kcwc fall 2012: day 1:: daring fireball mini tee

October 8, 2012October 9, 201242 Comments

sew-off challenge: Upcycle a Flashback Skinny Tee

rocky start to kcwc and the sew-off, you guys, rocky start.

before i started sewing today, i changed my serger thread from white (what i always serge with) to black. i don’t change my serger thread very often, so when the threads were all wonky, i thought it was because i’d done something wrong. after nearly an hour of threading and rethreading, i realized…wait for it…i had lifted my presser foot up to rethread and forgot to put it back down! oof, no wonder the fabric wouldn’t feed through! anyway, once i figured that out, this little shirt came together in a snap.

behold the daring fireball upcycled tee. my husband follows tech news like other guys follow football. one of his favorite sites for info on apple and other techie stuff is daring fireball. the site is widely read among those that follow that sort of thing, but pretty obscure in our day-to-day lives (kinda like me with sewing blogs!), and it has a really cool and simple design to it. my husband pretty much wore this t-shirt until it couldn’t be worn anymore (by him). so off it went into my upcycle pile for the boy!

i used his t-shirt for the body plus a slightly lighter gray tank top that my sister gave me for the bindings (she just moved back to town after finishing up school and was doing deep cleaning). the pattern is rae’s flashback skinny tee in 18-24 months.

then i let the little guy play with our first iPod and iPhone for a bit (both still work).

no multi-touch on that sucker, buddy!

**check out rae’s ADORABLE flashback skinny tee upcycle (with peter pan collar!) right here!**

giveaway winners and a challenge-within-a-challenge-within-a-challenge

October 7, 2012October 7, 201214 Comments

okay first things first – sweetheart dress giveaway winners!

grand prize: Shannon
sweetheart dress winners: Brooke and Sarah S

congratulations! we’ve emailed the winners. thanks so much for a great giveaway, Shannon!

***

now onto pressing business:

for some reason, my Kids Clothes Week Challenge planning didn’t come easily this time. i had tons of half-formed ideas, but nothing that jumped out as “must make.” last spring and last fall, i no trouble prioritizing my always-overflowing mental to do list into a nice balance of wardrobe staples and new pattens i’d been wanting to try. my KCWC project always end up some of my favorites, and also tend to be worn most by my kids. you can see all of my kcwc posts here if you’re curious.

so last week, after organizing my stash and deciding i wouldn’t buy any new fabric because i have plenty (my first challenge-within-a-challenge), i waited for inspiration to strike. i looked for those perfect combinations of fabric and pattern that would cause me to create wonderful things during KCWC.

i just couldn’t figure it out, aside from a couple minor projects.

i posed the question to instagram, to see if any of my sewing buddies out there could help. i got some good suggestions, but then…THEN…Rae threw out the notion that she should just give me HER list and i could make that. at first she meant it was a joke, but then it turned into a “hey that could be really fun!” type situation. apparently her mental to do list was too long too, and she needed help paring it down. she sent me her list and i picked the ones that inspired me…and a SEW-OFF was born!

i own most of Rae’s patterns already, and they’re always some of my favorites to sew, so she was the perfect partner.

want to know what we picked? want to join us, maybe?? Here’s the Rae-Kristin Sew-Off List for KCWC Fall 2012:

Upcycle a Flashback Skinny Tee
pretty self-explanatory. find an adult tee to convert to a miniature skinny tee. i almost always use upcycled knits when i sew FBSTs, so this is a fun one. you can get Rae’s flashback skinny tee pattern here.

Mini-Washi Dress
i was SO excited to see this on Rae’s list! i’ve totally wanted to make one of these and i’m excited to give it a go. at this point it’s not available as a pattern, so i drafted it myself using the flashback skinny tee as a bodice block and my washi pattern as a reference. i’ve got no idea if it’ll work but I’m sure hoping it does!

Heather Ross Pajama Pants
sometimes i’ve been lucky enough to come across fabric by the amazing heather ross during my trips to bolt, and sometimes i’ve even bought some! i tend to hoard it, though…i’m sure lots of us do. this challenge is to make pj pants (or anything!) from my hoarded fabric!

