Little boy pj's

Before we went on a trip away recently I looked ashamedly at my little boy in his tired old pyjamas and decided it was time to raid the stash and make him some new pairs. I mean, he's almost 4 and I was still squeezing him into size 2's. For a sewing mad mum it was embarrassing!

For the first pair out came the 'sleeping johns' pattern from the book Growing Up Sew Liberated. I used a groovy aeroplane print jersey I'd been hoarding for a while, adding a yoga style waistband, which I find works well with knitted fabrics and kids love for the softness - it's just a folded over band of ribbing, cut a few inches smaller than the waist of the pants and stretched and sewn to fit. For the top I chose a RTW basic t-shirt I'd also been hoarding and embellished it with a pocket in the plane fabric.


For the next pair (he could do with a few) I used the pants pattern from Oliver & S's Bedtime Story pattern. I find this is a good simple shape for woven fabric pjs. I bought the goldfish graphic print flannelette at Spotlight with this very purpose in mind, so it was satisfying to finally use it!

And this time I made the top too, finally succumbing to buying the Made by Rae Flashback Skinny Tee pattern. This pattern had definitely fallen into that mental category of mine called something like 'patterns I like but don't want to buy because they're too simple to spend money on and I could draft it myself'. Hmm. The problem is that I don't get around to drafting them myself, and what I'm finding is that patterns in this category that I do buy end up being incredibly useful and used lots. This pattern I've used 6 times already! Lesson learnt.



And here's the third set, again Skinny Tee / Bedtime Story combo, this one in a little boy's perennial favourite - dinosaurs :-)


Again using the Flashback Skinny Tee pattern I also refashioned an adult t-shirt (remember this one?) into little boy size. He likes the monsters and I like the feeling of satisfaction of ticking something off my huuuuge sewing list.


And this final one I like for it's cute colours and I'm thinking it could be a daytime t-shirt rather than a pj top but needs something printed on the front. I'm waiting for inspiration to strike. Any ideas welcome :-)

KWC Maggie Mae dress

Yikes, it's Friday already, the week has flown and I'm way behind on KCW. But, I have been tracing, cutting and sewing each day so that counts, even though I haven't actually had a finished garment til today!

I had something in the works for my big girl the other day when I started feeling guilty for not making anything for little girl. So I asked her if she'd like anything and of course she said a dress :-)


I suggested the Maggie Mae pattern from Shwin&Shwin. I made one for big girl this time last year (see it here) and we love it - it's such a classic little shape and has had so much wear. Luckily little girl went for the idea and also my fabric suggestions (cottons from the stash).


When I asked her to model the dress for some pics she obligingly gave me these poses :-) This kid kills me sometimes - she can be so cute at times and other times she drives me absolutely bananas!!


Next on the list is to finish big girl's parka top. Then I have a few pj's I'd like to make... I think my KCW will be spilling over to next week.
And I'm loving seeing all the pics on the Flickr group and the Instagram feed (#kidsclothesweek) - so inspiring!!

2011 - sewing for kids

OK, my guilt from the last post (thanks, by the way, for your lovely comments) is somewhat diluted when I look at the montage below, as I have clearly not just kept myself clothed but the kids too. I really love sewing for kids. Even when they don't particularly take to the finished item. They're small, don't take much fabric and it kinda doesn't matter if they're not finished perfectly, which appeals to the side of me that enjoys some instant gratification sewing. I'd urge you to try it if you're thinking about it.



- - - - - - - - -

In other goings-on, over the holidays my laptop and my iphone both died - can you believe it?! Which forces me to live with communications in a different way, at least for now, forces me to adapt. Thank goodness I was able to salvage all of my photos from the laptop before it drew it's last breath. The same can't be said for all the phone numbers on the iphone, but really, the world's not going to end, is it. In some ways it's all a bit freeing, not being such a slave to the ibeasts! Ah, I'm sure I'll get over it and be desperate to tech up again soon ;-)

