My First Dress



Just a quick post. I want to have a flashback moment to the very first (wearable) dress I made. I thought (and still think) it was the most adorable thing ever. I have been hooked ever since. It's cotton, with ribbon straps. I made it last December and Sunshine was able to wear it well into the summer. It's always a little sad to me when she out grows out of the stuff I make her.



Notice the crib in the background, wow, how much she has grown in one year!



A princess dress



Little Miss Sunshine is obsessed with the Disney princesses.... She has many of the Barbies and a couple of the dress up dresses. She usually has changed into one of them before she even comes to wake me up in the morning. Soooo for an extra special Christmas gift I made her my own version of "Sleeping Beauty" dress. This is probably the gift I am the most excited about giving to her. I know she will just LOVE it.

the fabric......ooooo shiny

sparkle trim

Two great things about this dress..... It only took me about 2 hours from designing it to hanging it on the hanger.....and it cost a little under $15 to make. That is more than I usually spend on making a dress BUT, these little suckers cost $20 anywhere. Plus, this one is way more special because it is from Mom.

The Christmas dress

I really wanted to make Sunee's Christmas dress this year. I was really excited about it. I had a vision of what I wanted it to look like, red and black satin, with a BIG bow on the back. But to be honest, I was nervous about sewing with satin. My sister, again, talked me into buying a pattern. I used some of the pattern pieces for a sizing guide, but that was about it. I realized that this is probably the only thing they are good for. I bunched the rest of the tissue you paper up and shoved it back in the packet. I guess I didn't have to make the dress out of satin but I think it makes the dress look so much more "dressy". Here is the fabric.

Since satin has absolutely no give whats so ever. I knew I might have to venture into "zipperland". I have yet to use a zipper in any of my projects, so again, I got nervous. I chickened out, and did hook and latches instead.

Getting ready to attach the skirt....

The finished product.

My little model had to be bribed to take some pictures and I still didn't get any good ones. But you can still see she looks really cute in it.

3 week long curtains

I have been working on some curtains for a very special man in my life. These curtains took me three weeks to complete, no joke. I have made several sets of curtains for our house. However, the curtains in my house were much simpler. I completed them the same day they were started.


Sunee's room

Our room...yum chocolate brown

The dining room

I love love the pattern of the curtains in the dining room

These Toy Story 3 curtains were more complex and required a lot more thought and planning. They are made out of a set of sheets, fitted and flat. My curtain journey started with me taking the elastic out of the fitted sheet. This is a long and tedious process. But after that was done, I had two nice pieces of fabric to work with. After cutting the main pieces, I went to work on the straps. Each strap took forever (15-20 min). I needed 16 straps to complete the curtains, you can do the math.

A whole lot of measuring, ironing and pinning later, they were finished. I definitely think they were worth all of the time and extra work. I was impressed with the final product, and so was my nephew.

all scrunched up...cute huh?

I was recently talking to a friend who has an interest in starting to sew. I was explaining to her that curtains, (not these kind) are a good thing to start sewing because curtains are a bunch of straight lines. Also. that curtains really show you that most projects are about 20% sewing, and 80% of a project is measuring, cutting, folding, ironing and pinning.

So now I am so excited about moving on to some Christmas gift making. I hope to make Sunee Mae a couple dresses to open on Christmas morning, including her "Christmas dress"!

pumpkin deliciousness

No new sewing projects :( but I did make a yummy recipe that I would like to share with you. Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls (recipe here). The recipe calls for yeast. J and I have been doing a lot of pizza dough making. I've been feeling the need to move on to an "intermediate" recipe. So after I mixed all the ingredients,(including the yeast) I had to let it rise for at least an hour. I only have the patience for the minimal amount of time, so after the timer went off, I quickly moved on to the next step.  I Smeared the cinnamon goodness all over rolled out dough.



all rolled up!





Then to the best part. I cut them all up using a thread cutting technique. It is so easy, and cuts perfect rolls. Put a piece of long thread under the roll and cross them over and continue to pull until the thread slices all the way through.

It was actually quite fun!(I'm such a nerd) After I cut them all, you had to let them rise again in the pan for another hour.



sunee looking on with approval

Since I was prepping the night before (because who has 2 hours in the morning to make this), I just popped them in the fridge (only letting them rise for 15 min.). This was later discovered to be a mistake. The next morning I popped them in the oven for 25 minutes, and made the cream cheese icing.

yum!

So out came the rolls, smelling and looking amazing. Here was the problem. Because I didn't let them rise again long enough before putting them in the fridge, they were not as fluffy as J and I would have like them to be. They still were good, just not perfect.  I'm planning on making them again for Thanksgiving brunch, hopefully I will have more patience then.

So I am working on a sewing project that has been taking a lot longer than I thought, hopefully I will post the finished project before Thanksgiving.

quick baby dress

A couple of days ago I made a cute and easy little dress for my best friends new baby. It was super easy to make, I just made it up as I went along.

I found this purple fleece at a garage sale. I got it and 4 other pieces of fabric for $3! Gotta love those garage sales. Won't this look so cute over a solid long sleeve shirt? I will make some for Sunee for sure.

