Oh well…

I think I’m cured of making clothes.

Do you remember that top I made for my 5-year-old daughter for Easter?  She doesn’t like it.  Not at all.  She put it away and said not a thing.  When I asked her after about a week when she planned to wear it, she suggested next Easter.  And then, she sadly confessed the truth:  the top has too much gray.  Take a look:

What, you see purple, pink, red (all her favorite colors)?  Did you notice the natural linen trim (it’s grayish)?  The ironic truth is that Aria chose this fabric herself!  Um, yeah!  To be fair, there is gray in the print.  Take a look at the back towards the center left:

Well, I’ll be.  Who would have thought fabulous pink and purple could be done in by a bit of soft gray?  Aria, quite sweetly and trying to help, suggested I should sell it.  So, I will.  Why not?  She reluctantly agreed to model it for me and so we enjoyed some time outside after a thunderstorm admiring the battered azaleas.

Not exactly what I had in mind, but oh well….

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Easter Projects

Before moving on to another big project, I stitched through a few small projects in time for Easter.  I fell in love with the lovely spring colors of these cloth napkins by Molly of the Purl Bee.  We never seem to have enough napkins when we host Easter dinner, so I used some beautiful Good Folks fabrics paired with lively Kona Cottons to liven up our table.  The rest of our cloth napkins are solid green, so these four pretties really dress things up.  I purchased the Kona on sale at Hancock’s for quite a good deal.  They may not have much selection, but they certainly have the best price on Kona cotton!

My cloth napkins are “luncheon size”, which is actually quite sufficient.  Why use more delicious fabric when good enough will do? Finished size is 9.5 x 15.5″. With a little care in folding, the colors really pop!

For our Easter baskets, I put my nose to the grind once again and made some clothing. Aria’s top is the “Blouse with Crocheted Doily Trim” from Carefree Clothes for Girls. This, my second jaunt with sewing clothing, wasn’t so painful. I’ll say that the directions in this book were quite a bit more user-friendly than the minimal ones included with that Hancock’s pajama pattern.  Several raw edge finishings in the blouse design also saved time.  Plus, when it came to Liam’s shirt, I used a plain, store-bought tank.  Liam has a sentimental attachment to a pair of outgrown robot pajamas.  I appliqued a large rectangle of the pajama fabric across the chest and hand-stitched two smaller, cut-out robots to hide the Old Navy logo.  Easy peasy.

Happy Easter!

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Pajamas by Necessity

And speaking of sewing… let me catch you up on my latest project. I made pajamas for Aria and Liam. These were born out of necessity, since the only fire retardant-free children’s pajamas are thin cotton knits. It’s cold in our house, so thin cotton won’t do. Armed with a $2.99 pattern from JoAnn’s, I purchased cotton fleece (which is incredibly hard to find) and got to work. It was not fun.

I did not like working with the thin, paper pattern pieces. I did not appreciate the minimal directions included. And before long, I realized that the patterns I had chosen were not the simplest ideas. It probably took about 16 hours per pair of pajamas. Ouch. I’m sure this was due mainly to my inexperience. But before I go on complaining, let’s see some pictures.

Here’s what happens when you ask a 3-year-old to stand by his desk for a picture. As you can see, he stood reallllllly still.

This is what happens when you let him roll around with his toys. Does he look calm and serene in this picture? Don’t be fooled, he’s just occupied kicking the door. Notice the cute little turquoise ducky on the front of his top? Love it! Liam helped me choose this fabric (it’s by Lizzy House), which I quilted over the cotton fleece to give his pajamas some personality. I’ve only been able to find cotton fleece in solid colors. It’s a lot like sweatshirt fabric with a nice soft, brushed side that’s super cozy.

And here are some more pictures just for fun. His cute little behind crawling behind our tree. (I already miss our tree, especially the popcorn/cranberry garland!) He was playing hard-to-photograph.

Here he’s trying to distract me from taking pictures by pulling a gingerbread/applesauce boy off the tree. Little does he know that we’ll be taking the tree down later that day, which was New Years Day.

At the table, Aria is doing some sewing of her own. She’s thrilled to have her own sewing box now, and a new set of her very own pins.

Makes her feel so grown up! But, honestly, doesn’t that hand look like so tiny? Please humor me! She’s working on a shirt of some kind for her baby doll, made of cotton fleece scraps.

Before long, brother is feeling left out and angles a way into the picture. He’s helping, I’m sure.

I finished Aria’s pajamas today, and good riddance. I’m so glad to be done with clothes and get back to something more fun (for me). I definitely gained an appreciation for the value of ready-made clothing, let me tell you! Now if only one could buy warm children’s pajamas that aren’t riddled with chemical fire retardants….

Here are Aria’s pjs, embellished with a butterfly fabric by Alexander Henry.

Now, onto some coasters, or maybe a clock, or both?

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