A Summer Skirt in The Early Spring

When we were at the fabric store last, I let Brynn look through material to choose a print for another simple skirt like the one I made her for her birthday. She chose a green, watermelon print. Every day since we had the fabric at home she'd ask "Mom, can I help you make my watermelon skirt today." After about a week of putting her off, I decided to go for it. We were able to make the skirt together in about 30 minutes, and it wasn't even Parker's nap time! I did all of the sewing, but Brynn helped snip the threads, stood for measurements and pulled out the pins as we went along. She seems to really enjoy watching me learn to sew and tries to get her hands in as often as I'll allow her. So, we finished the skirt yesterday afternoon and when I came home from work today she was wearing it! It makes me happy to know that she has been looking forward to having it made for her and now is loving to wear it. Although it is rainy, gray and cold out; she loved wearing her watermelon skirt today. So, we'll just ignore the sweater tights and long-sleeved, ill-matching top and instead celebrate a successful sewing experience! Now we'll just have to shop for a cute spring/summer top to go with it!

Crib and Lap Blanket

I've been wanting to make Parker a crib blanket for a while now, so when JoAnn's had a huge sale on flannel fabric I took advantage of it. With Parker's eczema, it's recommended that we clothe her and cover her in all cotton, especially when sleeping, to help her skin breathe and to keep her from over-heating. I saw the idea of using flannel strips as an easy way to make a baby blanket on the Sumo's Sweet Stuff website. I wanted to make the blanket large enough that Parker may be able to use it over the years as a light-weight lap blanket, too. I chose colors and prints that I thought she could enjoy over the years. After washing and ironing the material, I cut them into 5 inch strips. I lined them up evenly on one side and sewed each strip together with the wrong sides facing each other to allow for the seam to stand up on the right side when laying flat. Once all of my strips were sewn together I had to even up the edges and overall dimensions of the blanket. I then sewed the front and back panels together. At this stage, the blanket looked like this:

Now the time consuming part begins. I used scissors to snip into each of the seams every 1/4 inch. This would allow them to fray and create a fringe once washed and dried. This took me a couple of nights of TV watching to finish. I had to take occasional breaks because of an achy hand. Once I had all of the seams snipped, I tossed the blanket into the wash. I think with each additional wash and dry the fringe will get better and better. I am really happy with the way that this turned out. I decided not to bother with quilting any of it together, I don't think it'll shift around too much to matter, nor will Parker even notice nor care if it does.

Owls

I've recently been saving our toilet paper rolls, knowing that there are a lot of great kids' crafts out there that can use them. Brynn and I recently used an afternoon to make a whole family of owls. First she decided on the sizes of owls that she wanted: 2 adults, 3 kids and 3 babies - talk about a large family! Then it was time to paint them.

We let the paint dry for about 30 minutes then came back to form the feathers on top and stick on the googley eyes.

Brynn's favorite part was the next couple of steps because she got to use scissors to cut and glue to stick on the beaks and wings. She did all of the cutting herself and continually squeezed out gobs of glue. The owls now reside on her bedroom windowsill; they occasionally hoot the night away.

I got this project idea from the Natural Kids website.

A Birthday Skirt

What better than a birthday occasion to craft my first skirt. Since I am still very much a novice seamstress, I used the Made tutorial for "a simple skirt." It truly was a simple pattern. I'll definitely be making more of them. I had my eye on this fabric print for the curtains in Brynn's bedroom, but I figured she'd prefer more blue in the print for those. So, when I wanted to attempt a skirt for her birthday photos, I knew this hummingbird/floral print would be just right. Brynn's favorite part of the print are the little blue birds. I love it. I had to rip out the bottom hem and do it over because my needle must have been a bit dull and caused some puckering on the first try. Overall, this little skirt is exactly what I had pictured. I think I may officially have the sewing bug in my system!

Repurposed T-shirt Skirt

I used an old HHS t-shirt to make a Valentine's Day skirt for Brynn. What a fun, quick and super easy way to craft a skirt. It also felt pretty good to be able to use supplies from home without having to put out any money. I got the idea from the blog Somewhat Simple. I'll definitely use this technique again - maybe as a way to practice my free-hand embroidery that I have yet to learn. The best part of this project was being able to use my new cutting mat. My mom is letting me borrow her rotary cutter, so I used a JoAnn's coupon to get a mat - I love it, what a genius tool. Now I just need to wait for another coupon to buy one of the clear ruler-type things (I have no idea what the technical term is) to make it even easier. So, I first cut the t-shirt to about 14 inches in length, keeping in tact the bottom hem of the shirt.

I knew that the writing would not show because of folding it over to make the waist band. The other good part about using a t-shirt is that you don't really need to finish the edges because the jersey material will not fray! So, after pinning the waist band, I sewed it and threaded the elastic through, finishing the skirt.

I then used scrap felt to cut out the letters in "love." I embroidered them onto the hemline of the skirt. This entire project only took about 45 minutes - including the time to hand sew the letters onto the skirt.

The best part is that Brynn loves it. Hopefully she'll wear it to school tomorrow for Valentine's Day! Either way it is a success!