Redemption

So I felt like I needed to redeem myself from the "unflattering dress" from yesterday. I saw this tutorial a while back, when it was still summer (http://sewastraightline.blogspot.com/2010/03/domesticated-skirt.html). I really liked this skirt. Today I thought I couldn't go wrong with this. I was so right. It is awesome.It is so comfortable, adjustable (for skinny days and fat days) reversible (it's impossible to keep my clothes clean with a snotty nose toddler) and there is so much room at the bottom! It is easy to squat down to pick up toys or run after my toddler. This is one of my favorite things I made. J said it looks like an apron. uuuhhh that's kind of the point, it is called the domesticated skirt after all.

My sister helped me pick out the fabric. I really like the color combo. Too bad it is too cold to wear it outside now, but I fully intend on wearing it around the house all the time. I also plan on making a lot more of these babies. Maybe Christmas gifts?  And now that I have made it, it would probably only take me about an hour to make.

Failure

I remembered why I despise making anything from pattern. For those who have never done it, let me break it down for you. First, you have to cut out all these pattern pieces out of this material that is thinner than tissue paper. That takes me about and hour. (I have a toddler running around my house, blowing the pieces everywhere) I was so frustrated that I gave up after that for the day.

Next day, cutting out the fabric pieces. This task is even more annoying. I bought the recommended amount of fabric, which is also the minimal amount of fabric. So I spend forever trying to puzzle these pieces on my "recommended" amount of fabric. Then cut out the fabric pieces. This takes me an hour and a half.
I gave up after that for the day.

Day three, the most annoying day, figuring out the instructions.  This entails seven one line sentences to make and complete the entire dress. Yeah right. I make up most of my own instructions on my own. Four hours later the dress is done........and it looks horrible on me! The dress itself turned out great, but not flattering at on me. I mean I took 12 different pictures of me wearing it, none of which was postable. So this was the only picture I got.

This is the final annoyance. I am over store bought patterns....over it.

Then just for fun.... since I complained this ENTIRE post... I will leave with the most adorable girl in the world.

a spin and a twirl

Here are the pictures of my little model...



Dancing!



The dress, I thought, was way cuter on the hanger. The sleeves were just too puffy. I might go back and fix it later but for now she loves it and that's all that matters. Today we are going to the pumpkin patch to pick out one more pumpkin together as a family and maybe do some carving. Last year we so busy we didn't even carve one, this year we are staying ahead of the game.

Next project is a dress for me so stay tuned. I have yet to finish a wearable garment for me.

a dress

Wow where have I been? Working...blah. It was a long weekend, (J and I both worked) and I missed my Sunee bunny. It made me want to make her a dress. Like I have said before, making dresses is my real passion. Some time ago, Sunee and I took a trip to JoAnn's Fabric. After I was done doing all my shopping, I let her pick out a fabric. She immediately said, "Mommy, are you going to make me a dress?" Of course I was! This is what she picked out....

She picked the one on the bottom. See Sleeping Beauty hiding down there? Peek-a-boo! The dino fabric was for a little girls 4th birthday party. I used my own pattern, and it turned out like this.....

Anyway, Sunee has been waiting patiently for me to have the motivation (and the time) to make her this dress.  I have been working all night on it. I can't wait to show it to her in the morning! I used this pattern http://www.dana-made-it.com/2008/07/tutorial-shirt-dress.html.  

Maybe tomorrow I will post some pictures of her wearing it!!!!

a princess kind of day

Sunee is obsessed with princesses. Last Christmas she received this OVER-sized princess-castle-tent (thanks aunt mandy). We put it back up today, after being on closet shelf for months. She had so much fun, just like the very first time she played with it.

And later before bed, we cuddled up and watched 'Little Einteins' of course the 'Glass Slipper Ball' episode.

So not much sewing today, just fixed and finished my very first "boy shirt". I just hope it fits the little man.



boys shirt

We had good day, enjoying the autumn weather, playing at one of our favorite parks. But I did get some good sewing in today. I finished, or so I thought, the little man's shirt. I used the "90 minute shirt" tutorial fromhttp://www.dana-made-it.com/. Well it took me a lot longer than 90 minutes, and after I thought I was finished, I realized there were some big mistakes that will have to be fixed another day.





you can see the hole in the armpit and the brown edgeing didn't get completely sewn in

I wasn't too upset, because I can tell its going to be really freakin cute. I also manage to squeeze in J request to alter his police uniform.... I always feel weird altering his uniform, like it should be illegal for me to cut, pin and sew a police uniform. But J promised he would not arrest me, so I did it.

Stay tuned I will for sure have some dresses and skirts coming soon!!!!!



boys pants.....

I have be fabric shopping like crazy and....no projects. And now that I have all of this fabric, I was had a hard time figuring out what project to start first. Sunee has been asking me to make her a dress and honestly, dress are my passion. But one of my very best friends son has a birthday coming up, so this project took priority. I used a combination of my own idea and one of my favorite blogs  http://www.dana-made-it.com/2008/07/tutorial-knee-pad-pants.html to make these very special pants.


sewing top of pants (with my AMAZING new machine)

The legs of the pants ended up being wider than I wanted but, the little man they are for is wild-man and probably could use the wiggle room. 

 I added some frayed back pockets with a zig-zag stitch. They turned out so cute!

This is what Sunee does to keep busy while I sew and sew

 So the pants are complete! But he still needs a shirt.... here is a preview of my next project.

To be continued.....
~sam