KCWC paisley dress

I found this purple paisley-ish patterned light weight cotton in my mum's stash last time I visited her and instantly envisaged a dress for my little girl. Not sure where it comes from but I seem to have a bit of a thing for paisley, and when colourful little flowers are added it makes for a design that's kind of crazy but sweet at the same time - a bit like my girl ;-)



As my girl loves to dress herself and gets extremely upset if she can't get something on (she is 3, after all) I wanted to make it as simple as possible (unlike this one) so made the front section elasticised and then stitched down the bows so that they are purely decorative - no more "mum, can you tie it up" ;-)



There are plenty of patterns and tutorials around for this style of dress known as the 'Pillowcase Dress", but it's pretty easy to make up if you've made anything like this style before. I traced the basic shape of the armhole and length from one of my girl's existing dresses, and used this tutorial for the elastic & bias binding combo.



To stop it looking too much like a nightie I added a little gathered pocket to the front and bound the top in matching bias binding.



And despite the 'sooky-la-la' look on her face in the above pic she loves her new dress and wore it happily today.

I also made something else from this fabric, hopefully show you tomorrow, as well as a repurposed skirt that's not gone so well but I'm hoping to salvage. Oh well, you win some, you lose some!

Kids clothes and a twirly skirt

Kids clothes have been on my mind again lately as KCWC comes around again in a few weeks time (where have the last 6 months gone?!), and it made me think of this skirt that I made my big girl a while ago but hadn't blogged.



She and I attended a school concert one evening and her outfit made me cringe slightly. Not because it was mismatched, I'm over the embarrassment that it used to cause me. No, it was the very shabby state of her outfit and the fact that I knew she didn't have anything much better in her wardrobe - the perils of being first-born I guess - no nice hand-me-downs from a big sister. So... some sewing was in order.



She chose a lovely Prints Charming fabric from my stash and asked for a skirt. I hadn't wanted to make a particularly girly skirt but thought the fabric deserved a bit of flounce. I'd admired the lovely Insa skirt Fi had made her girl and thought this would suit, so made up a pattern with that as my inspiration, with the idea that the purple underskirt would anchor the busy overlay.



Then I added a pocket the same as on my dress, a style that was lots of fun to sew again.



I was happy with the skirt, and my girl loved it, which of course made me happy. It's very bright and girly, and it's hard to get her to not team it with a busy patterned top most times (maybe there's a little of that mismatch embarrassment still there afterall ;-).

Moving forward I'd like to try something a little more grown-up for her, in a simple way, if you know what I mean. I don't think we could go as far as a minimalist linen shift, mind you, just something in a different direction. Hmm, any ideas welcome!

KCWC progress and plans

This is the second year I'm taking part in KCWC and this year my list is much smaller than last year. This is partly due to not wanting to burn myself out but also because I can't wait to get onto sewing the dress for myself that I cut out on Mothers Day (sorry kids!).

The one thing I did want to try this year is the Make it Perfect Sprout dress for my little girl. I'm using this beautiful Moda fabric, which she chose herself (with a little prompting ;-).



The dress is designed for cooler weather and is fully lined with flanelette. So essentially you make 2 separate dresses and sew them together. The inner dress seems like a nightie as the flanelette is so soft and snuggly. Hmm, sounds appealing - pyjamas as daywear. Wonder if I can adapt it to my size, hee hee.



I'm hoping to finish it tonight as she is very keen to wear it (hopefully she still will be when it's finished!). I also want to get onto the only other thing I'd really like to make, which is a vest or sleeveless jumper made from this fabric:



My mum gave it to me from her stash and I thought it would be very cute as a hoodie for my boy. He'd look a bit like a teddy bear in it, and any opportunity to make your kids look like a teddies is good, right? A sleeveless hooded vest something like this funky one from Trula Kids would be most useful so I'm going to try for that.

The other things we could use are:
• slippers for the boy
• cap for the boy
• leggings for the big girl
• skirts for the little girl

But I think my dress will win over any spare sewing time ;-)

My creative space

I'm playing along with Kootoyou's Thursday 'My Creative Space' this week. Lots more creativity over there to check out.


