Sewing with my three year old!

Sewing with my three year old!
Whenever Serenity sees me sewing, she asks if she can help too.  I’ve tried lots of ways to get her involved in my projects.  I let her hand me things, put pins on the pincushion, and even press the foot pedal of the machine for me.  She loves helping, and does a really good job paying attention when we’re working.  When I was doing some hand stitching, she even would take turns pulling thread through after I’d take a stitch.  So when I saw little felt buttons at Jo-Ann’s, I knew it was the perfect way to get her started with her own project!

At first we started with a rectangle of cream felt, and I cut out a heart from light pink felt for her to appliqué.  I used embroidery floss and a big needle.  We tried it with plastic and dull needles at first, and while it worked, it turned out to just be easier with a regular poky needle.  She is very careful not to touch the sharp part of the needle, and I make her sit very still so she doesn’t accidentally poke anything.  I hold the fabric while she sews.  Her stitches are random and all over the place, but it is just the cutest thing =)  Eventually we’ll work on that but right now she’s just going straight up and down through the fabric.

Then she chose where she wanted to sew on the felt buttons and flowers, and she did it!  I helped her find the first hole sometimes, and helped her to sew knots to tie it off.  She can cut her own thread too.

She was so excited she took her sewing in to show and tell.  She said she was going to tell her friends “I love it!  You take the needle and DON”T TOUCH THE POKY PART!” 

Onesie tie and vest

Onesie tie and vest

I did it!  Actually made something that I pinned.  I was always a little skeptical of the appliquéd tie onesies.  Very cute, but not actually that dressy looking.  Then I saw this one that had the vest as well, and I was sold!  I went shopping with my niece and she helped me pick out the perfect little gray corduroy fabric and the paisley print for the lining and tie. 

It was SO easy!  I just used steam a seam to iron the tie on, using this pattern.  Followed instructions on the vest from here at B is for Boy.

Then I had to have some pants, and I just drew around a pair of pants that fit Donovan already to do that.  I added some fake pockets to the back, which I think are my favorite part =) 

I’m so happy!  I finished this in one day of crafting for fifteen minutes at a stretch.  Such a quick and cute project!  I’m still glowing with happiness =) 

Felt Food

I've been working on felt food all month!  My Mom bought me a set of patterns and kits from FeltCuisine.com.  The patterns are great, and it's fun handwork.  I've always tried to make felt food using my machine, but I think in the case of felt it's actually faster to just do it by hand!  And it's relaxing =)  The best part of the cupcakes, tarts, and cakes was using foam for the base.  I made Serenity a set of cupcakes for Christmas, but getting a real cupcake shape was impossible because I was using stuffing.  With the foam they stand up nicely and hold their shape much better.  So, I learned not to fake it with the wrong materials and not to be lazy and try to use the machine =)  Do it right the first time!  And aren't they cute? 

Braley's Quilt

Braley’s Quilt

My Mom and I made a quilt for my niece Braley!  It was wonderful fun, especially since when I was sewing on the binding, she scrubbed my kitchen =) 

The pattern was pretty simple, and extremely geometric which made it perfect for my brother.  All we had to do was sew together nine-patches, and then we cut them and rotated to get the smaller, more random looking design.  The back is flannel, which we prefer for its snuggliness.    

SuperWhy Book Club Card Table Tent: Roof!

Card Table Top:
The book club roof looks like an actual book, so I had to make a big book for Serenity’s card table tent as well!  What I ended up doing was just using felt to cover a big piece of cardboard that I bent in the middle several times to make it look like a book binding.  Then I took two big pieces of felt and glued them down the center so that the book has pages!  I think at some point we’ll use our felt board pieces to make our own stories in it!  Should be a blast!  And for now it’s a cute roof. =)   

If you want to see more, here are Sides One, Two, and Three!

To see the rest of the birthday extravaganza, go here!

SuperWhy Book Club Card Table Tent: Side Four

If you want to see more, here are Sides One, Two, and Three!

Card Table Tent Side Four:

On this side I made a big book for her to “jump into!”  (they always do that on Super Why)  I ordered a ton of felt letters off of etsy, basically a set of scrabble tiles to figure out how many vowels I needed with some extra of certain letters to spell common words, like extra Ys and Zs. (Gotta be able to spell her whole name, and pizza!)  She loves writing words with the letters! And they are great for spelling games and rhyming games!  The book itself just has strips of the poky side of the Velcro, which the letters stick to very well.  (Which is good, because no way do I have the patience required to sew Velcro on each letter!!!)  