Shirred Pierrot
i looooove Rae’s pierrot pattern and had already cut out a larger size as a “maybe” when I saw Rae’s list and her suggestion to shirr it! challenge is to use any peasant blouse-type pattern (if you don’t have the pierrot, maybe use the sweet little dress by leila & ben?). If you use Pierrot, Rae suggests to add about 1″ to the folded width of the tops of each of the sleeves to add more room around the neckline for the shirring (4″ total). she posted a shirred pierrot last week for an example.

Make a catalog-inspired item
after i saw gail’s adorable hedgehog pants on elsie marley, i started browsing the mini boden catalog myself. it’s so inspiring! i’m often pinning things by companies that i want to try to make, so that’s the challenge here – be inspired by something you see in a catalog. could be Gap, Hanna Andersson, Crewcuts, mini boden, whatever!

want to sew along within the sew along? join us! this was just a low-key* challenge designed to motivate us, so if you like any or all of these ideas, go ahead and make them along with us this week! and then let us know!! remember, the KCWC challenge is to spend 1 hour each day sewing for your kids, so these are not meant to be ridiculously intricate or time-consuming. just easy, cute items to add to your kids’ wardrobes.

and if you don’t…no worries at all! there’s loads of inspiration out there! i really can’t wait to see what starts popping up in the KCWC flickr pool.

ladies (and gentlemen??)…let’s sew! KCWC starts tomorrow!

*oh but did you know i’m sorta kinda really competitive? so of course i will crush her. 😉

skinny tee tank dress

June 26, 2012November 20, 20126 Comments

it’s summer and i’m out doing summery things, so today i’m bringing home a guest post i wrote for the leadup to elsie marley’s spring kid’s clothes week challenge. it includes a supertinymini tutorial for how to turn rae’s flashback skinny tee pattern into a flutter sleeve dress, and a bonus photo that didn’t post on meg’s blog due to technical difficulties on my end.

***

When Meg contacted me with her idea to have a bunch of gals sew Rae’s flashback skinny tee pattern, I immediately knew what to do – remix it into a dress! My daughter is almost four and wants to wear a dress every day. She considers them essential for dancing, which is her most favorite thing to do. I like sewing dresses, especially when they’re washable, comfortable, and easy for her to play in (I’m a practical mama). Soft jersey knit is the perfect material for all of that!

I made this simple tank dress with an XXL Old Navy shirt from the clearance rack, plus scraps of a t-shirt from another project. I have trouble finding good knit fabric and I almost always end up using repurposed sale rack men’s shirts – as big as I can get ’em! Extra bonus points if I can preserve the factory hem, though Rae offers great hemming tips within the pattern as well.

I extended the hemline of the 3T skinny tee pattern about 6″ (use a dress you already have as a guide), and made it A-line by using a straight edge, starting at the armpit and finishing about 3″ from the side of where the original pattern would be if it were dress length. I trimmed the top of the shoulder seams about 1/2″ (though I might recommend a little more), bound the armholes per Rae’s pattern instructions, and widened the neckline a bit. I also added a little pocket for extra detail.

For the flutter sleeves, I added 5″ to each armhole measurement and cut two strips to that length, each 1.5″ wide. I rounded the ends and gathered them along the longer edge. I attached each sleeve to the underside of the armhole, topstitching both on the outside and inside edges of the binding to catch it securely. I left the edges raw, since knit doesn’t fray.

The skinny tee pattern is a quick sew and so versatile, it’s great for adding your own customizations! I first sewed a “regular” version here as practice before remixing it into a dress.

Thanks for designing such an awesome pattern, Rae, and thanks for having me, Meg!

