Fat Tuesday's busy Tuesday

Sorry folks, this has been a crazy week leading up to an even crazier week, (i.e. mostly stay at home mom suddenly begins working three full days a week without giving up any of her normal "stay-at-home mom" busyness), so I'm so sorry to say it, but this post is not in the cards for me this week. You'll have to make due with a slightly blurry photo of the Easter skirt in full bounce down the hallway. Ta-ta for now!

Fat Tuesday's T-Shirt Quilt

I used to like the idea of a t-shirt quilt. I've been saving these t-shirts since I was little....I have shirts in here that I've had since I was nine ( I won't say how long that is, but it's over twenty years by a decent bit...).  They've moved around with me from place to place; quite honestly by the time I got around to it I was kind of over it. 

I cut them into pieces about two years ago, right when I started to sew and got all excited about quilting. Then other projects got in the way and my little rectangles fell by the wayside.  I almost didn't continue on it but it seemed a waste to go thru dragging those t-shirts around for all this time and then do nothing with them. So sew them together I did, and look how fun it turned out! The top of course, it's not done. I need to sew on the ironed on patches and then  quilt and bind it- I'm procrastinating, I'll admit it. Actually I'm hoping that posting the top here will inspire me to finish it by next week to show y'all. It's certainly not a work of art, but it's memories and it's mine and I'm so glad I went ahead with it. Here's to being back next week to show it off!

Fat Tuesday's Easter 2012!

Annnd, done! Yay! No last minute Easter eve sewing for me...no hurried stressing... Well, that last part is not true. I received one of those lovely Shutterfly coupons last week for ten free cards and I wanted to do Easter ones but those coupons only last for two days. Quite honestly there was quite a bit of hurried stressing. Trying to get the skirts done, shirts bought, pictures taken, and cards designed in the one day I had left by the time I noticed the coupon in my inbox- But didn't they turn out cute and summery?

(darling popsicle fabric from JoAnn Fabrics- Lisette by Liesl and Co)

 My middle child despises dressing up so I went for a little bit more toned down and casual summer in hopes that she might wear it more than once without being forced.

The patten is the Layered Skirt Tutorial by MADE- go check out her darling seersucker version on her cutie pie Lucy- ADORABLE. Super easy and fun. I will say that while you can totally do this without a serger, the serger made it so much faster/easier/bouncier. Let's hear it for sergers!

Can I just say I adore this photo and my sweet youngest trying to cram a pink plastic egg in her mouth? Good thing they have little holes in each end- she has a VERY large mouth. Look at that forehead wrinkled in concentration while she tries to get it in...

Happy Easter my readers. May it be full of remembrance, and joy, and God's love, and bouncy skirts on bouncy babies.

Fat Tuesday's sole other pattern...

This is it- Easter dresses (and pants) 2011 ! 

The way I got conned into doing another pattern was really quite good. It was a present. My birthday is in February and my (very brave) friend gave me two patterns and two bolts of fabric as a birthday gift. Crazy? Yes. You should never, ever, do this to someone- way too much pressure- and what if they hate the fabric? Or the pattern? UNLESS they are your very best friend and know you well enough to take raving mad risks like this. 

She was, (is,) and it was perfect.

(Mali's dress- reversible to the birds from Owen's dress on the other side)

This was for my littlest one. 

I added the little cinch up on the left because I just can't bear to

 leave well enough alone. It's outgrown now but I love the style because it can be a shirt with jeans or bloomers this summer for sure. The dots fabric is Heather Bailey's "Dream Dot" in Splash and the green pattern is from JoAnn Fabrics. I'm so sorry I don't have the name on it but it comes in a few colorways and I've used both the blue and green in various projects. The name of the bird print on the bodice of Owen's dress and inside of Mali's is Valori Wells "Nest"- BIRDS in Teal.
The patterns are both McCall's, M6058 and M6271 respectively.