 

To see the rest of the birthday extravaganza, go here!

SuperWhy Book Club Card Table Tent: Side Three

http://cleverfaeries.blogspot.com/2011/06/superwhy-book-club-card-table-tent-side.htmlIf you want to see more, here's Side One and Side Two.

Card Table Tent Side Three:

This side was a LOT of fun!  I made a little doll out of felt and ironed it onto the side, and added Velcro so we could play dress up!  I just cut basic shapes out of felt for shoes, boots, and dresses, although I did fancy one of the dresses up to look like Belle’s ball gown, as Serenity was in a Beauty and the Beast phase for a while.  I added some strips of Velcro as a little closet to store the extra pieces.  She has bows in her yellow hair, and blue eyes, which my daughter likes to say, “her eyes are blue just like mine!”  The best part of these dresses is that I got to use this stiff iron-on stuff called fast2fuse that my Mom got, so they are very sturdy.  I like that stuff, although it seemed to take a long time to iron on securely.  Probably I was being too cautious as I have melted felt with my iron trying to iron it on something… more than once and to the detriment of my iron, that can’t be used without a press cloth right now!

 

To see the rest of the birthday extravaganza, go here!

SuperWhy Book Club Card Table Tent: Side Two!

Here's the link to side one!

Card Table Tent Side Two:

The second side I wanted to have a window and some pockets to hold books like they have at the book club.  The window was easy enough, I just cut the hole the size I wanted, top stitched the lavender fabric in place, and then ironed on the yellow felt rectangles to the inside and outside.  The hardest part was that I wanted the felt to cover the raw edges of the lavender suede.  So ironing on the first side of the border, I had a little piece that I had to be careful not to iron until the top piece of felt was in place.    

Then as far as the pockets are concerned… mine is a cautionary tale.  I made them much too shallow( I wanted them to look like shelves), so they tend to dump out any full sized books.  They mostly just hold her stuffed Super readers, unless I put something stiff behind them.  So, make your pockets deeper, and the higher up one tends to hold stuff better than the one at the very bottom, unless you stiffen that side somehow.  I might go back and add sew a piece of cardboard into a casing to fix this problem… or not, as I seem to have moved on to other projects. 

I also added a little envelope pocket that we use to hold the letters for side #4, or I sometimes put her birthday cards in there so she can play mailbox!  She loves that!  

To see the rest of the birthday extravaganza, go here!

SuperWhy Book Club Card Table Tent:Base and Side One

Card Table Tent!

These are so popular,  all over the internet, and I couldn’t resist making Serenity one for her second birthday.  Since the theme was a Princess Presto Tea Party, I made it look like the Book Club on Super Why =)  At least Side One, which I’ll describe first. =) 

The base I made out of a queen lavender suede duvet cover that I was done using.  I love that the fabric is so heavy, because this undoubtedly gets some hard use!  And, it worked perfectly to just drape it over the table and pin it like I was making a slipcover, and sewed the sides down. I just used the hems that were already in place!  Super easy, although it did mean that attaching the decorations was a little challenging, with all that fabric to shove around under my machine. Still worth it as hemming is not nearly as much fun as decorating. =) 

The front side has the door, which I made just by doubling a piece of felt, topstitching, and using iron-on steam a seam to add the question mark to the door.  I cut out a rectangle from the lavender duvet, topstitched the raw edges, and made the pink door a little larger than it so it would cover the gap.  I probably should have made it even a little bit larger, maybe two inches wider, as it sometimes has a gap now when someone has been climbing in the windows too much and the table pulls askew =) 

The huge pencils are attached with Velcro, and truth be told they spend a lot more time off the book club than on.  But I love that she enjoys pretending to write with them and all kinds of crazy games. =)  I made these by cutting a pool noodle from the dollar store in half.  Then I sewed rectangles together to make the pencil design, pink for the eraser, gray for the metal part, yellow for the pencil, off white for the sharpened part, and black for the lead.  I sewed down the long side and at the part that was supposed to look like a pencil I angled it to come to a point, and sewed a little up the other side.  There’s probably a better way to sew a cone but this was easy enough. =)  Then I stuffed the point with fiberfill, and then used the pool noodle to fill the rectangle.  I just pulled the pink fabric together at the top and sewed it shut!  Add some Velcro to the side and it was done!!!  

To see the rest of the birthday extravaganza, go here!

Pinwheel Pinwheel Spinning Around...