There's a lot of family admin (or 'fadmin' as I heard it called recently :-) going on here today. You know, boring stuff like paying bills, making appointments etc. So there's not much time for craft, but between stirring the dinner on the stove and hanging out the washing (my life is so glamorous!) I was determined to start tracing off a pattern.

My big girl is turning 6 soon, and instead of having a party this year she is having her 2 besties here for a sleepover. All the girls love craft and pretty things, and I wanted to incorporate some of that into the event. I bought the lovely "Bedtime stories" kimono pyjama pattern from Oliver & S a while ago and thought I'd make a matching pair for each of them to wear on the night and take home. It wouldn't be a family celebration if I didn't come up with some lengthy project that will keep me up til all hours! But I'm trying to be organised with this one. I have about 2 weeks, and am hopefully buying the fabric this weekend. Wish me luck!

My little ghost

When I was growing up Halloween was not (I think) widely celebrated in Australia. So I admit that it's taken me a while to get into the spirit of it, but this year I really enjoyed it. The girls dressed up and I took them first to a party, which was raising money for a fabulous charity to build a children's hospital in Sierra Leone, and then on to a little trick or treating. We also made spooky cupcakes to take to the party (no pics sorry) and put a few decorations at the front of our house to signal to children and their parents that we were in on the fun and games. And of course we prepared a basket of lollies to offer to trick or treaters!



My small girl wore this ghost costume that I made last year for the big girl to wear to a party. The big girl had let me paint her face too so looked the part, but the little girl is not so keen on face paint, so I let that one go (reluctantly :-)



I knew exactly the design I wanted to do and it actually came together well so was a real joy to make. I cut 2 almost full half circles from a piece of white cotton...



then added a hood (taking the shape from a hoodie pattern I had)...



put a velcro closing on one shoulder for ease of dressing...



and sewed some elastic into the arm bands to help keep them down. This also meant that when her arms were raised it lifted the sides of the costume out creating a more ghost-like shape.



The I painted the 'boo' on freehand in black fabric ink, and attached a plastic bat and spider with a few stitches so they could be removed for washing.



I also had to include a pick of one of the big girl's classmate's lanterns. It was so pretty that I'm inspired to make one for next year.

So apart from having 3 small children restlessly sleeping with piles of sugar in their bodies by the end of the night (the baby got into the lolly bananas while we weren't looking), it was a really fun evening and I'm so looking forward to next year! Hope you had fun too.

Holiday sewing

L-R Urban unisex hoodie pattern by Heidi and Finn Best bubble dress pattern by Babes of Sweet


L-R Yoga lounge set pattern by Heidi and Finn Popover sundress pattern by Oliver+S Everyday dress pattern by Mani-mina


L-R Eva dress pattern by Mani-mina Little pleated tunic pattern by Heidi and Finn Chic kimono pattern by Mani-mina


L-R Thai fisherman pants by bibimbubba Ruffle top pattern by Oliver+S Sophie tunic pattern by Sis Boom

We have finally booked a holiday, yay! And you know what that means - an excuse to sew some new kids clothes. Because they'll need cover-ups for the beach, some fun clothes to play in and generally just something fresh after all the winter heavy things.

BUT, the risk is that I'll:
A. be tempted to make a really long list, and keep adding on to it until a day or two before we leave
B. feel overwhelmed at list make just a couple of things and feel disappointed
C. stay up very late in the days before we leave and totally exhaust myself, ending up cranky and unable to enjoy the start of the holiday

So... in an effort to actually get something done, stay sane, feel satisfied and still get some sleep I am attempting to put together a (realistic) list and stick to it. No adding things at the last moment, kidding myself that "it won't take too long". The idea is that you will keep me honest and that by promising to show you my progress I will actually stick to a schedule! Hang on, this is sounding like hard work - no, it's going to be fun! And at the end I can show you all my lovely holiday snaps where the kids are wearing the clothes. Well, that's the idea!

Providing lots of inspiration are the posts from the kids sewing challenge from Elsie Marley. I missed out on participating in this but it sounds like there will be another soon, and sounds like it's the push I need to get things made.

Pictured are some of the patterns I'm considering. Please tell me what you think of them and if you have any favourites of your own. I'd love to hear from you!