Playing in Polka Dots: PR&P Week 2

So this week the theme for PR&P is Polka Dots and Stripes  I made a goal on January 1 to use all of the fabric in my stash in the upcoming year.  The only fabric shopping I will allow myself is from the remnant basket at Hancock.  The.  Only.  Now, combine that with my lofty goal of sewing along for PR&P and that's a pretty tall order.  Why is it I love fabric when I buy it only to bring it home and have it be not what I was looking for?

A quick review of the stash revealed polka dots in Christmas colors (red and lime).  Let me clarify--a quick review of the knit stash.  When making play clothes for the kids I almost exclusively use knits.  I hang out in knits, so shouldn't they?  Isn't climbing on top of the piano much easier and more fun in knits?  I also do not sew for the sake of sewing.  If I make an outfit, I intend for it to be worn.  Over and over again.  But I digress. 

I just love this princess castle knit which I originally bought for a nightgown for Princess but thought maybe Zuzu should get some too.  I decided to make a bodice that would read polka dot by reverse appliqueing circles.  Hmm.  17 reverse appliques later and I guess it's okay.

My favorite aspects of the dress are the sweet lettuce edge bow and the details at the neck and cuffs.  The bow is made from two strips of jersey laid on top of each other and then run through the serger using wooly nylon on the rolled hem setting.  Helga and I are still getting used to each other but she's definitely falling into line better.  Woolly nylon is awesome in a rolled hem.  The ladies at the store said to only put it in the upper looper and leave all the other threads alone.  I tend to put the wooly nylon in the upper looper and the same color regular serger thread in the lower looper.  I think next time I'm sewing a colored rolled hem on a colored fabric I'll change the needle thread too.  There's a little bit of white peeking through.

The cuff/neckband are my new favorite way of finishing a knit edge.  It is a combination of two different techniques I read but didn't pin.  I'm so sorry that I can't provide you with the original sources--let me say that these were not my ideas.  I finally found the original author of this technique here.  Scroll down to item 2C.  This time I pinned it and saved it under my Peachy Things.  To make the bands I folded my band piece in half and sewed it to the inside of the garment.  Then I flipped the band to the right side of the garment and set my zig zag to a wide and long stitch with a crazy high tension setting.  You allow one of the legs of the stitch to fall just off the outer edge of the band.  The high tension draws in the stitch and scallops the edge of the band.  I love it.

I made the leggings with an upcycled tshirt and some ruffle knit from the remnant basket (both from the stash).  I think I have like $1.50 in them.  Love me a bargain. 

I thought I had planned my photo shoot so well--I finished the dress last night so I would have an awake model in the daylight.  It has actually stopped raining after floods of epic proportion and the light was okay.  I collected the baby's favorite toy as a prop and enlisted sister to help make her dance and laugh.  No dice.  Here are some of the lovely shots I got...

In the end she stole Sissy's Barbie (and Brother's tablet) and played on the steps.  And I couldn't shoo the dog away from the steps.  That's her favorite lay in the sun spot.  Okay.  Our cupcake set will have to wait.

Butterfly Jeans--KCWC Day 7

Woo hoo, we made it! 

For the last and final day of KCWC Fall 2012 I wanted to make something with lots of girly details (ones I hadn't done in the past 6 days).  I found some butterfly denim in the remnant basket at Hancock--like 1.5 yards for $2.70.  It wouldn't have been my first choice, but it was $2.70.

In the Spring I made a pair of pants for my little boy from this pattern by Dana at MADE.  It didn't go so good--namely because the pattern she gives is 3-4T and he needed 5T and I didn't do a great job tweaking it.  I love the pattern though--slim legs with a relatively low rise make them a modern fit.

So this go around I took a little extra time modifying the pattern and I have 6 more months of fit perfecting under my belt.  I've been sewing for 20+ years but have always been a 'get-a-McCall's/Simplicity-pattern-pick-fabric-and-what-you-get-is-what-you-get' kind of sewer.  No more!  I laid out Dana's pattern with some freezer paper on top.  then I took a pair of LJ's jeans that are currently a little snug and laid them on top of that.  I added some room in the waist and seat, added length, and then added a faux fly.  On the wrong side.  Oh yes, I drew the fly in on the side seam.  I cut it off with the intention of taping it to the other side and forgot.  Maybe it was the trio-ed cacophony in the room with me.  You decide.  As I finished each piece I'd rope in LJ to make sure we were still on the right track.  I may would have added a wee bit of extra leg room but they are okay as they are.

