stitched together for rachel: a little star

July 28, 2014July 31, 201421 Comments

one of my favorite kids clothes bloggers, Rachel from Stitched Together, is having a baby any day now! it will be her fifth child (!) and the new little gal definitely deserves some special gifts and attention.

another sweet blogger, Victoria, had the idea to make Rachel a collaborative baby mobile and contacted some of Rachel’s bloggy friends to secretly plot and sew. we set a color theme of navy, gold, mint, white, and peach – all used in a favorite fabric line, ARIZONA by April Rhodes. i love the colors in April’s line, so this was great news to me!

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handmade + storebought baby gifts

April 25, 2014April 24, 201410 Comments

i’ve gotten in the habit lately (ohhhhh in the last two months or so) of combining a little handmade thing with a store-bought gift for new babies. i love giving handmade gifts and i’d love to sew more elaborate things for these special little ones, but i’m a bit short on time these days and everything always feels last minute.

here are a couple examples.

for good friends that just had a baby girl, an outfit i would have loved for Em to wear as a baby – a lap shirt locally made by a little lark, some babylegs, and a baby circle skirt! mostly neutral colors with feminine touches, and just a smidge of coral pink. 😉

i referenced Dana’s free pattern and tutorial for the skirt, but bound the hem with chambray bias tape to finish it.

for another friend’s baby shower, i bought a trio of classic board books, and made a couple bibs using my free bib pattern.

she doesn’t know if she’s having a boy or a girl, so i kept them as gender-neutral as possible (so hard to do – everything always ends up looking either boyish or girlish to me). i backed both bibs in gray ikea towel. the ones i made when O was a baby worked well for the baby spit up phase and still fit him now for popsicles and such, so i know they’ll last a while.

i added a cloud appliqué to the top one. i love adding appliqué to bibs, and i always forget how quick and fun these bibs are to make. great scrap buster! these fabrics are from my hospital bag lining and Em’s “karate dress” as she calls it.

do you have a quick go-to baby gift?

seersucker bodysuit

April 4, 2014April 3, 201416 Comments

are you ready for a generous friday serving of chubby baby legs? thought so.

those adorable gams belong to my nephew, who is once again modeling a pattern i tested for Oliver + S – the bodysuit from the Lullaby Layette Set.

the pattern recommends light to medium weight woven material (though it can also be sewn in knit too as Tara shows!). i knew i wanted it in a lightweight fabric, so i used an orange and gray plaid seersucker from Hancock Fabrics (with Jess again!) and tried to cut carefully because I still want to make a shirt for O with it too. it’s a great summerweight shirting.

i made size 3-6 months for my 4 month nephew (just like with the jacket) and it fit him pretty loosely. in my opinion the tester version’s shape was a bit too bubbly for boy babies and think it may have been slimmed down a bit in the final version, but i’m not sure. it still looks mighty cute with pants!

all the snaps (6 here, 3 on the jacket) got me pretty comfortable with those even though snaps have been a dreaded technique of mine forever. i think the fact that i sprang for these pliers (affiliate link) made a huge difference – they work way better for me than the plastic snap set you have to hit with a hammer and just feel more accurate, too.

while i always seem to take forever to sew plackets, the instructions on this one were clean and clear (of course) and the elastic casings at the legs were frustration-free too.

i think this bodysuit would be super cute sleeveless in stripes for summertime like a little old timey strong boy, or with a little peter pan collar added (for girls, obviously). also if you didn’t catch Cherie’s tutorial for adding ruffle sleeves, go check it out! so cute.

hey spring kids clothes week is next week! did you sign up yet? i can never help myself and always end up sewing for KCW, even when my sewing time is super scarce like it is these days. might just need to keep it simple again. O had a growth spurt which has made getting him dressed in the mornings a bit difficult, so he’s sort of my priority #1, though it’s always hard to resist pretty dress sewing too!!

lullaby layette tiny man jacket

March 21, 2014March 21, 201411 Comments

i made this little jacket so long ago! before christmas! but now that the Lullaby Layette Pattern has been released, it’s bloggin’ time.

i was so excited to hear that Oliver + S was working on a layette pattern. most of their patterns start for slightly older babies, so it’s fun to have options for the little ones now. the pattern contains FOUR different cute little baby things to sew – a bodysuit, a shirt, pants, and this jacket. the sizing starts at 0-3 months and goes up to 24 months, so it’ll last quite a while and would make for great baby shower gift sewing, too.