KCWC spring 2012: days 6 & 7:: butterfly dress

April 29, 2012October 3, 201217 Comments

final post for this kid’s clothes week challenge – a butterfly dress!

i love wearing blue. my eyes are blue and when i wear it, they look even bluer. my daughter’s are blue too and it looks wonderful on her, but she calls it a “boy color” and wants nothing to do with it. to persuade her, i need to give the garment a “special feature” that she’ll love, like ruffles or butterflies or a major twirly skirt…or all three at once!

this is the coraline dress, a tutorial by jess of craftiness is not optional. jess is kind of the queen of sewing tutorials (check them all out here) and i realized that aside from her junebug dress which i remixed, i haven’t really made one even though i wanted to! when i saw this pop up, i knew it was time.

probably not the greatest choice for my final project of KCWC, after sewing more than just one hour a day all week (and blogging too!), to pick a pretty involved, bias bound/ruffle/buttonhole/full gathered skirt dress, but jess and i have some fun news coming up this week, so i wanted to end with one of her tutorials. and oh yes, it was a very solid tutorial. no head scratching moments, though i always struggle with the sandwich-and-sew method of bias binding and have to finish sections of the inside by hand. no worries – an easy fix.

i used rae’s flashback skinny tee as the bodice base (word to the wise – size up if you do this! i’m pretty bummed that this just barely fits over her head now, so she’d better stop growing so she can wear it for more than a couple weeks!). i trimmed the tops of the shoulders and wrapped the bias around to the wrong side of the armholes rather than having it show.

one benefit of having a ridiculously messy sewing room is that some of the dark gray shot cotton that i used in her elephant charlie dress was still laying around on my cutting table. when i saw how nicely it paired with the lizzy house butterfly sky fabric, i decided to work it in on the placket and added some flat piping, too.

as has happened a few times before, Em saw the dress in process and protested “but i want pink!” and then when she saw the actual dress finished, she giggled in glee. she’s a good sport. i think i’d better make her a pink dress next, or she may stage a revolt. though as long as she can twirl, run, and ride her strider bike in a dress (with the skirt tucked into her underwear), she’s pretty happy. in fact, she moved so much during our photoshoot, i didn’t get a straight on shot of the dress! i didn’t realize this until she had changed into her (pink) swimsuit for some sprinkler-running, so i had to use the old hang-the-dress-in-the-lilac-bush technique.

that’s it for me! five items sewn in six days (took a break on friday). the energy around this KCWC was fantastic, it has been so fun watching everyone make such amazing stuff. really great job, ladies, and thanks again for hosting, meg!

KCWC spring 2012: day 4:: fox pajamas

April 28, 2012April 30, 201215 Comments

it seems that all of my girl outfits this week have been “new to me” patterns/tutorials, and the boy items have been familiar ones. funny. these are the oliver + s bedtime story pajama pants (sadly out of print – hopefully they release this one as a digital pattern!). it’s quick, easy, and cute. i’ve sewn it a couple times (here and here) and was curious how fast i could make it. so i speed tested myself.

starting from already cut pieces, these took me 50 minutes! i had guessed it’d take 45. my stitching isn’t as straight as i’d normally like, and i was slowed down by too-wide-of-elastic for the waist (all i had at 11pm). but i also added a yellow elsie marley bunting tag to it so i suppose under one hour is pret-ty good!

the shirt is one i appliquéd during my very first KCWC last spring. radiohead reference anyone? i chopped off the onesie part but it’s still way too small on him. might be time to make a new one.

i can’t remember if i made 18-24 month or 2T pants for 17-month-old O, and can’t find my pattern pieces in the disaster area i call my sewing room, sorry about that. the adorable fabric, however, is aneela hoey’s blue bell foxlets with kona olive binding. i firmly believe kona olive goes with everything. EVERYTHING.

i grew up with three sisters and i’m finding it so funny how differently little boys play – O is so much rough-and-tumble than Em ever was, and he and my husband have a running game where they roar at each other like bears and chase each other around the house. O thinks it’s HILARIOUS. here it is in action:

while mommy activities are a little more calm:

we love our little guy!

okay, now i’m caught up on posting prior projects. i didn’t sew on friday night, but i’m going to try to finish my final KCWC project and post it tomorrow. have you gotten lost in the flickr group yet? sooooo much great stuff in there. it’s an inspiration fest!