Making a pattern?!

I have found the thing I love most about sewing is figuring out the pieces and how to put them together. I have wanted to learn how to make my own pattern forever but had no idea how. My sewing training consisted of, learning how to sew when I was about 8 years old. My cousin taught me to sew a basic straight line and I helped her with curtains. Then my dad bought me my first sewing machine, a little tiny kid Singer. (My son wants one now.) Anyway, I sewed my cousin a baby blankie with that machine, basically a square of fabric that I sewed binding around the edges. After that I have no idea what happened to that sewing machine. I don't ever remember using it again. 


The next time I remember sewing was when I was in college, I was renting a room from a close family friend and she taught me to sew from a pattern. After that, my dad bought me the machine I have now and I got all kinds of cute little patterns and learned a ton. The thing I liked least about sewing was cutting out the pattern pieces on the fabric. Back then, I would say that I liked putting the pieces together, sewing them and watching them take shape. But, I started really wanting to make my own patterns, so I searched and searched. Finally, I found, Design-it-Yourself Clothes by Cal Patch. I was so excited. I might really be able to draft sleeves. So cool!! Anyway, one of the things the book taught me is how to copy clothing you have in your own closet and make patterns from those without even cutting the clothes up.


The first thing I wanted to make was my favorite tank top. I love tanks, I wear them almost every day. Of course I wanted my favorite one in every color. Here is my first tank top from my home made pattern.

I was still a little intimidated by sleeves. One day when I was in JoAnns, I found this beautiful green jersey knit. I had to have it. I also knew what I wanted right away, one of those little jersey cardigans. But, I had no idea how I was going to put it together. Not to mention I still hadn't tackled making sleeves on my own. Even so, I began looking at every little jersey cardigan I could find until one day, my sister-in-law was wearing exactly what I had in mind. Of corse I had to barrow it and make the pattern. Since, you can't trace sleeves, I used my little book and I finally know how to draft them. It's really quite easy! Oh my goodness, it was so fun too. Ta-da...

One thing I loved about this cardigan (if that's what it's called) is, there are no hems. The edges are just surged. Oh, how I want a surger. Since I don't have one I had to zig zag the edges. It turned out much better then I expected. Someone that doesn't know how to sew doesn't even notice the difference.

It hangs longer in the front, but not a ton. It drapes just beautifully. :-)

Ok, now I'm just having fun making my husband take pictures that I don't like being in. Oh, and it is green, even if just in color. I am going to try to make my daughter one out of the left over fabric.

I hope you are inspired something crafty today.

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Science, fire, fresh squeezed orange juice and fun...

Sundays are our only family day. Our church has 2 services Saturday nights which works great so we have Sunday's all day to do whatever we want. The kids usually stay in their jammies if we don't have plans. I also love being able to keep the kids engaged in activities that they can learn from. Today was one of those days. The house did get so messy though that my husband couldn't stand it anymore so he got the kids to help him clean while I showered. Nice!


Today, it's so cold here in Southern California that we started a fire last night. Really, it was 47 degrees farenheit, that's cold. Anyway, that fire we started last night was still making a little noise this morning. Yes, there are glass doors on the fireplace. Then about an hour after we got up we saw flames, it re-lit. That same fire has been burning all day as we are adding wood to it. I love having enough wood to keep the fire going this long.

The kids were getting a little restless not wanting us to relax anymore so I decided to look for some kitchen science experiments for kids. There are some good ones out there but we only had the stuff for a couple experiments. Tomorrow morning I have a few extra items added to my grocery list.

This is supposed to be a homemade lava lamp. It didn't quite work. One set of instructions said you needed oil, water and food coloring. Another one had antacids on the list. We will be picking up antacids.

This little experiment is pretty cool, stalactites and stalagmites are supposed to grow on the yarn. The camera didn't pick it up, but it is starting already. They are supposed to start to appear in about 3 days.

L's attention span isn't quite as good as C's for this kind of stuff yet. She just wants to get her hands in everything. Maybe next time I'll just give her a bowl of cornstarch and water. That's when my husband decided to clean and take the kids out to pick some oranges. They cut 1/2 the oranges before I could take a picture, you can't see any of the blood oranges.

Here is one left on the counter. YUMMY! They smell even better then they look.

C and L love to squeeze the orange juice.

Time to relax before nap. C has to make sure there is enough heat coming out of the fireplace.

 A little more play for L.

Enjoy the moments!

Boppy Cover

I have a friend who got an adorable oversized boppy for her baby shower with her first child. It was very soft and very girly. The only problem was it wasn't a cover so it wasn't removable and it was bigger the than normal boppy's. So, now that that little girl is 5 years old and she is on her 3rd child which happens to be a boy, she is ready for a new cover for that boppy.

You can see the once cute pink, plush boppy is now quite faded and not so cute. It's ready for a cover.

I took my lovely pattern paper (newspaper) and traced the shape. 

The original boppy was made in 3 pieces, 2 in the shape of the boppy and 1 little wedge piece at the top of it connecting the 2.

Then I laid my pieces on top of the fabric to make sure they fit right and had enough seam allowance. I couldn't just unstitch the old cover because it was just stuffed. I didn't want the new one to be lumpy so we decided on re-covering. I made sure there was plenty of seem allowance because I could take it in after I tried the fit, but if it was too small, I'd have to start all over with expensive fabric. Then I cut out the fabric from my pattern pieces.

Last, I sewed it all together.

I love the way it turned out. It looks so fresh and clean. Good as new. She just had to take it home and whipstitch (I think that's what it's called) the last little opening. I would have opted for a zipper if it were me because I will do anything not to sew by hand. It's just so tedious. Now the boppy is done a month before that little boy is ready to arrive.

Pants!

