Made in 2008

Here's most of the things I sewed this year, along with 5 pictures of baby Lauren, who was my most important creation of the year. I felt pretty crumbly most of my pregnancy and had next to no energy for sewing for a long time. But now I'm feeling much better and have lots of plans for sewing cute baby girl stuff, things for the boys, and clothes for myself too. Today I've been making more of those churn dash blocks in just blue and red, and also sewing up bunches of tiny scraps into a future quilt top. I'm probably going to cut out some baby clothes and a sweatshirt for myself.

last minute

A couple of last minute projects from the last week and a half or so...

I decided on the fly (and the night before the last day of school this year) to make one of the storage cubes from Crazy Mom Quilts for my son's 3rd grade teacher. She has Jayhawks all over the classroom so we fused a Jayhawk on some white cotton and stitched that onto the denim cube. I had the perfect lining fabric for a Jayhawk cube.

I had been thinking about making a knotty doll for my baby girl and I decided the night of December 23rd what I was going to do. I got up and started dyeing the velour fabric in the morning on Christmas Eve, and then started sewing it later that evening. I finished sewing it up after we opened gifts on Christmas morning. This was one of those projects that turned out so well and I was just so happy with it. I love how the LWI dye job turned out and the doll is just so cute and snuggly. I already made another one for a baby friend and will make more in the future.

My 8 year old and I decided to make these recycled crayons yesterday. I couldn't remember where I'd seen them, was it OMSH? Not exactly. Was it Balancing Everything? Hmm, no. I checked my starred items in google reader and found it, at CraftSanity. (Check out her podcasts, they're awesome.) We had plenty of unwrapped broken crayons and made a dozen of these yesterday and a few more with friends today, too. It's a super cheap and easy craft. They're cool to color with, too.

hoodies, churn dash, with a side of pouty baby

I made some cool hoodies for the boys last week, from Ottobre 4/05. They went together quick and easy and I'm still loving my coverstitcher.


I also made a hat and some pants for the baby. The hat is from the wonderful NCBE pattern, but I made the newborn size and it's too small already. Pants are from Ottobre 5/2006 and I don't really like them. I'm thinking about drafting a footed pants pattern from the NCBE pants pattern.

Honestly though, baby isn't going to be going out much this winter--she was hospitalized again for a week earlier this month for bronchiolitis and apnea related to a viral infection (yep, a cold). She's hanging out at home in a shirt, diaper, and blanket most of the time. I might make it back to church by February, we'll see. Here's a picture of her making a funny pouty lip face. I love it.


I decided to start something from fabric I have on hand and here's what I've got so far:

At first I was thinking it would be another charity quilt but then I decided to make the churn dash blocks and now I want to keep this one, at least I think so. But I'm not loving it at the moment. The idea was to use up the red, white (really cream), and blue that I've got in my stash/scrap bin, but I'm pretty sure I'm going to need more red. I might go to the quilt shop tomorrow. I'm also trying to figure out how to set the blocks; I could do square-in-a-square blocks to alternate with the churn dash blocks, or just plain sashing. Or come up with something else. I don't know.

Finally, I'm looking for suggestions for Lauren's baby quilt. I've got the fabric for the top, and I really love the paper doll fabric, but I don't know how to put it together.

By the way, I really like how the coordinates I picked out all have different textures. I'd like to use fairly large squares of the paper doll fabric and I had a couple ideas for the colors--I could just alternate plain old paper doll squares with 4-patches of the other fabrics, or put sort of scrappy sashing around larger squares of the paper doll fabric, or... that's all I've got. So, let me know if you have any other ideas. I saw a couple of cute baby quilt patterns in an expensive book at the quilt shop, and if I go back there soon I might have to look again to try and refresh my memory.

I have a long, long sewing list, a few orders of fabric on their way to me, and my non-pregnant energy is back (although I'm still tired a lot) and I hope to be back to more regular posting here soon!

t-shirt remodel + baby clothes modeling shot

My inlaws gave a "little scout buddy" t-shirt to ds a few months ago because his older brother is in Cub Scouts. The shirt got too small really quickly so I remade it into this:


I cut out the design from the original shirt and zigzagged it onto this shirt front and then made a new shirt for him. I like it with the olive ribbing and stitching. I used the Ottobre raglan pattern from 02/05. It's size 110, the boy is 4.5 years old, and it fits pretty well. The fabric is a really stable jersey without much stretch though.



And here's the baby wearing one of the outfits I made for her.

I've been a little preoccupied....

A lot of people who read here already know this but some of you don't....

I had my baby last month; she was born 6.5 weeks early. Her name is Lauren and she was 4 lbs. 8 oz. She stayed in the NICU for 12 days and has been home with us for a week and a half. Click over there to the right on my flickr for a couple of pics. I was in the hospital for a week before she was born and came home a week before she did. I'm so glad that we are both home and heading towards getting settled in to our new life with her on the outside.

I have finished one sewing project since I've been home; a blanket and burp cloth for her out of the cutest pirate flannel I got at JA like a year ago, way before I was even pregnant. I saw the fabric and had to get it just in case I had another boy baby. Well I had to use it even though she's a girl. I'll put up a picture soon. Other than that, I'm thinking about what I should do for a blessing dress. We don't know when that will be, I really don't want to take her out into big crowds much any time soon.

She is still too small for the clothes I've made for her but is growing well. She is up to 5 lbs 6 oz as of yesterday.

Some more baby clothes

I finally got these ready to show off here at the blog. I'm getting the hang of using my new coverstitcher but it is easy for it to go a bit crooked and not always easy to undo the stitching. I'm really glad I bought some bulk needles for it and need to do that with regular ball point needles since they get dull fast. I need to order some snaps; I'm afraid the ties fastening the romper are going to be really annoying. Oh well. These things were made from Ottobre and New Conceptions Baby Essentials patterns; more info is on the photo labels at my flickr. (Click up there on the right, see it?) I'm especially proud of the green jacket; it's made from a $1.47 remnant of fleece from JoAnn's that was just barely big enough.

I have some flannel I bought at the JA sale so I might make some blankets, burp cloths, and diaper wipes next.

Baby Clothes

I finished this little set up on Monday; these are the first baby clothes I've made for the new baby. Patterns are from Ottobre Design 5/2006. I modified the bodyshirt to just be a regular t-shirt and made the shirts and pants in size 50 (tiny newborn). The hat is the smallest size so it will probably be outgrown really quickly. This is partly to make up for the stripey baby hat I am knitting--I'm afraid it will not fit until the baby is 6 months old. Also the hat still needs some ribbons for the ties but Hobby Lobby didn't have anything that matched well enough.

I really like how this turned out and wish the photo was a little better.

Skirt

Someone I know is turning 3 and I made her a skirt. I used pattern #16, Bell-shaped skirt, in Ottobre Design 5/2006, with some modifications. And, the directions on that pattern totally don't make sense. But I was able to put it together anyway. It took about an hour, maybe an hour and 15 minutes, including tracing the pattern, rethreading and changing needles on the serger, searching for my brown thread, and threading the sewing machine. Oh yeah, and hunting down the child in question to get her waist measurement for the elastic.

recycled Koolaid pouch pencil bag

I made this little pencil pouch this afternoon using this tutorial. I'm probably going to make a few more for the rewards "store" in my son's classroom. And I want to find some other cool projects to take in also (I'm looking at things like Poptart box notebooks over at Craftster). I did the zipper wrong on this at first, and it turned out a little bit weird anyway. But it will go faster the next time I made one. Overall it didn't turn out as cool as I imagined; I'll have to see what my boy thinks of it. There's another picture over at my flickr if you want to click through.

Wrap Mei Tai Baby Carrier

Last week I finished up this wrap mei tai for Lorilee. I'm nearly finished with a second one for myself. They are made from a long Storchenwiege Inka wrap sling that Lorilee found and bought at the kids' resale store. I'm really happy with how they are turning out. The hood is too long on Lorilee's and we need to fix it but other than that I think it's going to be a great baby carrier. I'll post an action shot as soon as I can but it'll be a while yet.

"The Dangerous Days of Daniel X" by James Patterson

I recently read The Dangerous Days of Daniel X by James Patterson for the
Mother Talk blog book tour. It's an adventure alien story targeted for ages 10 and up and I found it pretty enjoyable. I signed up for this tour thinking that my 8-year-old son and I would both read it. It turned out that my boy started it but didn't finish it, and I was ok with that, because in our case he probably really wasn't ready for this book at age 8. It has some scary parts that would have been too intense for him, and some boy likes girl parts that he just wouldn't be interested in yet(that's what I keep telling myself). I don't have a 10 year old child yet but as I read it that age recommendation seemed pretty spot on.

The story was pretty interesting, and it got intense with Daniel battling some seriously bad aliens through much of the book. The language was clean and I was impressed with that. I did think the scary/intense part of the book went on a little too long. I was really surprised and happy with the ending of the book, really the last fourth of the book or so.... I don't want to spoil it but it was a good ending and resolution.

The short chapters make reading this book seem to go by quick. The story has some slightly graphic violent details (if you're thinking about it for a kid) but has clean language and a good message in the end. I will probably encourage my son to read this in a couple years and I'll probably look for the sequels when they come out. I think it would be a great book for boys or girls around age 10 as long as they are ok with scary and sometimes violent scenes.

maternity jeans

I have been needing maternity pants and jeans and am having a hard time finding some, mostly because I don't want to pay upwards of $35 for something that I'm going to wear for maybe 3 more months. Maybe longer, but depends on how early it gets cold and I need to switch to long pants vs. capris. So today I cut the waistband off a pair of linen capris that I've been wearing with the zipper half way undone and the drawstring tied, and then I sewed a stretchy band of fabric around the top. It worked, and I like them! So I decided to head to the shiny new Goodwill and see if I could find another pair of pants to cut up. I ended up with ultra low rise Old Navy capris, $6.99, and a size small black cotton lycra t-shirt, $3.50. Look what I did:



