Sewing Rabbit Team - Handmade Holidays

The ladies of the Sewing Rabbit Team have put together the coolest collection of tutorials/DIYs that can be used for gifts this holiday season!

Check it out here! (It's like a mini-magazine!)

Girl Sewing

I have to first say, I had no idea I had been doing this much sewing... I mean, I sew as often as I have time, so I guess it just makes sense that the stack of kids clothing I am accumulating would begin to get rather large since I have yet to make something for anyone other than my kids, but wow.

I'm posting this to share the patterns I have been using lately. There is so much awesome stuff out there for toddler-aged kids and older, but the pattern selection is slimmer for infants for the kind of PDF patterns I love to buy. But I have found a few good ones!

1 and 2. Both these dresses were made using Rae's free Itty Bitty Baby Dress Pattern.
3. This is a dress from the Baby Basics Pattern Bundle from Shwin Designs. (I have a few of their other patterns that are for older children and can't wait to try them out.)
4. This is the Raglan Dress Pattern I blogged about before by Brindille and Twig. I am posting this one again because I got the colors right this time. :) Better photo.

5. Brindille and Twig again. This time the Baby Shirt Pattern with a ruffle added to the bottom to make it a tunic.

6. Brindille and Twig. Faux Pocket Baby Pants. Love these faux pockets. Also pictured with these pants is a little turban headband I made. There are a gazillion tutorials online for these, but I kind of just did my own thing.

7 and 8. Both these hoodies are from a pattern by Brindille and Twig. The first one was an utter disaster. (It's also the reason you might hear me call baby girl a swamp creature, because seriously, look at that fabric. Moss queen, much?) I picked this fabric up at Hancock because it was funky and on clearance. I don't know if I'll ever sew with something like this again. It's velour or something and such a freaking nightmare to work with. The hood is so off-centered because of how slippery that garbage was, that I don't know if I'm shameless enough to put it on my daughter when she comes. Version #2 (image number 8) with the stripey sleeves with the black sparkly fabric turned out much better. :)

9 and 10. This top and dress are both made from the Polly Peasant Dress & Blouse pattern by the gal over at Sew Much Ado. I would definitely recommend this pattern to everyone because not only is it incredibly easy to sew, but the size range is incredible! 0-3 month to size 6! I did lengthen the sleeves a little and left out the elastic on them. This pattern includes an option for a scalloped hem which I'm pretty excited to try in the future.

And in case you noticed, there is not a Geranium in sight. Sadly, I have yet to purchase that pattern, but hopefully that will be remedied before too long. It's definitely on my gigantic pattern wishlist.

Thanks for reading!

My Wardrobe To-Do Board

So, this pregnancy is coming to a close. Rapidly. In fact, the whole ordeal has come and gone rather quickly, but that's one of the perks of already having a kid during your pregnancy. I'm sure those that follow will be similar.

The light at the end of the tunnel has made me consider my clothing a little more. I don't really have enough time left to justify expanding my belly wardrobe, so I've been planning fantasizing about what I'd like to have in my wardrobe for after baby girl makes her debut. I say "fantasizing" because there is one major problem with my particular taste in clothing... I'm cheap.

Check out my "fashion" board on pinterest:

Follow Clothes Stress Me Out by Andrea Hatch on Pinterest

You may notice that the majority of the clothes I've pinned are from Free People, which is outrageously expensive. I have ordered exactly one article of clothing from their website and will probably hold on to it forever to justify the shameful amount of money I scraped out of my paypal account for it. (Did I mention that I'm super cheap?)

So, what is the solution? Well, I could either go out and get a job that I would probably hate and order one or two things a month, or I can put my new sewing skills to use and start making my own FP inspired stuff. Enter the "clothing pattern" board. It's a great age for seamstresses. There are so many great patterns available to us. Sure, you can find a lot of really cool stuff that is probably easy to modify from Butterick, McCalls, etc, but have you SEEN all of the amazing independant pattern designers out there and the patterns their churning out like rainbow butter?!

And all the amazing Japanese pattern books!? I WANNA CATCH THEM ALL!

Follow Creating My Wardrobe by Andrea Hatch on Pinterest
So, there's a pretty good chance that sometime in the future my nightly sewing with yield more than just kids clothes and altered shirts for my husband. Hopefully I will be good enough eventually to stop buying most clothing items and make them for myself. I mean, you can even get some pretty darn cute lingerie patterns...

KCW: Baby Raglan Dress (Another Brindille and Twig Patter I love)

Well Kid's Clothes Week just ended and I had a lot of fun working on kid's clothing projects for one hour each evening. I was able to finish two complete garments and get a lot of pattern cutting/taping done. I'm also half-way through a darling dress for the daughter. (I'm going to keep calling her that because I have no idea what we're going to name her anymore...)