I was so excited when I found out I was having a girl, I started sewing right away. I never knew what to sew for my boy. I always wished it was easier to sew for a boy, but for me, I just don't have the ideas. Anyhow, over at Made, they are having a "Celebrate the Boy" month. This is so exciting for me because my son LOVES it when I make things for him. It doesn't even matter how ugly it is, as long as I made it he will use it. Needless to say I hoped right on board and am checking out all the boy stuff every day. I even have a couple I am going to make from last year's "Celebrate the Boy" month.





Pants have been the most intimidating thing for me to sew. It's one of those things that I couldn't look at and figure out, so I didn't try. I am so not a direction reader. I like pictures. But over at Made for Celebrate the Boy, she made a simple tutorial that I had to try. She also uses all kinds of cute fabrics.


I've been trying to figure out what fabric I was going to use for pants and yesterday a friend brought me a huge pile of old skirts that her mom wore in the 60's. (Thank you Jill!) They are all these wonderful wool fabrics in wonderful condition. I thought they would be perfect for making pants for my son. Oh, and of course making dresses for my girl.

I love this one! This will be so cute in pants.

I picked a plain beige fabric for my trial pair. I worried a bit about the wool because my son is so the princess and the pea when it comes to clothes. It has to be soft or he says it's itchy.

Here is the fabric I chose. I cut it up and these are my 2 front and back pieces. It looks more like a linen to me, but I guess it's wool.

I used a pair of C's jean's to trace the pattern, but I forgot to flare the legs a little. They came together very nicely, but my little princess and the pea, or should I say prince and the pea hates them. As soon as they touched his leg, he said, "Itchy! I don't like them." I was barley able to get them on him for the picture. 

 He's SO dramatic!

 Already taking them off.

So, they are a little too skinny and they look like a potato sack. At least I learned how to do pants. :-) But these ones are a waste. Maybe I can give them away to some little boy that isn't so picky about his fabric. At least they didn't cost me anything to make.

Oh my! I just went over to MADE and saw that she now has a post up about linning the pants. I'll have to try that.

Playdough

Playdough is such fun. There is something relaxing about smashing it in your hands. Today, I felt like I needed to do something for L, since we always seem to be running around so I decided we could make some playdough. L got to pick the color, add all the ingredients and mix them. I just measured and cooked.


Here is the recipe I use, I got back when I taught preschool in college over 10 years ago.

I don't know why I haven't recopied it or put it in my book. But it never seems to get lost. I opened up my cook book cabinet and there it was sticking out at me.

I like to add the food coloring to the water, it makes it blend easier. I also use warm-hot water. L wanted pink so I added about 6 drops of red food coloring.

After L stired all the ingredients, I secretly stirred it better then added it to my only non-stick pan, my wok. Playdough is a pain unless you use a non-stick. I know they are really unhealthy, but it is the only one I have and I only use it for things that I can't seem to get off my other pans.

Stir constantly while cooking your playdough and eventually it will go from that to this...

When it looks like that, put it onto the counter and kneed it until it is smooth. Then let the little hands dig in.

Aren't they cute little hands?


So, why is this playdough green? Well, here are my reasons:
1. There is no waste in packaging
2. There are no preservatives
3. Since it's all natural, it's biodegradable
4. It's non-toxic, salty, but edible


Now, I know there are a ton of playdough recipes out there, but this one works great for me. You are welcome to share your playdough recipes that you love, especially edible ones.


Here is my recipe:
2 c flour
1 c salt
4 t cream of tartar (4 t =1 T, 1 t)
1/4 c oil
2 c water
food coloring


optional for sent:
1 pkg of unsweetened koolaid

Snack Packs

Yeah, my first feature or guest blogging! Ladybug Blessing is having me as a guest blog on her blog. She has a wonderful blog full of wonderful ideas, so I am very excited. Now onto the post...


When my son started preschool I started thinking how much waste he was going to have with his lunch. I knew the preschool wasn't recycling so I wanted food containers that didn't have a bunch of toxins in them and that were re-usable. So, I searched around and found little tins that were nice, but expensive. I bought him 1 for his yogurt, but I needed more. I did also find a reusable sandwich wrap, it was cloth on the outside and plastic on the inside. It was also washable. That's when I thought of the snack packs! I was so excited. I had some old scrap fabric that was in strips. Not much I could do with, but C sure loved it. So, I thought that would be perfect. Now, it took almost a year to figure out what plastic to use and I came up with the food saver bags. They are washable and they are food safe with no voc's or bpa's. :-)


Here are my snack packs. The kids LOVE them. Plus when they get too dirty for a good wiping with water, I just throw them in the wash.

Now, I am going to attempt a tutorial. Since I am new at this whole blogging thing, I have never done one. But those snack packs are so easy and quick, (literally 15 minutes to make 2), that I thought I had to do it.

First, here is what you need:

1. Roll of food saver bags

2. Sew on velcrow

3. Cute fabric

4. Thread

First, cut the fabric in the shape above, then cut the food saver bag in about the same shape. Lay them right sides together (with the food saver bag, it's the inside part of the bag). I like the bumpy side better, it's less slippery, but I use both. Can't waste any! Then sew around the edges leaving the bottom open. I like to cut the plastic after I sew incase it slips a bit. 

Next, turn it right side out, fold under the bottom and sew. Sorry, I forgot a picture of this.

Then you sew on the top Velcro.

Next, fold it up like you are done to mark where the other velcro goes. I've tried to sew it like a bag first then the velcro, but it makes sewing the second piece on a pain.

Don't pin, just hold it there. The pins make little tiny holes in the plastic. Sew the velcro. After that fold it like a bag and velcro it closed. Sew the sides closed and top stitch around the top flap and you are done.

Happy snacking!

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