Waaay back when we were in a serious sleep training mode, we bought a mobile for Serenity’s crib that had a remote control option.  It didn’t really help her sleep but it sure beat having to wind up the mobile all the time.  It was fish themed though which really doesn’t go with my storybook/Curious George plans for this baby.  So I made something to replace the fish!  Pinwheels!  These are all over the place now, and so easy to make.  I just used the fast2fuse because that’s what I had out, although a lighter weight fusible interfacing would probably have been better.  This worked though and I was in a “get it done” mood.  Strange what the doctor telling you, he could come any day now, does to your brain. =)  Then you just cut along the diagonals slightly past halfway from the corner toward the middle, and fold up every other side to the middle.  Easy peasy!  And I think it will be cute once it’s installed!  I made a six inch, a 5.5 inch, and a 5 inch pinwheel... mostly because that is the size I could get from my remnants of interfacing. =) 

Kites for the Nursery!

Baby Project Day!

Thanks to my very sweet sister I got a nice long craft time today!  While Serenity was off having a play day with her cousins, I finally made the kites and pinwheels for the new baby’s decorations!  I probably won’t install them until the room is 100% done, but at least I know now which room it will be!  Makes it so much easier to feel like working on things when I can finally visualize how it will work!

Here are the kites I made!  I used fast2fuse, which is a two sided interfacing that is thick enough to have a little weight.  That way it won’t flop too much up there, and I won’t have to make poles or anything like that to give it structure.  Basically I just sewed up 6.5 by 11.5 rectangles to 6.5 inch squares, and then ironed it onto the fast2fuse.  (It took forever to iron because I had to use a press cloth, both because my iron is a little sticky from an unfortunate felt ironing incident, and because I was using minkee.  After that, I cut the fabric to fit the kite shape (16 inches tall, 11 inches wide, 5.5 inches from the top to the center of the diamond.) 

Then I used twine and scraps of fleece and fabric for the tail!  I love it and I’m so excited to hang it!  Hopefully with some nice vinyl letters…  oh yes did I mention I ordered a SILHOUETTE!?!  Sooo excited!

Felt Cake!

Felt Cake

Well, this project was one of the major ones on my list!  I bought supplies for this around six MONTHS ago!  Talk about procrastinating.  I think the idea of cutting into the foam just made me scared.  It was not nearly as difficult as I feared.  Just like Lier at ikatbag.com (where I found the pattern) said, it was easy but time-consuming.  So basically, the first night all I did was cut out the foam.  And then I got lazy AGAIN!  So the next morning my daughter finds the foam wedges and circles and LOVES them.  She makes them into beautiful cakes using her scarves, and sand castles, and mountains.  And I’m thinking, “hmmm, do I really need to do anything else?”  So I waited a bit for the fascination to die down and then I finally got around to actually sewing the casings for them. 

And she loves it even more!  Her reaction was priceless.  All I finished was one wedge of the cake, and she said, “Thank you for my cake Mama!  Thank you thank you than you, I loooove my cake.”  She’s getting very dramatic, it’s fun =) 

So I made two layers, one with wedges so she can serve cake to her guests, and one just solid.  My foam was four inches instead of the three recommended, because I just grabbed what looked good at Jo-ann’s when I saw it on sale. 

I didn’t make two layers that had slices like she did, mostly because I know I’ll spend a lot of time putting it back together.  If I did make another layer, I would do it like this one so I had a place to put all the little felt pieces.  Serenity loved decorating with the felt hearts especially. =)  When I showed her the completed layers, she wanted candles immediately so we had to build some out of legos. =)  I sewed the actual candles last night, and so I now declare this project complete.  Checkmark for me!  Woo hoo!

Monkey Blanket complete!!!

Well, I finally finally got the monkey blanket finished.  After making the center I had a terrible time deciding on a border.  I considered a crayon box, but with the big stripes the crayons going the same way didn't look very good.  Plus I was snowed in and couldn't get more fabric!  I ordered some adorable monkey fabric from fabric.com, but when it got here the pink was wrong, which was such a bummer.  So now I have two yards of pretty adorable pink monkey fabric if anyone needs something =)  Anyway, I finally settled on the pink solid.  Since the walls of her future room are dark purple, I wanted to add a little more pink to the total.  I stitched down the appliques and added some purple bows that Serenity chose to each monkey.  She tells me every day now, "I love my blankie!!!"  We'll see how it lasts.  I love the different textures of the satin, minkee, flannel, fleece and cotton, but I am definitely not doing one like this again without investing in a walking foot!  The border got horribly wrinkled and drives me crazy!  Serenity doesn't care and as I imagine it will never lay flat again once it goes into her room, I've decided to ignore it and just be happy that she loves it even though it's not perfect.