This is my version of that new (to me at least, last time I was pregnant was 2004) style with the "secret fit panel", and they're pretty comfortable. They're also staying up pretty well. It would be better if I'd found jeans that were not ultra low rise to begin with but this will work, for now. I still need to serge around the edges so the denim doesn't fray, and also patch that oh-so fashionable hole on the left thigh, but they're really cool, and they went together really fast.

fall sewing update, and one picture

I'm still having problems with the new camera, should have had my husband pick up batteries when he went to Walgreens for chocolate just now. Anyway, I got a picture of my two wonky log cabin blocks:


And, it's starting to lightning outside so I need to log off, but the fall sewing update is that I'll be sewing for our baby girl who's due sometime the first half of December. I'm working on a sewing list (with a little knitting) and will share that next time!

sewing day

I got a lot of sewing in today and am having camera issues, so I can't post pics until later. I made the first 6 blocks for my husband's grandma's quilt, made from Grandpa's shirts. He just passed away this March. I'm sort of using the Happy Hour pattern as inspiration (saw it on Crazy Mom Quilts), and making up 12" blocks. They are in blues, greens, and dark reds, mostly plaids.

And I decided to start making some wonky scrappy log cabin blocks, inspired by Krom Mama. I even tried taking a picture of these with my phone but it has no flash and the picture was horrible. I'm feeling like my wonkiness is a little too wonky but I'll get better at it I'm sure.

It was nice to have a day where I had the energy to do this again. Hopefully I'll be able to get pictures up tomorrow.

Paper Piecing

I am working on a Noah's Ark quilt for my sister's new baby. Here are the flamingos:

These are from the bookA Quilter's Ark by Margaret Rolfe. I've had this book for a long time and this project is the first time I've used the patterns in the book. I'm enlarging all the animals by 50% so the finished animal blocks will be 6" square instead of 4". I've also made some zebras that I'll show pictures of next time.

I'm having a hard time being motivated to work on this, but I need to get it done. So... I'll set a goal now to finish another pair of animals this week. I'm also going to sew up another maternity t-shirt and show pictures of the one I already made. I just got a box of fabric in the mail and have a few pieces of maternity clothing I need to make for myself.

The Pregnancy Journal by A. Christine Harris, Ph.D.

I'm 15 weeks pregnant now and I was excited to get my copy of The Pregnancy Journal for the MotherTalk blog tour. I had seen this book at bookstores before but just assumed it was a blank book for writing in while you're pregnant. Turns out, it has detailed daily entries explaining what is going on with the baby and what is going on with the mom's body, for the entire pregnancy. There are a few pages at the front with prompts for journaling about things like the planning of your pregnancy, ways you hope to be a good parent, and how the baby will change your family if you already have children.

The main part of the book is divided into lunar months and weeks. Along with the baby and mom information, there is a lot of information about nutrition and health, along with occasional sections on pregnancy in other cultures and pregnancy comfort measures. Every week there is about a half page or so set aside for writing about whatever you want; there are also prompts for recording stuff like your weight, waist measurement, mood, and cravings throughout the book.

The daily notes continue for two weeks after your due date, just in case you go over, and then there is another journaling section that has a few pages with prompts for writing about labor and delivery, and the new baby.

With both of my previous pregnancies I found day-to-day pregnancy websites that I visited almost every day to get a little bit of information about my pregnancy. This book is sort of like those websites, only with much more information as well as all the places to personalize it with my own thoughts. I think it will be really cool to have it as a keepsake after this pregnancy is done.

maternity clothes

I just spent a couple hours making this skirt:


The fabric is a remnant from JoAnn's, just under a yard. I had to do some creative cutting and piecing (in the back) in order to have enough fabric to go around me. I don't think it looks too bad though. I made it a little bigger than I needed at first, then took it in, and had to adjust the waistband 3 times since the ribbing I used for it was stretchier than my pants. I think I have a good fit now, and I even made a pattern so I can make another skirt or two, only more quickly.

Last week, I made these pants:

I'm not totally thrilled with them. I do like the pockets and the piping, but they're too big. I need to take in the elastic in the waistband a bit more. The pattern is a modified one that I used 4 years ago, the last time I was pregnant. Only the pants I made then fit me when I was 6 and 7 and 8 months pregnant, not 3-4 like I am now. If/when I make maternity pants again, I'll try the Ottobre pattern again.

4th of July sewing

I finished up these shorts for my oldest plus a pair for my younger boy last week. This is the 3rd year I've sewn for them for July 4th. I'm going to buy them patriotic t-shirts soon to go with them. I got the prepatch fabric from Atlantis Fabrics and used the same Ottobre patterns (issue 2/05) as I used for their shorts last year. Same sizes, even.

So, now it's on to maternity clothes.

little update

I got some tips from this blog and also used the new (to me at least) blogger template stuff and changing things around wasn't too difficult. The photo could be better, I know that. But it's good enough for now.

2 sick kids

The boys are sleeping on the couch and the big chair in the living room. I wish they could just get and stay healthy.

I worked on sewing some maternity pants last Saturday and they are too small. But very cute. Too bad. I haven't done any sewing since. I did make a banner for the top of my blog but I'm a little scared about trying to tweak things.