(my favorite photo)

(or maybe this one- that was not posed, I swear)

Owen's skirt was a balloon skirt. SO much easier than I imagined it being. Honestly the only tricky part about sewing this was the pleats in the bodice had some very confusing directions.....  I will say that I have no idea how to make all of the wrinkles come out of the skirt and the balloon-ness of it poof up again after a washing...you can't exactly straighten it out...drycleaning? For kids clothes? Hmmm. Well thankfully I had the good sense to not wash them before Easter.

(except that this one makes me laugh)

Keler's pants are some light green stripey twill from JoAnn Fabrics, I think they still carry it, the pattern is Dana's "Kid Pants" from Made. I love that pattern, use it for everything- especialy shorts. Thanks Dana! The shirt was two season's ago Gymboree.

(My three babes- Mali tearstained but smiling after some rather excellent brother snuggling)

All in all, quite the success, even if Mali's headband is too wide and makes her look balder than usual, (maybe that's why she was crying?). 

(If I did it again I would cut down the width and length of the ties, maybe even just use ribbon?)

Check back Tuesday for this year's skirts and a little bit more hair on everyone!

Happy Easter sewing out there....

Fat Tuesday sewed a pattern

(and she kicked and screamed and only did it one more time ever)...

Easter is coming y'all! Remembrance of the greatest gift ever given, the annual Smith egg hunt.....and new dresses! Well here is my first attempt, (two years ago), at an Easter dress to get you in the mood to sew something for the little one's in your life...

This was my second sewing project ever. It's a "See & Sew" pattern #B5198. It was a bear to sew. I'm not sure if it was the pattern or just that I was so new to sewing in general but it seemed excessively hard at the time.

(PS- check out that wrist chub- she slays me. I'm so in love)

 It's supposed to have a zipper but I fell for these buttons so I adjusted it a bit for elastic loops and buttons instead...

In retrospect I should have used a solid fabric, it turned out way too busy for my taste even with the seemingly simple pattern. I like the bright springiness of it, but it seems a bit overwhelming.

So there you have it- dress, bag, and headband (way too scrunchy- live and learn) all made by Mama for my first girl on her second easter. (And for the record the things she's double fisting are grapes and strawberries- a treat but not one to make a kid go crazy in church, just one to make Mama stress about the dress and strawberry juice...).

I'll be back next week with last years dresses for both my girls (and a pair of pants for the boy!), and the week after that with this years skirts.  Happy dress making folks- 

Fat Tuesday's quick projects

Well unfortunately this is another week where I am writing this late monday night with a ton of other things on my plate- so short and sweet it is. 

(Freezer paper stenciled shirts for my kids)

This isn't strictly sewing per-se, but it's crafty and I use it in conjunction with sewing quite a bit. Have you heard of Feezer Paper Stenciling? It's so easy and fun. You just buy freezer paper, cut out the shape you want, iron the paper onto the item you want to paint (with the glossy side of the paper down), paint with fabric paints, and peel off the paper- viola! Don't forget to put a thin cloth over the paint after it's dried and give it a good ironing to seal the paint and keep it from getting so peely in the wash. I have another great example but I'll have to save it because it's a present and I don't want to give away the surprise. 

Next quick project: bed warmers

(a stack of folded warmers after a fit of Christmas sewing)

This one is easy and quick too. Buy some muslin, cut two pieces 7" x 14", sew together on three sides, turn rightside out and fill with 2 1/2 cups of rice, tuck your ends in and sew shut. Pick some cute flannel and cut one long peice 7.5" x 32", fold the ends down (wrong sides together) 1/4" and iron, fold over another 1" and sew. Fold whole piece in half (right sides together) and sew down each side, turn your pocket right side out, insert your warmer into it's washable comfy pocket, put in the microwave for 2-3min and stuff down at the bottom of your bed. Enjoy the cozy. Hurry quick before it gets warm!

Fat Tuesday's (one) original idea

Well I'm on the run today, (no, not from anything), a million things to do and only 24 hours to do them in. Hrm, tricky. So I'm just popping in to show you a quick something.

They're powder bags in case you were wondering. What is a powder bag you ask? It's my one lone original idea. Here in San Diego any day is can pretty much be a beach day if you want it bad enough. My trouble after I had kids was the whole question of how to not bring the whole beach home with us, and how to time the beach day so that I could arrive home in time to give the kids a bath before naps.

