Friday, July 30, 2010

old news... tee shirt to dress recon

This dress is a recon from early in my sewing-clothes-from-clothes days. I made it last summer, but Sweet has refused to wear it until last week (she declared it "tickly" without even trying it on). Last week, she wore it two days in a row...go figure! The body of the dress is a thrifted shirt I bought several years ago (it's an awesome find, if you know our family). I repurposed the original ribknit neckline to be the snugger top edge of the dress. The straps and ruffle are from a $1 Kmart clearance shirt I bought last summer (I bought quite a few different shirts on the same day, and they have been so lovely to have in my stash).







Sunday, July 18, 2010

Chick-fil-A Cow Appreciation Day

It was over a week ago, but I happily worked the entire week creating cow costumes for the girlies...

Sweet's costume started as an Adult size Medium (or was it Large?) tee shirt, pleated at shoulders to make it fit better while keeping the fluff, elastic added to bottom hem and sleeve hem. The black spots on hers and Boo's costumes are cut from a discarded black tee shirt.

Boo's costume started with a too-big Toddler tee to which I sewed black spots. I then made leggings using one of her existing pairs as a pattern, and, of course, a spare tee shirt. I cut the pants so that the bottom hem of the tee became the bottom hem of the pants. I was udderly (haha) proud of myself that I thought to sew on the spots BEFORE assembling the pants (that is something to brag about with my current state of mind). BONUS: Baby Boy should be able to wear this one, or at least part of it, on some future Cow Appreciation Day.

Here's a tail shot. I had a long, white, nylon string leftover from cutting a drawstring short on another project (I've had this in my stash for...probably 3 years?) that made the most wonderful cow tail. I clipped and unbraided the ends, melting the nylon just above the shredded part, and then used a black Sharpie to color the ends. I pinned these to their costumes so I could remove them before washing.

Thankfully, both my girls L-O-V-E the gigantic Chick-fil-A cow mascot. He and Sweet did some dancing that day...

Here's our whole cow family, each with custom-made ears (made from black felt and pink flannel). Hubby's are pinned to a head band that he wore in the masculine across-the-forehead sporty fashion, mine were hot-glued to a black plastic hair band, Sweet's are pinned to an oh-so-perfect black and white hat I found last year at Goodwill (I only had to remove a tiny red flower from the front to get it just right), and Boo's were hot-glued to hair clippies, which I also covered with black felt.

You gotta love a man who will dress up like a cow in broad daylight. For our costumes, I simply cut out big felt spots and pinned them to a white tee. I'm hoping to spend a little more time on something for me next year, when I'm not quite so...pregnant and feeling like I don't need help looking like a cow...HA!

I had so much fun coming up with the ideas and visualizing what I wanted to create for these costumes. The whole day was immensely more exciting that Halloween, and the process and objective for this project were pleasant deviations from the usual garment sewing for my babies.

All in all, it was one of my more successful sewing ventures to date. I didn't have to rip even one seam, and everything turned out exactly as I envisioned it. I'm getting much more patient with my crafting, which makes a much nicer end product (go figure) with significantly less frustration.

Sunday, July 4, 2010

catch up post...

Sweet's #4 birthday outfit! Her skirt is the bottom tier of a skirt I have that was way too long. There was so much material that I was able to make a miniature version for Carly too, and all THREE of us were matching (Rachel's favorite thing right now). I think it was her favorite part of the whole day.

Boo wanted to wear her almost-too-small NCSU tee shirt, but it definitely needed to be girlified. So I sewed up a little skirt using the bottom hem of a checked dress I had shortened for a friend and part of an adult tee...a little elastic and BAM...cuteness...

new playdress for Boo. The top part came from a hand-me-down bodysuit...I'm so over bodysuits by this age, so I snipped the snaps and added the floral knit from a $1 Kmart tee shirt. happiness!

favorite baby shower gift to date: car seat blanket! i used a tutorial from another blog for this one, and i LOVE how it turned out. the other side is all stripes, like the border.

Mothers' Day cards...I let Sweet pick out the scraps for each mother on our list, and I sewed them to a note card. Fun, quick, easy, and inexpensive. Now that I'm "making" these (thanks to another tutorial), there's no more running to the store for last minute cards...that's the best part!