Real Pictures

I made Bird try on the dress and model for me.  It is always nice when you get real pictures of things.  On people not hangers at 1 in the morning.  However, these days my 7 year old real pictures are feeling more and more contrived. 

 Silly play shows the dress better though I’m not quick enough with my camera to catch up.  I’m trying to dive into knits a little this week after being inspired by KCSC—a lot of cute knits out there.  In addition to my cream dress (knit success#1), I made two pairs of leggings in navy for school (knit success #2), one of which she is wearing.  They turned out cute and I’m finding knit to be real forgiving to work with.  Bird loves the leggings because she says they are cozier than the ones from the store.   I think the drape of the single jersey makes them feel luxurious though they may not be the hardiest pairs.      Also.  I feel badly with all the dismal and downright disastrous weather across the country to bring attention to ours.  But really, can you believe this Halloween week?  Could potentially be the warmest Halloween in recorded history and we are enjoying it. 

Happy Halloween!

News to look forward to:  Have you seen all the Farmer’s Wife Quilts making their way around the internet.  I’m starting one and hope to finish it sometime in 2013 (at my quilting rate this timeframe is ambitious).  I also have a hand-pieced hexagon project I’ve been working on here and there that I need to share.  It looks promising that I’ll be done with that one by the time I’m 2013.   

Cream Dress

This is a dress from Ottobre, Issue Winter 2010.  It calls for a lightly felted wool but I made it out of a quality cream ponte knit.  It is a fast sew.  Satisfying.  I love the ruffly trim at the neck and the wide turtleneck collar.  I’m interested to see how it fits on.  I think if I made it again out of a knit I would try to omit the zipper entirely.  I imagine there is enough give and this collar is wide enough to pull it over, which would make this dress insanely quick.  It is a size 128 for Bird.  Hopefully it stays clean longer than one wear.    

Happy Halloween (almost)

Today was the first of our Halloween parties. Naturally, I was frantically sewing/crafting the last minute accessories for Queen Elinor.  Bird loves her costume.  I didn’t hate it.  I think the resemblance is good and if you knew who Queen Elinor was you would potentially recognize Bird.  (Did you pay attention for the 10 minutes she wasn’t a bear in a movie you maybe saw once?)  

I wish the green of the overdress was less Kermit. 

I’ve been wishing that I had put a seam down the top of the sleeves to help me shape them better.  By the time I realized the limitations of the sleeves they were cut out and I was not going to buy more kermit fabric. 

So far there isn’t a pattern out there for Queen Elinor—limited demand I’m sure.  I made this with some dramatic drafting modifications to McCalls 5499.  I made an unlined underdress and then a lined overdress because that was the easiest way I could wrap my brain around what needed to happen with that queen’s sleeves that didn’t require me rolling any hems on those extreme convex curves. 

My darling girlfriend drew and cut out the pellon-super-stiff-and-expensive-stuff for a crown.  We had worked on a crown last week when I was helping mostly chatting with her while she worked on her own amazing costumes.  She made a Max of The Wild Things, Goldilocks, and Olivia the pig.  I need to see if I can post her costumes here because they should be shown.  Anyways, it was nice because I was running behind and I could just come home and cover that crown with gold taffeta without thinking.  I was busy with spray paint.  Making my chains and my gem’s setting gold.  (Yup, there you have it.  I sprayed my accessories gold.  Quality.)  I did find time to freehand some scrolling on my crown.  It was my favorite part of the whole construction and the first time I’ve utilized my new machines free motion embroidery features.  It was so fun and I’m trying to think of other things I can do. 

These aren’t the best pictures.  I’m hoping to find time tomorrow for some that are better.  There you are folks.  Happy Halloween. 

     Lulu didn’t want to wear her dress today.  She really preferred Belle.  She did love getting candy so I called it her candy dress with hopes that she will put it on again.   It was pretty cold, even with her velveteen hood.  Fingers crossed that Halloween is warmer.

Halloween Preview

Lu is being Little Red Riding Hood.  (My choice.)  Bird is being the supporting character in Brave that gets turned into a bear for most of the movie, Queen Elinor. (Not my choice.)  Lu’s costume has been fun to sew.  Birds costume, not so much. 
This is what Queen Elinor looks like.  I pretty much hate this dress right now and my rendition of it.  It has been a costly and messy sew with a lot of wonky parts.  It isn’t done because Bird chose what she wanted to be on Saturday.  I’ll post pictures soon though. 
Onto the happy half.  This is what 8 yards of tulle looks like on a size one.  The pattern is 2571 Simplicity.  I made some changes in my fabric choices, the construction, and of course the addition of the tulle.  I also made the apron (modified to be shorter) from Simplicity 2571.  I added the lace to the bodice and the apron with a pinstitching technique.  Janice Ferguson has a set of really helpful posts for this technique here and here.  I was really pleased with how it turned out.  The white is a batiste, the black is cotton velveteen.  The lace isn’t anything special, just happened to have it stashed.  The cape from Simplicity 2571 seemed too big for such a little person.  I wanted a whimsical cape, not a cloak.  Ottobre Issue Winter 2008 had a darling cape with a pointed top and a clean cut jacket.  I made this out of red velveteen with red satin lining it.  This pattern is amazing.  It is so quick—only 2 pieces to cut out and sew together—yet so satisfying. 
Ooohh, I forgot.  And bloomers for underneath.  Also from Simplicity 2571 in the white batiste utilizing the pinstitching technique for detail. 

Watch for modeled pictures soon.  Friday maybe?
Bro wanted to be batman.  And he wanted to buy it.  Gasp! I know.  I'm trying to think of it as a pleasant way to save a little time and money.

That last dress…

This is the last dress I had planned for KCSC that I sort of just fizzled on (partly because I hadn’t found a contrasting fabric I loved that brought out the pears).  The pattern is Simplicity 1814.  I love the sleeves on this pattern.  They are so sweet and it makes a novel twist on a basic dress.  However, this pattern runs BIG.  Big big.  I’m hoping that it will shrink enough to be wearable this winter but I don’t expect it to fit well until next fall.  I made a size 2 for my 2.5 year old Lu and it fits like it is a generous 3.  So, overall, make this pattern, it is fun and has darling details but size down if you are uncertain on the size.  I also didn’t have enough contrasting fabric to fully line it in the green flowers.  I made sure the sleeves were properly lined in green because they flutter open a bit but the rest of the bodice had to be pieced.  The pear cord was on red-tag clearance at JoAnns.  The green flowers I picked up at my local quilt shop on a hexies paper run (which they were out of, argh!).  I’m not sure of the designer of the green and wasn’t even sure I liked the fabric until I had the dress all made up—I do like.