I'm Back...with some Madeline Pattern Info

I know I've been missing for a while...a long while...and here's why. I've decided to take a small step back from blogging. As life continues, the children grow up, and as I'm sure you all know there comes time and time again a moment to evaluate and prioritize a new stage of life. In doing this, I've decided to put blogging a bit lower on my list of priorities. However, please do not think this means that I'm disappearing completely! I'm still creating and will therefore still be sharing on my blog. My posts will probably be shorter and less frequent. My current creations of the moment it are mostly for my Etsy shop and upcoming craft fairs, which I am really excited about and will be sharing about soon!  For now, here is a quick catch up on promised information about the Madeline outfit I made for Sew Many Books...

Madeline Jacket: Butterick B5809

Madeline Dress: Butterick B5876

Have a wonderful week!

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Sew Many Books: Madeline's Rescue

I'm super excited to be participating in the Nap-Time Creations Sew Many Books sewing series. Head on over and check out my full post inspired by Madeline, one of my daughter's favorite book characters.

You'll see more of the clothes and get to enjoy our condensed version of Madeline's Rescue.

And if you want to see even more pictures and learn details of my daughter's new favorite outfit, come back here in a couple days when I'll be sharing our recent trip to Paris where we visited some of the actual sites from the books...a wonderful way to explore Paris with my kids!

Here's who is joining in the fun this month:

Nap-TimeCreations - Buzzmills - All This For Them - Wild Wandering - Cocoa Pie Creations 
Sunny Stitching - Bless by Tone - Coles Corner and Creations - Nap Time Crafters
Threading my Way - Welcome to the Mouse House - Sewing like Mad - Sews N Bows
Simple Simon and Co- iCandy Handmade

Be sure to stop by Nap-Time Creations on these days for some great giveaways
August 6th- $50 to fabric.com & free Personalized kids book from iseeme.com
August 13th- Pattern Pack from Peek-a-Boo Patterns 
August 20th- Pattern Pack from Coles Corner and Creations & A Remnant Surprise Book
if you are interested in sponsoring a giveaway or participating in NEXT years Sew Many Books series e-mail Emily at nap-timecreations{at}hotmail{dot}com

Fabric Baby Blocks

It's baby shower season in my part of the world... and I'm about to give a shower for my sister!! I'm pretty sure all babies love noisy and squeezable baby blocks, so my mom (Kay from jerryandkay) and I made baby blocks to go with my sister's baby boy themed baby shower.

Our goal is to have as many of the decorations as possible be things that my sister can use for her baby. I loved doing this for my friend's shower and am using some of the same ideas, like the cloth diaper cake and muslin roses. The cake and roses will be slightly different, of course, so stay posted to see them in the next couple of weeks. 

I used this baby blocks tutorial as a guide to how to make fabric baby blocks. The most difficult part was choosing fabric...the baby blocks were a cinch to sew. I appliqued a capital and lower case A,B, and C on the solids sides of each block. My mom's doing X, Y, and Z.

To make the ABC blocks more enjoyable for the baby, I added noisy items in the center of the filling: jingle bells in one, cellophane in another, and marbles secured in easter eggs in the third. 

Shake, shake, shake...my kids loved testing the sound in the ABC blocks...

They sound good enough for preschoolers and good enough for a baby!

The fabric baby blocks also passed the squeezable test.

We are sure that baby will love them!

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I'm linking up to some of these fabulous parties.

Kids Clothes Week Day 6: Supergirl Costume

It's day six of Kids Clothes Week!

And, in case you haven't seen, I'm having a GIVEAWAY!

...you can enter it by clicking here. Now, on to KCW...

I didn't have a chance to post for day 4 or 5 because of life. On day 4, I cut up a thrifted dress using a thrifted pattern for a girl's nightgown. On day 5, I sewed the front top to the back top, gathered the sleeves, and attached them to the bodice. Boring. There are no nice pictures of that process. It's at a stand still now because we got interrupted by Supergirl!

Our local Hobbycraft had a fundraiser today and the theme was superheroes. They had a bake sale, craft sale, art sale, kids crafts, and a costume contest to raise money for a hospital. We love Hobbycraft and were excited to go to support the fundraiser today. Originally, I was going to take two Spidermen. Then, one of them changed her mind and convinced me to make her a Supergirl costume.

