Bedroom/sewing room

About a year ago I decided to give up my sewing room so that the girls could each have their own room. In order to do that I had to move my sewing room up to our bedroom. With a little creative planning I have managed it, although there's not a lot of space left in the bedroom after this. If you're interested you may look at the new layout.

I have had to be much more organized and have a place for everything since the move so this is good. The girls get along much better since they can be apart and that is good too.

Curtains or sails?

M has two skylights in her room that let in way to much light at 5:30 in the morning so she requested that I make some curtains to cover them and she was willing to have this project jump to the head of the list of projects I have to do for her. So, with my MIL (who has made LOTS of window treatments) in town we decided to work on it one afternoon. My FIL was nice enough to hang the rods for us and between the three of us it took 4-5 hours for the whole project.

I decided the easiest thing would be to hang two long parallel rods above and below both windows and then hang them on the rods using the little white rings you use for draperies. (Don't know what they're called.) The rings slide very nicely on the rod. When she wants to open them she can just stand on her bed and pull them to the center. They are made with outdoor canvas which was doubled so they pretty much hold their shape as they are moved. These were moved to the middle once and then moved back once without straightening so you can see how nicely they hang either way. When opened they just fill the middle space perfectly and look great that way too.

We intended to make them so they were fairly flush to the rods but were tired by the end and forgot which number to work from when sewing on the rings. I actually like them this way. They kind of look like sails. They also give the room a very warm feeling when the light comes in. I told M that if she wants them less drapey we can take them down and I will teach her how to sew the rings on and we can move them. She just didn't see the humor in that. LOL.




From the side you can see the light coming in the window.



Straight on you don't even see the light out the sides. The window openings are recessed quite a ways from the roof so the light doesn't spread much .

Jalie 2788 Twist Top

Here's the second new summer shirt I've made for M. I didn't really like this pattern on the envelope but it is so cute in person. I didn't try to do any pattern matching with the fabric, as you can tell. The ruffle was supposed to be only one layer but with the patterned fabric I decided it would be better as two layers so I did a narrow hem on my serger to finish the edges. The pattern for the front includes a modesty panel but M requested I leave that off as she layers with cami's all the time anyway and she just so happens to have a black one. The back is supposed to have a tie way up at the neckline but she didn't want that either. I think it fits and looks great, although the twist on the bodice sure looks funny when it's not on her.

I made a size S with some of the yummiest 4 way stretch fabric from fabric.com. It was kind of a bear to do the hems around the arms and bottom as it's a bit slippery but the result is so worth it. She wears this and the other Jalie 2682 a lot. I have enough of this fabric left to make something for me too, although it won't be this twist top. LOL. The hems are even, btw, it's just that the fabric is so stretchy that when she didn't pull it down evenly it stayed that way.

Ottobre 1/08 #31 "Ball" Vest part deux

After having this sit cut out and then partially finished for a couple months I finally got it completed. Now after sitting on my camera for a couple months I finally downloaded the pictures so that I can blog about them. This is the same pattern I used to make K's vest only I sized this one up one size from a 170 and then ended up taking it in about 1/2" inch on both sides. It's still a little baggy but she's ok with it.

I used a twill polka dot fabric from Sewzanne's on the outside and a white linen that someone gave me on the lining. I didn't have enough linen to line the hood so used self fabric. If the linen weren't a bit see through this could easily have been double sided but didn't want to waste the snap parts as I don't think she'll wear it that way. For the elastic on the hood, I just cut apart hair elastics and sewed them to a regular elastic. Looks great and I can use whatever color matches this way. Probably way cheaper too. Guess you can't really see the toggles and elastic so you'll have to believe me that they're there. She's not gathering the hood anyway so I could probably have omitted those. The bottom fronts are even. Not sure why they look uneven in the picture.

I'd have to say these vests are probably the most challenging projects that I've done. The woven fabrics were much easier than the stretch fabrics to sew and get the lining even and such. This is the first pattern that I've done that's been fully lined and that was the hardest part of it for me. I think I figured out how to master it now so maybe lined projects will be easier for me in the future.

