The flip vest: take one

Recently Dana from Made released her latest pattern - the flip vest.  When I saw this pattern I knew I had to make one for each of my boys (one boy might be a bit too big but I'm going to have a go at enlarging the pattern a size or two).

I've been working all day on this vest, the pattern is easy, the instructions are detailed and despite being a relative novice with polar fleece and knit ribbing the whole thing has gone together without a hitch...

...but even after doing a whole lot of pre-sewing measuring and checks I just had this nagging feeling that the 12-24 month size was a little on the small side for my 18 month old.

And yep, when he woke up from his sleep and I gave it a quick try on, it's too small for him.  It's too tight around the chest area, the front just won't overlap to put any kind of fastening on.  Obviously the sizing gods are not smiling on me recently after the too large pants episode.

Oh well, we'll call this a practice run and start over on the next size (the 2-3).  Lucky for me I bought extra fabric so I've got plenty of extra to work with.

Boy fabrics

I'm preparing for boy sewing in the coming weeks, so I went shopping for boy fabrics and came away with these lovelies.

Corduroy, drill, some blue fleece and grey ribbing.

The most prized fabric that I am yet to find is some navy blue pinwale corduroy - I've checked for it twice in the shop already with no success, but they say it's coming.

Off to throw these in the wash and prepare some after school snacks, those boys, they need feeding.

Saturday shop update

One for girls and one for boys, both size 4.  I like to keep things even around here obviously.

Have a great weekend!

My creative space: size up

I bought half a metre of red and blue car corduroy on the cheap last week.  My sole intention was to make a pair of pants for the boy.  Last time I made these I was still using the 6-12 months pattern, I skipped the 12-18 months size and went straight onto the 18-24 months size seeing as he will be 18 months in a few short weeks time.  Aaargh, they're too big!  Never mind, there's plenty of shorts and t-shirt weather around here for a time yet so here's hoping these will be the perfect size for the colder months later in the year.

I love a pair of oversized pants on a kid though, they look so cute and funny.

We had a lot of fun mucking about in his room this morning, there's a huge mirror in there and I quickly realised it's easy to get caught out in the background while taking photos...and I should really have moved that fan to the side before I started...never mind, I'm just showing you to a bit of "real life" around at our place this morning.

Ah so what, let's have a go and some self portraiture while we're at it!  

Joining in with these talented folks today.

Making

Today I finally got caught up in some dressmaking.  

A quiet house and being on top of the domestic work gave me the mental release to spend some blissful hours in the sewing room.

Ah, so many projects, so little time!

The love in the stitches

 Oh how I love my little guy, he's super cheeky with a ready smile, he's got a soft little giggle that he reserves for when something is really funny, or if I tickle his ribs. He's quiet and patient and gentle, and very attached to being in the warm cocoon of our little family.  

But this year it's time for me to start to inch my way forward to a return to some form of paid work outside the home.  For my little guy this means one thing - he has started in daycare.  After a false start with a local commercial daycare operator that neither of us felt comfortable with he now has one day a week at a community based centre in a beautiful setting with beautiful resources and the most friendly and caring daycare staff a mother could wish for.  He seems to be settling in and having fun, and also getting plenty of cuddles when he needs re-assuring.  It's odd for me too in these first weeks, I feel a little empty handed and directionless without him.

To make sure there's plenty of love packed in his bag when he goes for his day I made him a special sleep time blanket.  

I used some fabrics I already had for the top, a vintage nursery print and red gingham, and backed it with a metre of red and white striped flannelette.

  I hand stitched the bias binding on the back, every stitch has a little bit of love and wishes for fun...

...and happy days. 

xx

Deja vu

Got that deja vu feeling this January - too much rain, cleaning up after the storm, the start of the school week routine.  I also got that slip-sliding feeling again from my ironing board cover.  Nearly three years after making my last cover the elastic gave up the ghost.  I will spare you any evidence of the state of the fabric, it had that brown tinged, well ironed look to it OK - yuck.