So, after a quick study of Supergirl's outfit, we visited Hobbycraft yesterday to get some red fabric (on sale 1/3 the regular price!!!). That left this morning for me to make the skirt, cape, and specially requested mask (this was desperately wanted knowing the real Supergirl didn't wear one). It was tough mainly because it's Saturday. Usually, there is nothing that we have to do and there is lots of time to play with the kids. It was hard to stay focused, but any time my little girl wanted me to play with her, I gave her the option: I can play now or you can have a Supergirl costume in a couple hours. She chose Supergirl every time. Miraculously, I was able to make a skirt using Made's Circle Skirt Tutorial. I used the yellow waistband left over from the shorts I cut up for the Batman T-shirt. So I altered Made's method a bit so that the raw edge of the waistband wouldn't show.

I used Georia Lee's Superhero Cape Tutorial as a rough guide to make a cape. 

I simplified the applique by only sewing on the yellow shape and then stitching the outline of the "S" in red. From my costume inspiration, it looked like this was a bit closer to Supergirl's and it cut down on the time it took to make the cape, which was most important today!

Finally, I made a mask. I used some felt left over from the chalkboard party favors and the drawstring from those same yellow shorts mentioned earlier.

I got it all done in the nick of time and quickly snapped these pictures on our way to the car with Supergirl and Spiderman. Funny enough, Spiderman won the costume competition! We came home with about £50 worth of Hobbycraft kid craft supplies....how fun is that! My little guy fell asleep with a smile on his face tonight because he was so happy he won. I was just happy that I didn't have to make his costume...it was so easy to dig into the dress up box, pull it out, and put it on! But, it's also so satisfying to see my little girl proudly posing as Supergirl.

 If you're interested in participating in Kids Clothes Week, click here for more information.

Or you can take a look at all the great kids clothes that people are making by taking a look at the Kids Clothes Week flickr group!

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I'm linking up to some of these fabulous parties.

Kids Clothes Week Day 3: Little Heartbreaker Pants

It's day three of Kids Clothes Week! 

And, in case you haven't seen, I'm having a GIVEAWAY!

...you can enter it by clicking here. 

For day three, I made some new trousers for my son. He's about to outgrow ALL of his, so it's time for some new ones! I was as cheap as I was for my little girl's dress (KCW Day 2), so when it came to fabric, I hunted through the local charity shops and found a very large pair of women's trousers (£4) that I cut up and turned into this cute pair of boys' trousers. That was much better than £8 per metre at the fabric shop!

I made the Little Heartbreaker Pants from Sewing for Boys. They are adorable...and too big as you can see from the pictures. This was on purpose so the my little guy can wear them for a long time. They'll be baggy now, but will hopefully fit at least until the fall. That's my plan. I even left length inside so that I can bring the cuff down if he gets taller.

This was my first time using button hole elastic, even though it's something I always look for when buying my little guy trousers. I like it and it's another great way to make the trousers fit longer. The facing is from an old button down that King Damascus had in our give away pile. I snatched it out to make a shirt for my son (which I hope to have done by the end of the week!).

The brown pockets are from scraps. I love the overall color combination and think the outfit is going to be adorable with a matching striped shirt!

Today, we settled with orange plaid that matched well enough, wasn't too wrinkled, and was fresh from the closet so hadn't had time to get dirty yet. Bribed him with a lollipop to do the photo shoot and he was such a perfect model! He did everything I asked him, happily. A rare moment in time.

He doesn't love these trousers nearly as much as his Batman shirt, wont' be begging me to wear them, but I know he'll get enough use out of them that it was worth the time I spent. He's even forgotten he didn't want to put them on for the photo shoot and is still wearing them...that's a good sign.

 If you're interested in participating in Kids Clothes Week, click here for more information.

Or you can take a look at all the great kids clothes that people are making by taking a look at the Kids Clothes Week flickr group!

☼

I'm linking up to some of these fabulous parties.

Kids Clothes Week Day 2: Shutt Dress

It's day two of Kids Clothes Week! 

And, in case you haven't seen, I'm having a GIVEAWAY!

...you can enter it by clicking here. 

My daughter chose this dress (Shutt Dress by SewSet.) for Kids Clothes Week. I had pinned it months ago (here) with the hopes of making it, so I was really excited that she chose it and added it to my goals for the week!

I've been really frugal about buying fabric to make anything. I just have the hardest time spending an amount of money on fabric when I know I can buy something similar for less at any store on the high street. To make up for this, I keep my eye out for anything special at charity shops. I bought a sheet almost a year ago because I thought the colors and flowers would make a really pretty dress for my little girl. It was perfect for this dress!

