Dress Extension

It sounds like hair extensions and I'm thinking it's the same principle.  My neighbor's daughter is getting baptized on Saturday and asked me to help her with a dress.  The dress that she has is a family heirloom, each girl in their family has worn while they were baptized.

 The dress is fine--except for this little girl--it is too short.  We contemplated adding an eyelet ruffle and then I had an idea pop into my head.  I made a slip with eyelet ruffles on the bottom. 

 

 This way we wouldn't be touching the dress  with scissors or a sewing machine and the other members of the family who will get to wear it won't have to worry if the dress is too long. 

 This project worked out well.  I had barely any scraps and the sewing went smoothly, can't wait to see it on her.  I think it would be fun to wear this slip with other dresses too.

New Friends Friday

This is a fun way to find new blogs and interesting project ideas



Found here at The Girl Creative.

Shirr is Pretty

You know those ideas that float through your thoughts and you can't seem to get them out of your mind until you do something about it?  Well this project was one of them. 
Some time ago I saw some leggings with rows of ruffles on them--I kept thinking about them and knew exactly what I wanted to do.

   Using a pair of pajama pants I made my own pattern and cut out the pants using a gauze type fabric. Next I cut out two inch strips of fabric, serged each long side and ruffled it.  Before sewing the pant leg sides I sewed 5 rows of ruffles to each leg.

 Sew, sew, sew...

The bottom row of ruffles is folded in half to give it a little lift.

For the top/dress I wanted to try shirring again.  After eleven rows I finally figured out that I needed to drastically increase the tension on my machine to get the gathering that I wanted.

I have a lot of this purple material--thank goodness my little girl likes purple.  The straps are made out of 2 inch bias tape--one continuous strap for each arm--this also finished off the edges on the armholes

Simple and Sweet

Towel Kimono Cover Up

I've seen towel cover ups-but they usually don't have sleeves and I knew my little girl would freeze if I made her one.  My little girl gets cold if there is a slight breeze or if she is in the shade (I think the shade thing is a psychological thing.)  I wanted her swimsuit cover to have sleeves a hood and a good length.  My other thought was to use what I had.  I have a big stack of "rag" towels--not plush enough to use and may have a stain or bleach spot. 

Using one of her shirts I added some room on the side and sleeves--next time I would make the sleeves a bit wider

Cut out two (front and back)

Cut the front down the middle

I didn't take pictures of the sewing process--

• sew shoulders seams
• sew sides and under arm seams
• add hood (hand towel cut to neck garment measurement)
• add ruffles (hem & sleeve)
• add bias tape
• sew button holes
• sew buttons
• Photoshoot!

 She requested that it had buttons so she would not be immodest.

Reversible Bag

After trying several times I finally made a reversible bag.  I like the idea because you get to use two great fabrics and it makes the bag sturdier.  I found the pattern at the Very Purple Person. The instructions are great and it was a quick project.  This would be a great reusable grocery bag pattern.

Not too big and not too small--I love the width too.

You can't see it but this side has a pocket--I liked the black and white because it was easy to embellish.

Don't you think these flower looks kind of like this one...

I saw this in my yard today--this may be our only peony this year because we just planted them last year and we have had crazy CRAZY weather this year.  In fact today it is only 70 degrees and it will get close to 40 tonight!!!  Back to the bag-

I think I will make a brown flower to go with this bag. The outside is polyester the inside is muslin

The Jammie Quilt

My MIL and I went to the fabric store last month and while perusing fabric for I-Spy swaps she came across this green fabric with little jammies on it.  She loved it because they were the footie jammies and they were on a clothes line--two things she loves.  I told her we (I) could make a quilt with the fabric, she wants some quilts for the grandchildren to sleep with when they come to grandma's house.  We picked out some coordinating fabrics and I went to work.
I made up two blocks took some pictures and copied and pasted them into a picture so my MIL could get an idea of what I was thinking for the quilt top.  It took several different block patterns, but we figured it out in the end.

After reading this book several times I wanted to try out free hand quilting.  I loved doing it, but I did learn that my machine is not up for hours of quilting at one time--now to saving for a quilting machine.

I loved how this turned out and am excited to stitch up some other quilts.