This is the answer to that. Someone told me that a little baby powder sprinkled on the hands and feet, (and arms and legs and everywhere else), and then dusted off again would take off beach sand and leave your little ones clean enough to skip the bath, at least for nap time that is. I tried it and they were right- it's magic, the sand falls right off. But why carry around a bottle of baby powder when you could have pretty fabric instead- and why dust all your children yourself when you could just hand them a powder bag and they could do it (willingly!) themselves as you pack up?

The interior pouch is filled with baby powder and sewn shut (yes, this means some day it will run out- I've had mine for two years and it's still fairly full- I'm not worried) to make a little pouch that you simply rub over your skin to remove the sand. The powder comes thru the fabric just enough to be useful without getting used up immediatly. The exterior pouch is vinyl and velcro to keep a perfect seal on the baby powder pouch and keep your car/diaper bag clean. Now how fun is that? I sell these for $10 apiece, (or $15 for custom fabric), plus shipping and I'd love to say that they are in my etsy shop and to go take a look- but alas, it's not true. I haven't posted any recently. If you are interested though I'd love to make you one- just write my a note in the comments with your email and we'll chat okay?

Spring is in the air folks- enjoy it!

Fat Tuesday's Vintage Skirt

My love affair with fat quarters is largely due to how inexpensive they can be; which of course naturally leads me to thrifted fabric. In the case of this skirt not only thrifted but thrifted by someone else and then given to me- i.e. free!
It began with Melody (Monday's girl) finding a darling top sheet at a thrift store and using it to back a quilt (one of my favorite quilts of hers, I'll have to make her share it with y'all). The next weekend found Holly (Thursday's girl) and I marching out of the same thrift store with three or four sheets each. The darling vintage flower print found it's way home with her, under my admiring eye, for a total of 0.95 cents. Where she proceeded to use it to make a purse that she sold at Oktoberfest and a few other little things before deciding that she was tired of working with the same fabric over and over and passed the rest of it on to me- why yes, thank you!

The pattern is a bit of a game of six steps to Kevin Bacon (did you ever play that? You try to connect everything to Kevin Bacon in six steps or less? It's weirdly uncanny how it works). About a year ago I was on a blog that I read frequently (can't remember which one), which led me to another blog, which led me to another blog, which had this darling tutorial for a forties inspired high waisted skirt. I skimmed over the tutorial and liked the skirt so much that I swear I favorited it, (this was way back in the days before pinterest), but I was never able to find it again. It was such a great skirt though that I cobbled together what I could remember of the tutorial and made up my skirt- except that this is not that skirt. This one was inspired by that one. There were a few improvements that I wanted to make to the original to make it faster to pull together and then several of the changes were due to not having quite enough yardage in my gifted half of a sheet.

Have I lost you yet? If you're still here I'll give you a quick rundown on how I made it. And please, please, please if you're interested in using this as a tutorial, feel free, but read thru the whole thing first to make sure you know everything before you cut out your pattern. You may need to adjust here and there to suit your needs (i.e. the length of skirt- I didn't need a hem so my skirt measurement is full length- if you cut that piece according to my measurments and then added a hem you'll be sporting a very full mini skirt and I don't want you to bring back the eighties on account of me).

Below is a quick sketch of the pattern pieces- not the actual pattern to scale so don't try and print it out, you'll be sorely disappointed, but an idea of the shape your pieces should be with measurements that fit my frame so that you can adjust as needed. In skirts I'm roughly a size two, just so you have a starting point for the measurements I'm giving you...

Still following me? You're brave, okay- so first turn on your iron and get that heating. Now haul out your serger (or flip to your zigzag stitch if your house is sans serger) and lets get those exposed edges taken care of. (note: when I give instructions for a piece that there are two of do the same to both pattern pieces).
           Piece #1- serge (or zigzag) side "D", iron along the fold (right sides together of course) and serge sides "C" and "B" together. (You can sew it as well if you like or if you're using a zigzag stitch you'll need to, but the serger alone works fine for me). Turn them right side out and iron them flat. Nice, now you have your two ties.
           Piece #2- Serge all four sides, turn all four sides under (just the width of your serged edge) and iron down to give a nice crisp line starting with the short sides. Now fold in half long ways (wrong sides together) and iron again as sharply as possible.
             Piece #3- Hold it up to your hips and decide where you want your pockets. (A quick note on the pockets- make sure that the wrist edge is wide enough to get your whole hand thru easily- not that I found out the hard way or anything...). Pin your pockets (piece #4) in place (wrong side of pocket to wrong side of skirt) and and serge the wrist edge to the edge of your skirt. I didn't actually pin these, but you could, if you're into that sort of thing. Now serge (or zigzag and sew) your two skirt pieces together above and below your pocket opening to make one long skirt piece.

Whew, still with me? Let's keep going...

          Piece #3- Grab a piece of 1" no-roll elastic and cut it to fit the top of your hips plus 1/2". Mine was 31.5 for reference. Fold the top edge of your fabric over 1.25" and iron down. Don't sew it down yet. A few notes on the hem. I used a sheet and I used the top (4" hem) of the sheet as the bottom of my skirt, which I think turned out nicely. If you happen to not use a sheet you'll need to add extra length (4.25") to piece #3 and add in a hem, now is the time to do that if you need to- go ahead, I'll wait..... Okay, done? Great. Now serge the two ends of your long skirt piece together above and below your other pocket (right sides together of course) to make a circle of skirt. Now you can go ahead and stitch that top fold on your skirt in place so that you have a channel for your elastic. Remember to start at the back of your skirt and not at a side hem and remember to leave about an inch and a half open to fish your elastic thru. Go ahead and fish your elastic thru and sew it together by overlapping it 3/4" and giving it several strong lines of stitching back and forth. Now sew your hole that you fished the elastic thru closed (this is also where you would put in a tag if you want to be all cute like that- I always want to and often forget). I like to catch my elastic here just a tiny bit so the bump of the elastic that was sewn together can't work it's way around to the front. Grab your pocket flaps and serge those right sides together so that you have pockets instead of flaps. Turn your skirt right side out. Set this aside and lets get the waist band going.
          Pieces #1 & #2- Take one of you Piece #1's and sew it down to the folded (remember we folded in just a quarter inch and ironed it?) edge of either side "B" or side "D" of Piece #2. Do the same thing with your other Piece #1 to the opposite side of Piece #2.

Hang in there, we're almost done...

           Now this next part is a bit tricky to explain without photos but I'll give it a whirl for you... take Piece #2 and stitch the wrong side of it to the inside of your skirt waist band with the rest of it above the band. You want Piece #2 to eventually fold over and for the ties to be on the outside of the skirt when it's folded over. Like Piece #2 is an upside down bun and the skirt is a hotdog but I only want you to sew the inside part right now and I want you to sew it very close to the elastic but be careful to not actually catch any of the elastic. And be sure to line this whole thing up so that the middle of Piece #2 is at the middle of the front of the skirt (Piece #3).  Clear as mud? Good. (I should mention here that the waist band is not meant to go all the way around- there should be about 4" of exposed skirt in the back- this is both for ease of putting it on and for aesthetics).
           Last part. Fold your waist band over, (being careful to keep your ironed 1/4" tucked under), and stitch it down to the front of your skirt, again being very careful to not catch your elastic. I stitched it down and then gave it another line of stitching 1/8" lower just to give it a bit of a more professional look. Done!!! Slip on your skirt, (the elastic should move freely and make it very easy to slip on), and either tie a big bow in the back or just give the ties one tie around each other in the back and do a cute little knot in the front.

There you have it folks- my one of a kind, so far from the "can't find it" tutorial of the inspiration skirt that I'm considering it an original design, fifty cent, thrifted vintage skirt. Like it? I do, especially with a bold pair of $5 blue Target tights. Happy Tuesday my lovely sewists. Hope I didn't make your ears bleed too badly with that one. Feel free to put questions in the comments and I'll do my best to help.

The humble beginnings of Fat Tuesday

 So, waaaay back two yearsish ago, our beloved nanny, Ledah, decided to go and graduate college and get married. I know right? Uncalled for- we miss her terribly, still. Her husband is lovely though and I suppose everyone has to grow up sometime... She told me about her engagement by way of asking if she could have the kids (just Squeaker and Odie, who were barely four and two at the time. Missy was just a large bump on me) in her wedding. Yes!! Yes, you may!  Now what to wear? My first thought was tutu and when she called and said "well, I know it's unconventional, but what about something in the tutu sort of genre?" I knew I was going in the right direction. Except that we couldn't find anything in ivory- only white. Her dress was decidedly ivory with touches of a darker coffee with cream color- white just wouldn't do. So I opened my big mouth and offered to make it... What was I thinking? I didn't sew! My machine was given to me by my grandma (another story for another time) and was circa 1950's. Plus it had serious bobbin issues... Hmmm... Well I was committed, so I borrow my neighbors sewing machine and set off to find a base shirt to work with.

(the dress)

Baby Gap tank in the clearance section- score!  I bought a lightly patterned quarter yard of ivory cotton to be the under skirt, a yard each of ivory and shimmery ivory tulle, and a quarter yard of white jersey knit for the sleeves. 

(Odie 2, Squeaker just barely 4- both mine)

I started with the sleeves. All I could find was white jersey (this was way back before I knew where to look) but my mother in law had the great idea to tea dye them- which worked wonderfully and gave it a lovely vintagey look where the dye gathered at the edges of the fabric and made it darker, so cute. (I will warn you though that when I washed it-,(thankfully I had the good sense not to wash it before the wedding), the tea DID wash out and I was left with white ruffles like you see in the top photo; so beware). I cut three half moon shapes of varying sizes for each sleeve and gathered one edge and then just stitched them on in progressively smaller sizes one on top the other. 

 (Miss Odie on the swing that Mr Handsome made for photos of the bride, adorbs, I know)

The under skirt when on fairly easy, I just gave it a quick gathering stitch and then basted it directly to the bottom of the shirt. Same thing for the tulle. I cut it into strips about eight inches wide and sixteen inches long and folded it over to make an offset square. Then I gave it a gathering stitch on the fold and sewed it to the skirt alternating shimmery tulle and matte every other one. This is where things got hairy. All was well but it was getting later and later and I guess I was getting tired because I ended up catching a bit of the shirt in the stitching I was doing for the skirt. Oh horrors- I picked it out as carefully as I could, (my MIL was in town and she helped- but I was using very tiny stitches and even with the patience of both of us...well), but it was no use- there were holes in the shirt and still a bit of shirt tucked up in the skirt that refused to yield to my seam ripper...sad. Off I went to Baby Gap with my fingers crossed and a prayer in my throat. Yes! They had one more on the rack in her size, hurray! Home again home again jiggity jig. I just snipped off the skirt whole and sewed it on the next shirt. Probably not the most professional method but it looked fine and I was not starting all over again...

(Mr Handsome and one of his three favorite girls)

Lastly I stitched on a few rolled flowers at the waist, some dyed, some not, and called it good. The bride LOVED it- which is all the matters- and Miss Odie looked precious all day long. Even when she sat down at the end of the isle and bawled and refused to go down it even with Squeakers encouragement and I had to carry her down and got to be in the wedding for several impromptu seconds huge belly and all- even then she looked adorable. 

(gazing)

This last photo clearly has nothing to do with the dress, but aren't they the sweetest? I could just eat them with a spoon, to say nothing of that cake and our dearest Ledah's fantastic taste in flowers...

And that my friends, was my first "real" foray into sewing...

Billy Cardi with Fat Tuesday

       So....here it is folks. Fat Tuesday's version of the Billy Cardi. 


