quilter's fabric and definitely not as soft as another fabric labeled 100% cotton. I know this now.

In the end, the pictures look good enough. It's the smiling baby in the clothes that mattered most. :)