i actually pattern tested the jacket and bodysuit, the first time i’ve pattern tested for Oliver + S, and it was a great experience. the reason i love pattern testing is i get to see the behind the scenes process of patternmaking, and with Oliver + S it was especially fun to get previews of the upcoming patterns, since they tend to be pretty hush hush until release. i was totally flattered to be asked and took the responsibility seriously – i know a lot of work goes into making patterns as good as theirs. the pattern was already pretty darn solid though – i didn’t have to do too much. 😉

i sewed the 3-6 month size for my (at the time) 4 month old nephew, shown here. my own baby boy was still in my belly! i wanted it to be a “manly” baby jacket, so i upcycled my husband’s khaki shorts for the body. i lined it with a pair of flannel pajama pants that were also my husband’s and added a little twill tape loop at the back neck. the jacket can be totally reversible if you want it to be, and the lining of the sleeves is very cleverly done.

please disregard the plaid mismatch – i didn’t try to match it but apparently on one side i matched it perfectly! not so on the other. drat. but i do love how the plaid peeks out when you fold up the sleeves.

i used store-bought double fold bias tape and size 16 snaps to finish the jacket (both larger than recommended by the pattern). now that i look at these photos, i want to make another for my own little guy (or see if my nephew has grown out of this one yet…).

a couple of my bloggy friends have sewn adorable versions of the Lullaby Layette jacket – you have to check out Tara’s tiny sherpa boy (that hat! Tara’s styling is always so good!) and Cherie’s awesome girl version that had me beelining it to the store for neon bias tape. both of those gals also happen to have ridiculously adorable babies, which helps matters.

i’ll show you the bodysuit in a bit! gotta do everything in small chunks of time these days.

thermos toss changing pad cover

February 27, 2014February 27, 201429 Comments

hello! still enjoying settling in with baby but i felt like blogging, so here i am with the changing pad cover i made just a couple days before C was born. i had a major nesting/sewing frenzy there at the end!

this was on my to do list for months, and finishing it was probably one of those “final straw” things that let me go into labor. that’s what i’m telling myself anyway.

as i mentioned before, the “theme” of the boys’ shared room is Camp Ivanhoe, the Khaki Scouts’ base in the movie Moonrise Kingdom (affiliate link). my Pinterest board is here. i actually got the Camp Ivanhoe idea BECAUSE of this fabric! it was sent by the lovely folks at Dear Stella, who offered me some fabric at the end of last year. Em’s Christmas dress and Laura’s tote bag were both made in gold confetti sparkle, but this was my fun bonus choice – Thermos Toss flannel from their Take a Hike line (you can buy it online here).

i love these retro thermoses – i remember my dad taking a thermos to work in the wintertime, and the quirky plaid nostalgia grabbed me. it seems that the Khaki Scouts would probably carry these around in the colder months too. and the flannel is so cozy and soft for baby!

thermos toss changing cover

i figured out a pattern to cover our contoured changing pad myself after searching unsuccessfully online for exactly what i wanted. i made two end pieces that are elongated, shallow U’s, then i wrapped a long piece around the middle, matching up the centers and then turning sharply at the corners and sewing down the edges. i folded the bottom edge under and added 1/4” elastic and it fit really nicely. after stressing about how i was going to figure it out, it ended up working just fine. phew!

want to see a bit more of the room so far?

here’s a little peek – the brass bugle was a $3 thrift store find, and i made the troop 55 flag out of felt. my sister in law made the “Be Brave” pennant (inspired by one in this shop, different phrase sold here) as a Christmas present and i love it!

the garland was made by Cherie and the phrase in the middle says “here to make friends,” the opposite of the ubiquitous reality show mantra. i might change that out for a moonrise kingdom quote eventually and once he’s more mobile (and sleeping in the crib) i’ll rearrange the garland for safety. Cherie also made an perfectly campy divided basket for the room!

the National Parks poster is from Schoolhouse Electric as well, an awesome Christmas gift from my inlaws. it goes really nicely with the divided basket that Gail made (currently in our room for middle-of-the-night-and-every-day diaper changes) and the quilt Jess made! having generous and talented crafty friends is truly the best.

i want to hang some rustic-ish shelves, style a few more things, get more art on the walls, and then i’ll do a full room tour and show O’s bed too. the room is one of my favorites in the house already, though! kind of cool to have a design that looks better the more handmade/thrifted items that are in it.