      I found this adorable cardigan on No big dill several months ago and decided to make one as a gift. We won't mention for whom or for what holiday as it has not been given yet...but lets just say that the fabric was bought in early December and the cardigan was just made a few days ago. Oh but girls, (boys? are there any boys present?), it is so easy and fun! I was a little edgy, (in truth I've been puting it off for sheer lack of confidence), but it came together so quickly. I could have done it in one evening if I hadn't started at 10:30 at night. In fact I didn't even need to cut apart a shirt to use as a patten; I just smoothed out one of my current long sleeved t's and it worked out great. Thanks so much to Katy for the fantastic tutorial!!  (Pretend not to notice that hers is a bit cuter than mine...).


        A few notes:
              *The Sulky thread that is used for the detail stitching breaks easily- Katy very 
                kindly mentions this and tells you not to use it for seams- I'm just reiterating 
                because it broke several times on me just during the detail stitching.
              *I personally wasn't able to get my fancy stitching large enough to notice on the 
                ribbed jersy, but that was quite possibly opperator error so give it a try and tell   
                me how it goes for you.
              *This whole project took me about three hours (and over half of that was figuring 
                out the pattern and cutting it out) and 1.5yds of fabric (buy as much fabric as she 
                says to, I'm quite a short and small girl).
              *Go thru the trouble to do the top seams inside out and sew them down- it's such a 
               great detail and it takes the piece from Old Navy to handmade chic, nothing 
               against Old Navy of course!
              *It's super comfy, go thru the extra time and fabric to lengthen the sleeves like she  
                says- so worth it!


      So thanks again to Katy from No big dill, I love your cardi. In fact, I'm off to find me some good jersey to make one for myself, I want to sew thumb holes in the sleaves of the next one!

Patience

          Patience is not my strong point. Well, let me set some perameters around that: patience while SEWING is not my stong point. You've read my "about" page right? The love of fat quarters (i.e. small quick projects), the lack of pinning, the using of the rotery cutter to cut out EVERYTHING, the revoltion with patterns...no, it could be said that I am not exactly a perservering sort of seamstress. Which is why these poor girls got to listen to me whine about my lastest big deal project: a quilt for my wonderful mother in law.
            "Whatcha' doing tonight M?"
            "Oh cutting pieces for this quilt, which I'll be doing FOREVER. Mel, you don't mind do you? If I sit on your floor FOREVER and cut out pieces for this quilt? 'Cause I'm going to be here FOREVER!"
             Poor sweet girls- they were very forbearing. They listened to me whine about cutting, about pinning, (yes, I pinned a little- later I found out it was very nearly totally unessecary, I COULD have just pinned two rows down the middle and been fine I bet), about quilting. Very sweet, very forbearing. In fact not a one of them pulled out the lovely queen sized quilt that Melody has on her bed to show me the bajillion little pieces and roll their eyes as I cut out 6" by 6" or 6" by 18" rectangles.

              But it is done y'all, done. And it turned out so pretty! Please don't mind the poor photos- I'm ashamed (seeing as my other job is as a photographer) but the lighting in my house is horribly awfully horrific for photos at best; and these had to be taken for posterity the moment after the quilt was done and the moment before the quilt was packed away in several layers of plastic to be mailed to my MIL the next day to arrive in time for Christmas, (which for the record, it didn't- but I've come to terms with it, and she LOVED it which went a long way toward making the lateness not matter- for me that is, she never minded the lateness in the firstplace because she's gracious like that). I love it, well, as much as you can dote on an inatimate object that is a whole state and a half away that is.                            

                   So here it is folks, a family tree quilt of my own design. 

                  My foray into quilting has come and well, almost gone. My three babes each have one (babes is figurative folks, they're 5, 3, and 1), my mother in law has one, and I have one more up my sleave- a scrap quilt for myself with all the lovely bits from clothing, and bags, and FUN things to sew that I've done in the last year or so. And then I am done with quilting- perhaps forever. Holly, Melody,  Mary: hats off to you and your patience and your darling quilts but me and my fat quarters are very happy over here in the land of no pinning with projects that can be completed during naptime.
                   In reveiw:   Patience- 0
                                      Quilts- 4
                                      Love of parentheses and using all caps for emphasis- 2,794

                    Until next tuesday.....