 You may barely be able to see the top-stitched faux fly.  I just couldn't give it up.

I also did some decorative stitching at the front pocket.  She was watching the Avengers with big brother and it was a scary part.  Who am I kidding--the whole thing is scary for a kid.  (Not my decision to let them watch--really violent parts were skipped and I don't know that they'll ask to watch again soon).

Now for the icing.  The back pockets.  I don't think Dana gives a back pocket pattern piece (not that I'm complaining--she put out an iconic pattern for free) and I got to thinking it would be really cool to make the back pockets as butterflies.  That is what took forever because I wasn't happy with just any butterfly.  I should have embroidered some as patches and sewn them on, but that wasn't from scratch enough for the finale!

Check out that booty cuteness.  Oh my goodness.

Definitely my favorite thing from this week.

And, for the last little detail, the label I fiddled around with forever.  Can't wait for my real ones to materialize.

So to recap, I this week I sewed 4 dresses, 2 pairs of leggings, a pair of pj pants, and a pair of jeans.  Good gravy.  You should see my sewing room--well that and my kitchen and laundry room.  My sewing room is really the guest bedroom and my stepbrother and his wife are coming on Friday, so no rest for the weary!

I got pretty pooped over this week.  I have time management issues I have discovered.  I also do everything slowly, but I'm working on it.  But, I set a lofty goal, I reached it and I feel great.

Boo-tiful Dress KCWC Day 4

Are we done yet?  It is 11:58 CST and I am limping to the finish line on this one.  I bought the girls these dresses umm, shirts, on major clearance at Target last year.  Zuzu was like 6 months old.  Hard to believe.  I was just going to pair them with jeans but then I got the idea to make dresses and leggings.  The leggings are gonna have to wait...

I actually like the fabric combo this time.  Who can mess up Halloween colors?  I had another band of fabric on the bottom--a cute pink leopard print that was funky but right.  Then I realized that it would be a pencil dress reaching way past the baby's knees which is probably not the best idea for a newish walker.  So, it was to the couch, seam ripper in hand, to watch the agony called the Vice Presidential Debate.  As is usual with me, a quick and simple project took forever. I did exposed seams--maybe not correctly, but they look ok to me. Supposed to be a mess, right?  Let me assure you, they aren't fun to get out.

I also added a little length to the sleeve, hoping that the 18 month shirt would be okay.

 Check out the new labels.

PS...Hancock Fabric has cotton interlock for 50% off.  Do not be tempted to take your 16 month old with you to the store.  She will be very, very bad.  You will mistakenly buy lots of jersey, which, while cute, is only 30% off.

 

PSS...Have you ever seen anything as cute as this???

 

How to make your own labels

We interrupt Kids Clothing Week Challenge to bring you a small tutorial.  **Gasp** a tutorial.  I originally called this a tutorial.  This is more of a 'Here's my take on someone else's tutorial.'  We'll see how this goes.

Have you ever had this urge to figure something out and yet not been quite able to get there?  That's me with the whole clothing label thing.  I'm way too cheap to buy nice ones, though they are totally within reach (not the woven ones, but printed ones for sure).  I hate the thought of ordering some and then getting them in the mail and being disappointed with the quality of the base fabric.  I've seen tutorials for printing on fabric (with a laser printer...I have ink jet) and thought that would maybe work.

For a while I embroidered my own labels and then I totally changed my blog, rebranding everything.  I don't have a good font in my embroidery software to mimic my new blog branding (shoulda thought about that when choosing that font, huh) and all efforts to self digitize it fell pretty flat.  I also de-spise trimming ends/tails of thread between letters and designs, which is pretty much standard when embroidering little labels.

I was reading a really nice blog Elm Street Life and she has a great tutorial for printing your own labels.  This morning  I temporarily forgot I don't have a laser printer and got excited about making my own labels to use in the last few days of KCWC.  I got into Word and tried my best to get moving.  Something that should have only taken me a few minutes took about an hour--I had to restore my computer a few days ago and in so doing dumped the new font I used to rebrand the blog.  Gag.  So, after reloading it etc etc, I finally got it together.

Here's the template I used (in Google Docs).

LABEL TEMPLATE

SIDE LABEL TEMPLATE

For the label template, cells A, B, & C are where you turn under for your top border.  I believe it works out to be 3/8".  Cells G, H & I are where you turn under for your bottom border, again 3/8".  Cells D & F are where you turn under for your sides, which are 1/2".   I only outlined them in that first cell so you could see where your allowances are.  You will put your text or image in Cell E.  Text seemed to work better for me than an image.  If you like a raggy look around the edges, simply don't fold.  In Google Docs you can turn off the lines in the table but clicking in any cell, going to Table > Table Properties and change the Table Border to 0 pt.

For the side label template, the premise is the same.  Cells A-E are your top border.  Cells I-M are your bottom border.  Fold in 1/2 and then you should have 1/2" seam allowance to sew in a side seam.

I didn't realize that Google Docs can be so limiting, so I also saved the templates as PDFs.  You may be able to do something with that better.

LABEL TEMPLATE AS PDF

SIDE LABEL TEMPLATE AS PDF

After I made my templates, I followed Elm Street's tutorial to the letter.  My printer did not appreciate having to suck up fabric and paper at th same time, so some of the printing got a little whompy.

As to the ink jet thing, setting the ink with heat does help it not to smear.  The World Wide Web says everywhere that ink jet ink is water soluable and will wash out or fade badly when washed with soap.  I got a label wet and then washed it with soap--it did fade a little bit, but hopefully after 50,000 washings it won't be a white square sewn in the back of the kids' things.  I suspect buying labels off of Etsy will be cheaper than buying a laser printer.  Wonder if I can sell that one to The Bank (my truly affectionate name for hubs).

Here's how my labels turned out.  Seeing them done made me want to get it right.  For real.  So, for now, I'm going to invest in some of these fabric sheets.  I can get 3 for $10 and if I use a coupon, I'm hoping it will make them $6.  A color laser printer runs about $150 (I think) so I can get 15 packs of these things before I pay for a laser printer.  I can also get a hundred or so labels from Etsy for $20 (MOL) and that may be how I go. 

 

Check out the new labels in action

Quickie Leggings--KCWC Day 2

Please pretend that this post is on time--or is it?  Seems like I didn't post what I made yesterday.  This sacrificing sleep to sew is adversely affecting my brain.  When I was in my 20's and even early 30's I could stay up late to do some project and hop up the next morning like it was nothing.  Then 3 kids and a decade happened and now if I miss my 7+ hours of sleep I am worthless.  Like now...

So, yesterday I made some quick and cheap leggings.  You know LJ won't wear it if it's not a dress and so it's either leggings or tights under them on cold days.  I don't like fighting with tights, so I lean towards leggings.

 

I finally found a cute, store bought pattern for knit clothes--t-shirts, leggings etc.  It is Simplicity and I got it when Hancock's put their patterns on 5 for $5.  Since I'm sleep deprived I'm gonna ramble.  I used to pay a buck for a pattern and then trace it out to preserve it for use when the Peaches grew.  I finally woke up to say, Umm, yeah.  No, I'd rather be sewing than pattern tracing AAAANNNND it was a dollar.  I mean, a dollar make me hollar Honey-boo boo child, but come on.

 

So for these leggings I made one with a lettuce edge (forgive the picked out hem that I couldn't iron out, even undeprived of sleep) and

one with a ruffled edge

I also added embellishments to help Middle Peach know which is front and which is the back.  As if sparkly ruffled knit weren't comfy and appealing enough, I added a little Princess just to ensure she'd wear it.

And, on the yellow leggings, which aren't princess or sparkly enough I fear, a little piece of fabric from the dress that these are supposed to be paired with.  That was more for daddy, who will put the mustard yellow leggings with sunshine yellow and argue that any yellows go together.  Silly Man.  He also puts The Boy in dark socks pulled up to his knees with dress shorts, but that's for another post.

And, now for the crown jewel, the price tags.

The yellow leggings cost me $1.80-5% and the sparkly knit (with enough left over to make Little Peach some leggings too was $2.00.  Woo Hoo!  A Dolla-make-me-holla...

 

 

 

KCWC Day 1

I started KCWC with an easy project and something I've been meaning to get right for my middlest daughter for a while--a good twirling skirt.  Really, if you must twirl and have the skirt go right, it has to be a circle skirt.

A good circle skirt tutorial is by Dana of MADE. 

I pinned this tutorial for a circle skirt dress and it's a great tutorial.  The yardage suggestion was pretty much right on the money.

For this dress I used an Amy Butler print I've been hoarding keeping safe in my stash for two years now.  I figured it was time.  I used some Pick Your Plum trim on the sleeves (which are still too long, even after I hemmed them).  But, this dress will twirl.

 

On to day 2!!!