This is my favorite project for this week:

I have every intention of uploading better photos of this baby dress. The style is a sort of oversized sweater that I will probably pair with some funky colored leggings. 

The Good:

- This Pattern. Plain and simple. It's easy, straight forward and absolutely DARLING.

- My fabric. Which is actually THIS jersey cotton blend from Girl Charlee. This new journey of sewing clothes for my kids has been full of knit fabric. I have absolutely no fear of knits and neither should you if you want to try sewing. Having a really cool serger helps, too, but is not necessary. Also, ribbing is fun. I need to accumulate a much bigger stash of ribbing with a lot more colors.

- I plan to make a few more of these with some funky color/pattern combinations with the pockets and sleeves. And in different sizes so the daughter can wear them a lot. I just LOVE this pattern.

The Bad:

- I only had one real blunder with this dress and it was 100% my fault. I was finishing this project up around midnight and was extremely tired. I was on the very last step, attaching the ribbing on the bottom of the dress, and I had completely zoned out. SO! The big seam which is supposed to be nicely hidden in the back of the garment is front and center for all to see. Unfortunately, I serged it on and was way too lazy/tired to unpick the darn thing and it's going to stay that way. Oh well!

Brindille and Twig Sewing Patterns

We are having a baby girl in December. Yes, I'm ecstatic. Yes, I'm a little nervous about how much more money I'm going to be tempted to spend on this kid than the darling son I already have. There is just so much out there for girls. Dresses, leggings, headbands, cute little everythings. It's overwhelming enough that I've been able to refrain from draining our bank account for this Hatchling who still has 14 weeks to bake. (Well, almost. Paying for the delivery two months in advance has been brutal.)

However, Baby S has inspired me to start sewing. This wasn't originally in an effort to save money. I find sewing therapeutic and I have been wanting to make clothes for a long time. I have a hard time spending money on clothing and sewing give you the opportunity to have something just the way you want it. Color, pattern, fabric, all of that. And I love that. That being said, I think I can create personal, unique clothing for my family and do it on a budget.

So, I made some leggings//
I have been sifting through the many baby legging tutorials/patterns on pinterest for a couple of months. There are a lot of great ones out there, but nothing seemed to be exactly what I needed. For starters, a lot of these patterns were supposed to based off of pants you have for your child already. And most of them were patterns for one size, to be modified by you, the seamstress. I don't know about you guys, but patterns are already incredibly intimidating to me. I didn't want to waste time and fabric on that. I was looking for something legit. In desperation, I searched newborn/toddler legging patterns on Etsy.

Boy, did I hit the jackpot. Sewing friends, head over to Brindille and Twig and give the brilliant Melissa Hendrickson ALL of your money. The woman is an absolute genius. Not only are these patterns convenient PDF's, which means you're not wasting any sizes of your pattern by cutting out the tiniest one, but they are easy to read/understand and a breeze to sew. I immediately purchased two patterns. The first was her Baby Leggings. Okay, obviously this lady knows how to display her patterns. The fabric she chose for each of her products could make ANYONE want to sew. But the thing that finalized the deal for me was the fact that both these patterns range from size 0-3 month to 2/3T. Again, jackpot.

The fabric I used is from the Doodles Collection at Joann. It was on sale and these pants are tiny, so I had a ton of leftover fabric.
I finished this masterpiece in less than 30 minutes. Needless to say, I will be make more. Many, many more.

Pax asked me why they were "half crotch" and I had to remind him about diaper butt.
Hah. I love baby clothes.

And then the scariest thing I have ever sewn//
The second pattern I bought was the Envelope Neck Tee.
I'm just going to say quickly, as someone who hasn't really sewn in several years, I don't know what I was thinking when I bought this. I'm sure the cute example shirts listed in the shop had a hand in this, but perhaps I just felt like pushing myself. Not only does this garment have real SLEEVES, but the whole envelope nonsense going on that we all love on babies onesies/shirts. I'm SO glad I went for it, though. This shirt was easy to make.

Obviously, it's not perfect and I'm definitely going to invest in a serger since I've got the knit fabric bug, but I am very proud of how this turned out. The grey fabric I bought for this shirt required a LOT more of my patience, but it's soft and drapey and will make a great tee for my girl.

Let me also just add, really quick, that I was dreading the whole ribbing situation on this shirt. BUT! My rotary cutter and cutting mat made that a cinch and the rest was a piece of cake.

So, I'm going to wrap this up, because it's already really long, but the bottom line is, sewing is extremely rewarding and I'm excited to get even better at it. If I can get those tiny sleeves on that shirt made of extremely stretchy fabric, then by golly I can make whatever the cuss I want. Bam.

I'm most excited about the fact that both these pattern are no doubt going to be utilized for Parley too. Onward!

Please go check out Brindille and Twig. 

This is the pattern I'm getting next!