teeny tiny mini pierrot

November 3, 2011March 23, 201210 Comments

anyone else having a little bit of lingering inspiration overload after KCWC? now that i can get back to non-halloween sewing, i find i have too many ideas in my head. i don’t know where to start! i never seem to have a lack of projects, but sometimes when i have too many, i get a bit blocked. usually a trip to the fabric store for the perfect fabric will push a project up to the top of my mental “must make” pile, but sometimes it just takes a ridiculously short deadline. this is a case of the latter. 😉

my cousin therese, who didn’t find out what she was having ahead of time (prompting me to make this gender neutral baby shower gift), gave birth to a beautiful baby girl a couple weeks ago. baby E is a sweet little thing, and so teensy! since they didn’t know they were having a girl, i wanted to make a girly dress, even though dresses aren’t super practical for tiny babies. WHATEVER! i got some ruffle butt leggings to go under it. that makes it practical, right? i think it’ll fit her next spring.

since pierrots can be sewn in a couple hours start to finish, i made this in the evening while texting therese to see if they were up for a visit the next morning. as plans were firmed up, i continued to sew!

the pattern is made by rae’s pierrot tunic (which fits more as a dress for the little sizes), 0-3 month size. the fabric is hide and seek by kayo horaguchi (with kona cotton neckline facing). i wanted Em to show how tiny this dress was in comparison to her wearing one of her two 3T pierrot tops, but instead she insisted on wearing her “zebra dress.” she wanted the dress with the matching fabric!

the selvage side i used for the tiny pierrot is a slightly different print than the one i used for her popover dress, but they match well enough for her!

i’ll end with the picture my little artist wanted to draw for the baby. she tells me it’s a horse. she’s going through a color-blocking period. 🙂

homemade halloween 2011: winnie the pooh

October 31, 2011October 16, 201311 Comments

happy halloween!

i don’t know if i’ve written too much here about the personality of my little guy. we got pretty lucky. he is mellow, almost always happy, rarely cries, and even his “stranger anxiety” consists of simply suspiciously eyeing the stranger, larry david style (versus his sister, who would burst into tears at even the most loving of great aunts). when i read him books, he laughs. he claps when i sing him songs. he’s a joy, and just slightly dopey at times (he usually has a red mark on his forehead from bumping into things). put simply, he’s a tubby little cub all stuffed with fluff.

we were brainstorming his costume this year and throwing out much “cooler” ideas but then thought of winnie the pooh, and it had to be. he’s sweet, he’s got a little belly, he’s winnie the pooh!

you’ve already seen his sailboat pants. i actually made them expecting this to be his costume. the project i tried to get to but never completed for KCWC was his hood, in matching honey-colored corduroy (it’s the oliver + s cozy winter hood from “little things to sew,” lined with joel dewberry woodgrain just like the pants). instead of ribbon, i made a thicker strap of corduroy and attached it with a button.

his undershirt is from old navy, but i couldn’t find a plain short sleeved red shirt, so i decided to make one. it’s the raw-edged raglan from “sewing for boys,” but nothing is raw edged! i sewed it right sides together at the shoulder seams and used a XXL men’s t-shirt (again from old navy, actually about half the price of his undershirt), so i could utilize the finished sleeves and hem. i also double folded the neck binding…so yeah…nothing is raw! also, the pattern starts at 2T, so i shortened the length and sleeves before cutting.

on a last-minute whim, i also made him some coordinating shoes. they’re the cameron baby sneakers from i think sew. i actually had a little trouble with them, but i’m not sure if it’s because i was sewing late at night at the end of lots of projects, or because i decided to use suede from a long-ago thrifted jacket for the soles, but they turned out pretty cute in the end.

since he’s not walking yet, here’s a better view of the shoes. they’re also lined with woodgrain, of course.

and now, winnie and angelina together! i think the fact that he is a pleasant baby really helped ease the transition from one kid to two. his big sister adores him. huge sigh of relief!

she totally did that on her own. i love these kids!

have a happy halloween, and have fun taking candy “fees,” all you parents! 😉

homemade halloween 2011: angelina ballerina

October 30, 2011August 22, 201415 Comments

for halloween this year, my ballet-loving 3.5 year old is angelina ballerina (a ballet-dancing mouse, of course). i had a lot of fun making or adapting her existing ballet stuff, and she was very excited to wear the full costume. ready for the rundown?

EARS:

i covered a headband with white fleece, fashioned ears out of white fleece and pink felt, and attached a big pink satin-y bow. my hot glue gun became my best friend with these!

BODY:

she has legwarmers on as armwarmers, is wearing her regular ballet leotard, and her little things to sew tutu with felt rose clipped on (here are the details on the tutu and rose). because of the fact that it ties in the back, it’s the perfect tutu design for her…

TAIL:

her mouse tail is made out of the same white microfleece, which i stuffed with polyfill and then threaded in a length of floral wire (like you use to make the ubiquitous paper pom poms) so it holds its shape. i just safety-pinned it to her leotard, which is hidden by the bow.