Jalie 2682

I whipped up a shirt for M out of Jalie 2682. This is the second time I've made this shirt. It goes together quite easily, although the four way poly/lycra knit fabric from fabric.com was kind of a bear to work with. I did match the pattern on the front bodice and then from top to bottom on the front. I didn't even attempt it on the back. I made a size S but maybe could have gone up one more size. For sure I will need to add some length to the bodice if I make this again as this one doesn't quite come low enough, although I think she pulled it down before the pics. Aside from the bodice being a bit short and the uneven stitching as I attempted to sew a straight seam over lumps and bumps while the fabric stretched, M loves her new shirt. The only change I had to make was to stitch the front bodice pieces together a few inches higher up than the pattern called for. My dd isn't into cleavage baring shirts, thank goodness! This is a very simple change to make; as long as you have the right needle that doesn't skip stitches.

Funny thing is that when taking these pictures I noticed that M's left shoulder is higher than her right. It's noticeable in the pics too. I think she was standing flat footed with her weight on both feet. Wonder if that contributes to her headaches and neck/back tension. Even after commenting on it and her playing around with moving her shoulders they went right back to being uneven.

Variety Show Performance

M and A playing Tango d'Amore at the Variety Show at school.

Old Purse, New Handles

Last year I made this purse. I have gotten lots of use out of it and spent a lot of time making it so when my handles started wearing out I starting thinking of solutions for replacing them. I looked for some rectangular shaped links that I could use to attach new handles and couldn't find any the right size. I finally found some circles at Mill End that I thought would work. After cutting the handles off and attaching the circles on one side I decided that rather than make two handles again I would make one and allow it to slide through the rings when I open the purse and back out when I close it. This also meant that I needed to sew the new handle to the top flap so that the handle wouldn't slide too far down and allow the purse to hang lop-sided. It's not perfect (who's looking as closely at my purse as these pictures anyway) but it will greatly extend the life of my purse.



As far as making the handles I didn't want them to start to wear as quickly as last time. I figure that I was initially supposed to use fusible batting and used regular batting so that probably decreased the wear of the fabric. This time, I used some sew-in interfacing that I had lying around and fused it to the handle fabric. Then I sat the batting on top of that. I folded the handle in half and then each side in half again; kind of like double fold bias tape. I stitched the outsides and then added stitching 1/4" widths apart to stabilize all the layers.



The hardest part was stitching the handles onto the existing purse straps. I initially tried to layer them so I could make another X through both handles for strength and also hide the ends of the straps. That was way too many layers for my machine to handle so I attached them with just one double line of stitching. You can see the ends of the handles a little bit but this was the best that I could do and again, no one will be looking at it as closely as these pics.



I really like this new handle. It is very easy to open the purse by sliding the handle through the rings and I just grab the end of the handle and it closes back up again. I especially like the new length. I guess I much prefer a shoulder-length purse than one I have to carry in my hand.

Ottobre 1/08 #31 "Ball" Vest

I am finally getting around to posting pictures of the vest that I made for K from Ottobre. From the time I traced the pattern out until I completed it was almost three months. Now, unfortunately, it barely fits so she won't get as much wear out of it if I had gotten it done sooner. Darn kid keeps growing! I made a size 146 lengthened to 170. Fabric is pique is from Sewzanne's.

Tiny Ottobre Baby Coverall

I got the second tiny baby outfit completed today. It is fun to sew for a little baby although it has it's challenges too. This time I made the Baby Coverall from Ottobre 3/05 #2 size 50. I thought the little crotch gusset was hard to deal with. Next time I'll sew it in with a sewing machine instead of the serger. I also had trouble with the zipper. I've never had as much trouble with a zipper as I did with this one. I'm not sure why. The little gusset going up next to the zipper didn't help. I don't think it was the pattern though, just me. The little arm and leg bands were sewn in the round and they're smaller than my serger foot. So, I had to sew them on with the sewing machine. This was really nice fabric so there was no issue with the fabric getting stretched out.