 I didn't attempt the bunting because I know myself too well, and I knew it would make this project more of a burden than an enjoyment. 

I think it is still absolutely adorable, even without the bunting, and it's obvious that my little girl feels pretty in it, which is the most important thing! 

Great for spinning! Great for playing!

Even though, it was rainy and grey when I sewed this dress, it's going to loads of fun to wear in the sunny summer!

 If you're interested in participating in Kids Clothes Week, click here for more information.

Or you can take a look at all the great kids clothes that people are making by taking a look at the Kids Clothes Week flickr group!

☼

I'm linking up to some of these fabulous parties.

Kids Clothes Week Day 1

"Look what I got from Kids Clothes Week!"

This is day one of Kids Clothes Week Spring 2013! I have loved this idea from the first time I saw it a couple years ago. I attempted to participate in the fall (here), but didn't have much success (here). So, this year, I actually cheated a little and started sewing early. I knew I would not have an hour a day to sew every day in a week. It's just not possible with my work & life schedule.

However, I really wanted to at least try to blog every day about things I've recently sewn. So, after I posted my goals for Kids Clothes Week, I started sewing a little bit each day. I can get in about 15 to 40 sewing minutes on an average day, with an off day now and then where I get lucky with an hour. Part of the problem is that I have trouble sewing at night. Literally every time I attempt to sew after the kids go to bed, I end up sewing pockets in backwards or the right side to the wrong side, or any other mistake that involved ripping out multiple seams. What you'll see this week are things I've made for my kids over the last two weeks. Here is the first...

A batman t-shirt. Every boy needs one of these, right? Well, any boy that's into super heroes like my little guy. He had Spiderman, Superman, Darth Vader, and Yoda, but did not have Batman.

To make it, I bought a long-sleeve t-shirt 2-pack from H&M and a pair of yellow shorts for super cheap from their sale rack. Then, I found the Batman logo in a Google images search, printed it, cut it out and used it as my pattern for the applique shape.

I cut out the logo, pinned it on and stitched around the outer and inner edge a few times to make sure it's secure. It worked for the dinosaur applique t-shirt that is still a favorite, so I thought I'd stick to the same technique.

As you can see, I've got one happy guy who is very proud of his new Batman shirt!

If you're interested in participating in Kids Clothes Week, click here for more information.

Or you can take a look at all the great kids clothes that people are making by taking a look at the Kids Clothes Week flickr group!

☼

I'm linking up to some of these fabulous parties.

Serger Tension

My serger has sat for four months due to some intimidation and some lack of time. I finally found the time last week to figure it out. My manual was very helpful, but I was having major issues with my serger tension. I could not figure it out. After searching around for help, I found this great tutorial on YouTube that provides a way to know your serger's tension. I've written it out here so that I'll always have a record of it. If you want an even more clear and detailed description, please visit YouTube to watch "The Secret to Taming Your Serger." 

If you want a quick tutorial, here is my serger tension test:

First, thread your serger, making sure to have a different color thread in the left needle, right needle, upper looper, and lower looper. 

Next, cut four rectangles out of white cotton: 5 inches (13cm) x 15.5 inches (39.4cm). Fold the fabric in half lengthwise so that you now have the dimensions that are the same as the above diagram. Label your fabric according to the diagram. The lines should be spaced 1.5" (3.8cm) apart. Each space should have a number (1 to 9). Make one for the Left Needle, Right Needle, Upper Looper, and Lower Looper. Make sure to note the color of thread.

Next, start at the top with the tension of the specific strip set to the lowest tension which in my case was 1. Serge until you reach the line. Then change the tension to 2. And so on. You will feel the tension tighten as you continue to serge and adjust the tension to higher numbers, all the way to your highest tension setting which in my case was 9.

 

After you have serged the edge of your strip, take a look at it and decide which number has the best tension for that specific thread (this is where noting the color of thread is important). Mark a star in the space.

For my right needle, I number 3 and number 4 looked the same, which I thought a bit strange, but I marked them both anyway. My serger was bought used, so I have no idea what it has been through! I was also surprised that my right needle was 5, but that's what was best.

Once I completed this serger tension test, I made sure that all my tension dials were set to the best number, and gave it a try. It worked! I will keep these strips forever because I know that they will be a very important reference.

 ☼

I'm linking up to some of these fabulous parties.