SHOES:

i found her some new pink ballet flats at the gap for $5 on a lucky break (her old ones were super worn out and getting too small). i hot glued lengths of satin ribbon into each for a toe shoe effect, though the ribbons don’t stay up very well. might have to just tie them around her ankles for trick-or-treating.

i put a little cream blush on her nose for these photos because i hadn’t picked up any face paint yet, but that’s been remedied for tomorrow. she has informed me that angelina doesn’t have whiskers, though, so no whiskers.

and now, the reason i have to break the kids’ costumes into two blog posts – the sheer number of photos of my sweet little dancing mouse.

oh yeah, one more thing. at ballet, the girls get to pick a color of scarf to dance around with for a certain portion of the class. Em ALWAYS picks pink, but on saturday she picked the green one! i thought maybe her pink obession might finally be coming to an end, but then…it was time to decorate her pumpkin. wanna take a guess what happened?

yep, a pink pumpkin. 🙂

come back tomorrow for little winnie the pooh plus a pretty darn cute photo of the two of them together! happy all hallow’s eve eve!

halloweens past and a preview

October 24, 2011October 31, 201214 Comments

as i finish up this year’s halloween costumes for both kids, i thought i’d share my handmade costumes of pre-blog years gone by. i started sewing in 2009, so that’s the first year i made a costume for Em. i come from a rich heritage of mom-made halloween costumes, though – my sisters and i were bumble bees, pioneers, vampires, cats, mad scientists, and overworked office women (that was mine – i actually thrifted a jumpsuit in middle school, it was incredible with a crazy wig and smudged makeup). mom also helped me sew a two headed monster one year (two thrifted plaid shirts sewn together and matching masks). that was a fantastic costume to rock with a friend.

i think kid halloween costumes are becoming my favorite thing to sew. it’s really fun to figure out what costume matches their interests/personalities at the time and make them come to life.

2009: TINY DOROTHY FROM THE WIZARD OF OZ

i had been sewing about three months at this point, but i knew what i had to do for her costume – DOROTHY. Em was born with a ridiculous amount of hair (like suri cruise hair) and never lost it like everyone said she would, so by 17 months she could easily pull off pigtails, even after multiple haircuts. she was also waaaay into doggies and shoes.

her blue gingham dress had no closures, and she grew out of it the week after halloween. it was a rectangle attached to a gathered rectangle with rectangle straps. i did sew real buttonholes, though (my very first buttonholes)!

you can kind of see it here, but i wove strips of felt to make her a treat bag that looked like dorothy’s basket. it even had a pocket inside for a mini toto that she carried around. i also gathered some fabric and attached it to a onesie for a ruffled collar look.

we went to a halloween fair at a nearby school, and i believe there were four dorothys there, including one of the teachers. Em was by far the tiniest.

2010: DORA THE EXPLORER

last year, in preparation for O’s arrival, we finished the basement in our old house, taking our living space from about 1,300 square feet to 1,800. livin’ large! however, i sew in the basement, so for a few months i was unable to do that and it KILLED ME. i regained my sewing area about a week before halloween, so i was able to pull her costume off just in the nick of time.

she was super into dora the explorer back then, so it was kind of a no-brainer. i used dana’s tutorial to dye her socks yellow and a pair of too-short pants orange (then i hemmed them into capris, because it’s too cold here for shorts). she had on a store-bought shirt, but i made her beaded bracelet that promptly got lost.

and of COURSE i made her backpack and map. this was actually really fun – it was the first backpack i’d made, i designed it myself (after a 3 month sewing hiatus, mind you) and i feel like i nailed it. it’s made of kona cotton, fully lined, and she still uses it to carry things around, a year later. map is often played with, too. backpack’s face and map are made out of felt.

in action with her superhero cousins. she was a happy trick-or-treater.

2011: SEWING FOR TWO PREVIEW – THE YEAR OF THE EARS

both kids are animals this year, and it doesn’t get much cuter than animal ears, if you ask me! you’ve already seen the bottoms of each costume (her tutu and his pants), and here are the very tops. these are my most involved costumes yet, and i’m excited about how they’re turning out. hers is done and she’s thrilled, but i still have something to make for his…so i’d better get back to it. 😉

halloween is so much more fun with kids around! i can’t wait!

a new friend

October 18, 2011May 14, 201214 Comments

well, i wasn’t able to get my “bonus item” sewn for kids clothes week day 7. it can wait. instead, i had a full weekend – a date night with the husband, Em’s ballet class, a foot massage and lunch with a great friend, folded 5+ loads of laundry, cleaned (and cleaned and cleaned) the house, had friends over and made homemade chicken noodle soup, and played a soccer game. it was great. i was getting just a tad fatigued of sewing, so the couple days away did wonders. i had such a fun time last week, though – it was a whirlwind! i got totally inspired, found some great new blogs, and added to my kids’ wardrobes. my sewing for kids pinterest board saw some action for the future, too.

last night, i was able to sew up a little project that i had cut and ready prior to KCWC, but in the hustle and bustle i hadn’t gotten to it yet. it’s an idea that i saw on hart + sew, a lovely blog i just started following recently after we both guest posted for sparkle power!. stacy had her daughter draw a monster, then she helped turn it into a stuffie! i thought it was the sweetest idea and something Em would definitely get behind. i asked her to draw an animal/monster, let her pick fabrics out of my scrap pile, and i sewed it up. here’s what we came up with: