Fashion for the AG!

Well, someone got something sewn for them! She got a little dress. She got some jeans too, but dd didn't want to take the dress off of her, so you just get the pictures of the dress! :) It was a pretty simple little pattern. I believe it is simplicity 7083, view H. I can't be bothered at the moment to run upstairs to find out what the pattern envelope says.....

The neckline is gathered with some elastic, I attached some ribbon around the sleeves and bottom edge. I wish now I had chosen the white ribbon I had, instead of the contrasting blue, but oh well, she hasn't complained!

So, I got the house I am selling into escrow! My agent put it on the market thursday morning last week and by monday I had 5 offers! Yay, that went easy! I met with the tax accountant yesterday, so that is done, yay! With those things off my chest, I felt I could get a little bit of sewing in without feeling too guilty! Next up, I am going to try another version of the t-shirt I made dh, with the changes he requested. I think this one will have to be short sleeve, though, I only have one yard! Chat with you later! :)

Stuffed animal sewing??

Have any of you sewn stuffed animals? If you have, would you say that it is worth it? I am toying with an idea of sewing up some stuffed animals for my dd's bday, but don't want to get in over my head. I have about a month to get it done. What do you think???

My February sewing!

It seems that I sew in spurts these days, with long periods of nothing in between! I sewed two tnt nighties from Ottobre 6/2009 - 17. These are going together super quickly now that I have made them a few times. The girls love their nighties! I used knit interlock from stash. The little ones has purple unicorns and the older ones had little puppy faces. Cute prints I got from the evil fabric queen.

Such a poser!

Here is a little fleece hat that I made up. I used simplicity 4311, I have had it in stash for quite awhile so it is probably oop by now. Anyhow, it was pretty simple. I found my head circumference in between the medium and large (I think this is a teenager pattern), so I made the large. It was too big (puffy looking) so I just took about an inch deeper seam where the circle top and band around the head meet. I like it now....my little one is my photographer!

Lastly, I found some time to squeak in a shirt for my dh. I made the purple t-shirt under the top shirt. I actually made the top one too, but that was about a year or so ago. He thinks he is funny posing dorky, maybe just dorky.....

Here he is with just the t-shirt. It was made from a knit that is brushed on one side and super soft. I put that on the inside of the shirt. I used Kwik Sew 3299. Another pattern I have had in stash for awhile. There are a few things I would change on that pattern. Number 1, I think the neckband is too wide, I think I would cut it close to in half. The other thing is the neck opening is a little larger than dh's favorite t-shirts, so I would make the neck opening shallower. The other thing he requested is that the body length be a couple of inches longer. I could have made the sleeves a tad shorter, but the shirt was a surprise (he was out of town), so I didn't get his arm to measure!

Well, that is all folks! I am not sure how much sewing I am going to get in the next few weeks....I have my plate full of stuff to do! I am selling a house, my dh's bday is friday, my dd's bday is in march and needs planning, I have my taxes to do, and taxes from a deceased relative to take care of. Plus normal day to day stuff. I may just need to sew to stay sane! :) Take care everyone!

Ta Da!

Okay, here we go! First up is a pair of shorts for my older dd made from Jalie 2920 (the legging pattern): I added a little ribbon trim to the backside for looks and identification of front and backside when putting on!

On the front side I added a little rhinestone crystal heart at the bottom of the leg.

Next up are my leggings.....you don't want to see me in tight white leggings without the skirt on....I put a little heart in hot fix crystals at the bottom of my leg too....

Here is the tank top and the leggings under a skirt. Here, my youngest dd wanted to take the picture of me....I had to kneel down to get the tank top into the picture!

I added this little ribbon accent to the side of the shirt so it wasn't so plain....

Next up is my Burda 4-2009-122 shirt! I think it turned out pretty. At first I wasn't sure how I would like it, but after finishing it and trying it on with the tank top, I think it looks cute. This was pretty easy to make up....I bound the neck and front edges instead of doing facings, I don't particularly care for facings and a bound edge has a nice clean look. I did a rolled hem on the serger for the bottom hem and the sleeve edges using a shiny embroidery thread that matched the pink in the shirt. I turned all the seams in on themselves so the raw edges were enclosed and topstitched (is that a french seam?) so the inside has a nice finished look. For the casing, I serged the edges of the seam (at the middle) and then just topstitched it down from the right side.

And last on the list, here is my youngest modeling her new legging pants:

Again, I added a little rhinestone heart to the leg...

I added a ribbon trim to the backside (like on older dd's shorts)...

Close up of heart....

Well, that makes up for the lack of sewing in January, right? Now, what next???

Finally inspired to do something!

I found my camera and downloaded the hundreds of pictures from christmas! Then I took some photos of my finished American Girl clothes! Yay, I got something sewing to show you! This is the pattern I used for the american girl clothes. It is simplicity 7083 and I made the little jumper and shirt in the top left hand corner. Here she is! I added some trim around the sleeves and the bottom of the jumper, to help tie this outfit together. There is blue in the jumper stripes, but it seems to get lost in the sea of pink. I got this trim off of a christmas gift...it was wrapped around a child's hooded towel to make it look prettier and I decided to save it. Funny where you can pick up cute trim! The pink jumper is a seersucker material leftover from some capris I had made my older dd a long time ago. The blue shirt is leftover interlock knit from a tank top I made myself last summer. The American Girl is the right size to use up those leftover scraps that are big enough they are hard to part with and small enough you are not quite sure why you are saving them!

Here is a full-length shot (I know - she doesn't have shoes on, that is the first thing my dd always takes off....)

Now on to some new projects! I'm really going all out here! This is one of my latest purchases of fabric from fabric.com. It is a cotton lawn. I have never used cotton lawn before, nor really knew what it was, so I wanted to give it a try. For those of you clueless like me, it feels like a light and airy cotton. I really love the pattern and you can't see in this photo, but there are bits of gold metallic in the design as well around some of the white pattern edges. Very cute. I was originally thinking a light airy skirt....but I didn't feel like dealing with lining and couldn't find the right pattern that I had in my mind, so it has become a shirt!

I am going to use this burda pattern on the cover of the 4/2009 issue. Many people have made this up and posted on patternreview and I really like the results of everyones creations. I added a couple of inches to the top bodice section for boob room and because I traced the size 42 (largest size) and I am more of a size 46 around the bust. I also added a little flare out at the hips of about 2". Lastly, I added 4" to the length of the bottom portion of the top, because I like my tops to cover my tummy and some of my booty!

I have it all cut out and ready to sew!

Next, I thought that I would want to wear a tank top underneath the above top, so I pulled out my tnt tank top pattern from Ottobre 2/2009 #1.

It is this one here in the gray. I cut mine out of an off-white bamboo interlock knit.

Then I decided that I would like some leggings to go with the outfit, so I pulled out my new jalie legging pattern and cut out some leggings in the same bamboo interlock knit. I then decided that the girls could have some leggings too and I cut my younger dd some in a white interlock knit and then I didn't have quite enough of the offwhite left to cut my older dd leggings, but some shorts! Kind of like bike shorts style. Stay tuned to see all of this sewn up!! Ambitious, huh!?! (maybe just crazy......)

no mojo

WELL, you would think for not blogging for quite awhile I would have lots of exciting things to share with all of you...alas, that is definitely not the case. I did sew up another doll outfit, but I haven't photographed it, so I can't show it to you. I finished that a couple of weeks ago. Since then, I have really wanted to sew, but honestly, I haven't been inspired to sew anything. I even got some new fabric that arrived today. Still, I have no inspiration.....not even enough to photograph it and show yah. I figure it is just a phase I will have to muster through....maybe it is our hot then cold again weather. I can't figure out whether I want to make long sleeves or short sleeves, sweatshirts or shorts! I haven't found a pattern I really want to make.....so I thought I would be inspired by my fabric stash and then find the perfect pattern, but that didn't work either. In the meantime, I am still enjoying reading everyone's blogs and love the stuff everyone is making! Don't give up on me!