I used fabric and zipper from my stash and I didn't have a long enough zipper in blue or white so I used a sage green one. It looks a little dark in the picture but IRL it looks just fine.

I have a red and white baseball stripe fabric and I think this coverall would be so cute with that and red sleeves/cuffs. Not sure I'm up for another tiny baby outfit right now though. I need to move on to the girls' vests. I've had those patterns cut out for over a month now. Need to get them sewn. LOL.





While I'm blogging I might as well say HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!! I don't do New Year's resolutions so nothing to post there. Just hope everyone has a happy and healthy New Year.

Tiny baby sewing

One of my dh's co-workers had a little baby boy; and I mean little - 4 lbs 11 oz and 19" long IIRC. I have never sewn little baby stuff from Ottobre and I've heard it's not only expensive to buy tiny baby clothes but that they're hard to find. So, I decided to make a present or two. Here is my first garment. It is from Ottobre 6/07 #1 "Wrap-around jacket for premature baby", size 45. I lengthened this to 19" and made it a wrap-around kimono instead of a jacket. I think it is so adorable. In the picture it looks incredibly long as I took the picture at an angle so you could see the fabric instead of a white glare.

I made the sleeves the length of a 50 and they can either fold them back until he grows or let them go over baby's fingers to keep him from scratching himself. Cuter than the little foldover mittens IMHO. On the bottom I sewed clear elastic into the hem folded it over and coverstitched it. I had fits when coverstitching the sleeve ends but after changing to a larger needle size the coverhem not only handled the binding around the neck and front edges but it did a great job around the hem too. I added Snap Source snaps instead of ribbons on the front as baby went home today so isn't in a warmer any more.

I'd make a couple more of these but I don't know how many clothes they have in tiny sizes. I think I will make a little overall and wrap-around jacket in a size 50 next. I have some other cute fabric that I didn't have enough yardage for this. Stuff I bought for N but never used.

Create-a-purse

In November I decided to make M a new purse. I had shopped and hadn't found anything that I thought she'd like. I ended up designing the purse myself using ideas from things I liked in RTW (is it really "ready to wear" when it's a purse?) and some tips from u-handbag.com. I took M to the quilt store to pick out some fabrics that she liked. Wouldn't let her know what they were for. I even "waited" until Christmas instead of making the purse for her birthday to throw her off the scent. LOL. This is the final product.



Front - I drew the lines on my pattern and then copied them to the sew-in interfacing that I was using. I essentially "paper pieced" the fabrics onto the interfacing rather than cutting them out individually and sewing them together. Much easier.


Back - the batik fabric is actually a pocket. The brown is piping along the pocket edge. If I were to do it over, I would put piping on the front side too but it looks fine without it.

You can't see it but I used a gold magnetic clasp to hold the purse openings together. It works very well.

I think she likes it. I made sure to make it big enough that she can still fit a book in it like she does with her current purse. Forgot to check if she can fit a knitting project in there. LOL.

Children's achievements

I am a mom. Therefore, I have to brag over my kids' achievements. Since M took pictures of her projects, I can post them here.

The first two pictures are of things she made for a teacher at school. Her teacher is hoping to have her baby soon. Mikayla designed and made the quilt using leftover pieces from a quilt project I had made. She did all the stitching and even hand stitched the binding down. She made a little hat and scarf and a tote bag too. As you can see, she is very proud of her quilt.

The next picture is a clock that she made in Industrial Tech. She plays the cello so wanted her clock in a cello shape. At home her dad gave her some guitar strings and helped her drill holes so she could add strings. She has also made a hearth lamp but I don't see that she has taken pictures of it yet. It is really neat too. She broke one of our Santa stocking hangers so she put it in her hearth so that Santa is coming down the chimney. LOL. Iwill post pics when we get them.

The next achievement is from K. She was recently in her school community choir and they sang before and during a play. Here is a video of the group singing in the hallway. K is the tall red haired one who sings the first solo. It's a little hard to hear with no microphones. I didn't want to be too pushy to get right in front of her so I sacrificed a little clarify. You get the idea. I took this video with the camera I got for my birthday. This is the first time I've watched a video from my camera and I'm impressed. Now to go look for one I took of N.

K will be singing in an Honors Choir performance come spring. Now I know I can easily save some snippets to share with relatives.

Here's the one of N while he was singing. I'm not sure why I turned the camera sideways partway through but it's still cute.

All in one post I've conveyed the creativeness, goodness, pursuits, and silliness of my children.

Better watch out or they'll be posting videos of mom's reaction when they aren't doing all of the above! LOL. (wha wha wha wha wha - remember on snoopy movies adults alwas sounded that way)

Getting caught up

I'm finally getting around to blogging my most recent sewing projects. As you can tell from one of them it's been a while since I worked on these. Just didn't seem to get the time to get them into my blog.

The first two are turtlenecks that I made for M. She likes to layer so requested these. They are both from Simplicity Lizzie McGuire 4390 size 16. I changed the mock turtleneck to a regular turtleneck and lengthened it. I made some mistake on the heathered one and ended up having to lettuce the two layers of the turtleneck together and I like this one much better. I forgot to add as much length on the heathered one too so I lettuced the hems to keep as much length as possible. The sweater knit was hard to lettuce as the stitches wanted to come apart when I stretched it but it is passable. I got both of these fabrics at S.R. Harris.

For the next one K wanted to be a pop star for Halloween. You might want to look at the enlarged version to see it better but I just had to put in the modelled view. It is a cap from Ottobre 4/07 #25 in size 56. It is a little big but looks great on. On this one I forgot that I had plans for the day before she needed it and I ended up working on this from 11PM to 3AM. Boy was I tired that next day!

The next project is a favor I did for a friend. She ended up cleaning my carpet in exchange. I do think I got the better end of this deal. She had purchased some knit pants that were too short but oh so comfy and cheap. I added cuffs to them using an assortment of fabrics from my stash. I ripped the hems out and added about 2" length total to each pair. The project ended up being quite easy once I got the measurements figured out. She loves finding shirts to match the colors in her new pants.

The last project is actually something for *me*!! It is the gathered neck tee from Ottobre Woman 2/07 #4. I when I was going through fabric for something else I was wearing the pants in the picture and realized that this fabric would go perfectly with them. Finally something to give me the impetus to sew for myself. I had made a pj top (that I didn't photgraph) to check fit. From that I decided to add an 1" to the center folds to give a slight bit more width to gether into the neckline. I also added some width at the shoulder, about a half inch?, that I graduated into the existing armscye. I didn't want the armscye any lower. I still could use a smidge more ease through the bust because it kind of pulls in a line straight across the bust if it's not pulled down all the way. I might have to do an FBA to accomplish this. I've had trouble with that in the past so have avoided doing it. This has some gathers at the side bust and I moved those down about a inch too.

I changed the sleeve on this to use the sleeve from #6 in the same issue. Was going to make it long sleeves but forgot that when I cut the pattern out. Was wondering why I left so much room in between pieces on the tracing paper. LOL. Next one will be long sleeved, although I like the 3/4 length sleeves too.

I used my new coverstitch machine to hem and stitch down the binding on this shirt. It was SOOOO nice to use it. It took awhile to get the tension right since I used regular thread from a spool and bobbin for the outside threads. Don't have the right colors in big cones. I made a boo boo on one of the hems and decided not to fix it, I'll bet no one can even find it. Overall, I'm very happy with this shirt and want to make some more. Recently I was wishing I had a red shirt. Wonder if I have the right fabric for it....

Ottobre Hooded Sweat Jacket 1/2005 #26

I just finished this Ottobre jacket. It is made from a sherpa fleece on the body and sweatshirt fleece on the sleeves. The elbow patches, paw prints, and hood linings are from a cotton woven fabric from Sewzannes (I love this fabric and think I have enough left for a shirt); note the little row of paw prints in the stripe. I got the idea for the paw prints from another Ottobre pattern that used frog prints for front pockets. I decided the paw prints wouldn't work as stand-alone pockets so sewed them onto the pockets and stitched a paw print on each of the elbow patches. To help keep the woven fabric from getting too wrinkly and ravelly I interfaced the paw prints completely and the elbow patches to within 1/4" from the edge. I have a puppy applique I could put on the front chest but N vetoed that idea. So, we'll stick with paw prints. I made this in a size 128 and didn't make any other pattern changes except I don't think I was supped to add seam allowances to the elbow patches and I did. I topstitched in reverse colors but the blue kind of got buried in the nap of the fleece. Of course the ribbing doesn't bury it so I hope that looks like a design detail. LOL.

New Family Photo

We just went to get family pictures taken today. Here's the best one we've seen so far...

Ottobre Knit Jacket 3/2004 #12

I finished this jacket up about a week ago and am finally getting around to blogging it. It is a knit jacket made out of sweatshirt fleece I ordered from Sewzannes. The pattern called for front outside pockets and K wanted them at the side seam. I used the pocket pattern piece from #36 and added a pocket. I also added an interlock lining to it to make it a bit warmer for our cold fall weather. Basically I sewed the same jacket in turquoise and inserted it with topstitching visible to the inside. I stitched the sleeve edges right sides together, then I wonder taped the bottom and stitched it, turned it right side out, and Wonder Taped the front edges together. I added the collar before adding the zipper. Then I covered the inside of the zipper with the collar so you can't see the zipper on the outside of the collar like you can if you follow Ottobre's directions. Next I pinned the collar over the inside lining at the neckline and topstitched it down. I had the most trouble with this part even though I thought I pinned it accurately. The pocket is completely enclosed within the lining so you can't see it on the inside. This is made in a size 140 with no size modifications, not even length. Will try to get pics of dd modelling it before school tomorrow.

I am happy to report that K LOVES this jacket and is wearing it. I finally made her something that she likes as well when completed as she does in the planning stages. Of course now I wonder why I thought a fabric with a white background would be a good choice for a jacket. LOL. I keep finding it on the floor. Of course I mind this much more than I would a RTW jacket.

My new favorite game

Previously my favorite game was Blokus. Tonight I played Keesdrow for the first time and I love it! It's like the old word finds I used to do as a kid but better. Using the letter tiles on the board you find a word and mark it with pegs. The letters can be forward, backward, or diagonal all in the same word. You can use each letter tile up to three times; either in one turn or separate turns. It wasn't so much fun for a 4 yo but the rest of us enjoyed it and our word geek (my dh) actually lost so the kids enjoyed it that much more. Not only is it fun to play but it helps the kids work on both spelling words and addition for scoring. This just might be my new suggested kid gift for birthdays.

More cute comments

I'm trying to remember the most recent of my favorite comments of N's. They were made a while ago.

5. "Does God make police cars?" I tell him "no, God gives us the intelligence and technology and man makes cars." His response. "Or girls. Maybe bad men make race cars."
4. "I think we should get a green golf cart" (the neighbors have a golf cart that they drive around the neighborhood in). "That way we could go hunting in the woods." When asked what he wants to hunt he responded "we could hunt for bears!"

How does a 4 yo's mind really work?

Will a 4 year old think of anything just to not fall asleep? N asked me these last two in bed before going to sleep at night.

4. "Why does God give morning breath? Why doesn't he just give regular breath?"
3. "Why does God make Tornados if he wants to take care of us?" When I responded "I don't know" N suggested "let's dream about it."
2. "Can we see when we're dead?" Not having any idea where he's going I respond "no, we can't see or hear or eat or anything." His next question is "Then how can we see God when we're in heaven?"
1. "Is the sky God's floor?"

N's Questions

The newest of N's inquisitive questions.

3. "Why does God make Tornados if he wants to take care of us?" When I responded "I don't know" N suggested "let's dream about it."
2. "Can we see when we're dead?" Not having any idea where he's going I respond "no, we can't see or hear or eat or anything." His next question is "Then how can we see God when we're in heaven?"
1. "Is the sky God's floor?"