I dug into my "pattern filing system" and found the pattern I made three long years ago.  A little bit of quilting cotton, a packet of binding tape and some new elastic and I'm back in business.  For the record though, I still hate ironing...but at least my board has a little bit of love. 

I've got to say that my tutorial on covering your own ironing board continues to be one of the most visited pages on my blog.  You too can do your own, its easy!

Vintage doily name plate

I have a little collection of embroidered doilys stashed away for a rainy day and when a friend of mine recently had a baby I picked out one of my favourites to embroider her new daughters name on it.

Here's the drill if you want to have a go at one of these yourself.  You need:

• One lovely doily
• A wooden embroidery hoop (mine was a 15cm one)
• Embroidery floss
• Computer and printer
• Scissors, needle, sharpened lead pencil

First give the doily a good press with your iron so its starting off nice and flat and crisp.  Next, print out the name you wish to use in a font that you like from your computer. I chose Palace Script MT font and printed it at size 120 (from Microsoft Word).  Place the doily over the name printed on the paper, centering the name as you like depending on the embroidery designs on your doily.  You might like to use a light box or a window here to help you see through the doily fabric, but I found I didn't need one.

Take a well sharpened lead pencil, or one of those disappearing fabric markers if you like and trace carefully over the name.  Then take your embroidery hoop and centre the doily inside the hoop, make sure the metal hoop tightener is at the top of your work, this will be where you hang it from when you are finished. Tighten the hoop.  Now you are ready for the embroidering.

After looking through the purple and pink threads I had in my embroidery box I chose a light purple.  

I used a simple back stitch.

 Once you are done with the embroidery, tidy the ends up on the reverse side by trimming them and then trim the edges of the doily close to the hoop frame.

Tada!  You are done.  Hang on a nail or pin board pin using the metal hoop tightener.  

Simple and sweet.

Scraps, strips and summer

Being the start of the new year and everything I have rolled up my sleeves and cleaned out my fabric cupboard.  I've given it a good tidying and sorted things into new and vintage, plains and patterns, dressmaking and quilting, fat quarters and large quantities.

And scraps.  My scrap bag is full to overflowing.

My last serious clean out of scraps was the year before last, a large bag going to the kindergarten for craft activities.  This time I'm keeping them for myself.  I've picked out the blues (got lots of them, I must like blue), greens, yellows, pinks, purples, and creams to work with, I've left the heavy weight fabrics, the denim cottons, anything too sheer like voile or lawn and anything red or black in the scrap bag (and even that takes up plenty of room in the bag). 

 I'm now attacking the scraps with my rotary cutter, slicing them into strips of all sorts of widths and lengths and sewing them into quilt blocks using the method I found here.

After trimming up the strips as I sew them together I am left with the teeniest tiny little squares and rectangles of fabric.  Should I now throw these away....?

I made eight blocks of about 20 x 20cm in a concentrated afternoon sewing effort.  I'm not sure how many blocks in total I will have at the end of this exercise but its certainly something fun and easy to work at over the warm summer days and evenings we are having.  We'll see where this project takes me over the coming weeks.

Holiday escapism

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you all!

Our little family escaped to the beach on the Sunshine Coast for the Christmas holiday this year.  We loaded the car and headed north for the two hour drive, what a great time we had.

There was sun, salt, sand and sunscreen, swimming in the pool and at the beach, kayaking, bike riding, sunset walks, fish and chips, cold chicken and salads, sweet things to eat, summer fruits...and of course Santa found the boys and their new mummy made Santa sacks.

I think Mum and Dad might have liked a little more downtime on their holiday, but in a way it was nice to be physically exhausted at the end of the day and then have very little to do but enjoy the evening breezes and sea scent.  Technology was turned off, even the mobiles ran flat.

The little boy dipped his toes in the ocean for the first time, and the big boy honed his body boarding skills.  For a kid that once was afraid of the waves at the beach we now can't get him out of the water!

Thanks for sticking around and reading and leaving your comments and kind words over 2012. I've been less present in this space than I would have liked to be, I've done less sewing than I would have liked to as well, but I hope it's just a stage that will pass.  I'm looking forward to 2013 and all that it may bring!