Monkeys!

Well, the weather is turning cold again, hopefully I'll take the opportunity to finish up a bunch of projects around here, although I've been having a little trouble with the motivation coming and going.  Today I finally managed to commit to my monkey appliques, so the little project I hinted at here, is finally coming along!  Here's the new blankie I'm making for Serenity's new pink and purple room...  (she asked for monkeys =) 

There is still quite a bit to do, stitching down the monkeys for security, a border, backing, and so on, but the monkeys were the part that I was hesitating the most about.  I wanted them to be cute, and I always have to take my time on applique.  (Even though I barely do applique, I always use fleece or felt so I don't have to turn anything under. Much simpler)  I used one of her favorite shirts from Carter's as the inspiration.

Infant-Sized Superhero Cape

Well, I posted just last Friday about the capes I made for my daughter's birthday, but I made another one last week that I have to share!  I attended a shower for my good friends Marilyn and Andrew.  I made capes for their baby's cousins when I did the huge batch last summer, and they mentioned that their baby will need one so he can be one of the Musketeers too.  Well, I decided he probably needed his cape right away, so here it is, the superhero onesie!

 

I altered my original pattern by removing the neck part, because I thought it would choke the baby.  Instead, I sewed snaps to the top, and snaps onto a light blue onesie.  That way they can remove the cape when they want to stop flying the baby around  without removing his whole outfit.  

And if you're curious about the superhero emblem... yes that is bacon.  They are calling him Baco-Bits until they decide on his name, and it's so cute everyone is using it now.  So I thought it would be a good Superhero design for him!  I just took dark red felt and beige felt, cut into wavy shapes.  Then I topstitched the beige down to be the marbling in the bacon.  You might not be able to tell, but the bacon is actually a little bit dimensional.  I just tacked it onto the blue plate in two or three spots so I could make it wave like actual bacon does.  

This cape is reversible too, to a plain dark blue. 

Superhero Capes!

For Serenity's last birthday, her Princess Presto Tea Party, I made superhero capes for all the kids!  It was a lot easier than I thought it might be, and I wanted to share a few tips and the design I settled on for them. 

 Here are the general dimensions:
The bottom is 21 inches wide (22 cut), with a gentle curve at the bottom because I wanted it to look wavy.
The length from the bottom of the cape to the neckline is 23 inches (24 cut)  At this point, the cape is 12 inches wide.  So it's a triangle with a rounded bottom. 
Then the neck, which I just eyeballed, is about six inches if you measure from the top of the cape where the velcro is to the neckline.

The general shape is the most important, I sized it so that I could get as many capes as possible from my 60 inch wide fabric. 

The capes are reversible, and I used reds, dark purples, medium purples, lavender and hot pink.  I just sewed two pieces together, trimmed the corners and clipped the curves,  turned it right side out, ironed it and ladder stitched them shut.  For my daughter's, which I fancied up a bit, I top stitched it.  This definitely makes a big difference, but I didn't have the time and energy to do it for all 14 that I made for the party!  Then I just sewed velcro, one to the top right neck piece, on to the bottom left. 

The star and letter applique was very simple.  I just printed the biggest star I could make in photoshop, and the letter S in the Dolphin font, which is one of my favorites.  I used iron on steam-a-seam, and top stitched it for security.  **** I did this before I sewed the two pieces of the cape together!  The capes also look good with big circles or Superman shaped diamonds. 

Part of the party fun was getting to decorate the capes!  I had a ton of sticky-back foam, foam letters, and other stickers for this purpose.  The kids loved them!  And they could add masks, wands and other various accessories to finish their superhero costumes.   I also set up two canvas backdrops with appropriate super hero designs for photos!

Here are some other pages for superhero capes.  I love the applique designs at Puking Pastilles, she even has a SuperWhy design!  And her diagram was helpful for the start of my pattern, although I did a different shape.  I like my pointed corners, I couldn't explain why. =)

And Martha has some more ideas for superhero designs.

Plans, Plans, and Shopping!

Well, the new year has begun the way I like best, with lots of new ideas, projects and plans!  We've got some major plans underway on our house, and these ideas are starting to settle in a way that's letting me get my sewing machine back out!  Yay!  We're adding another room for another baby!  Well, Eric and I will be in the new room, the baby will be in Serenity's nursery, and Serenity will move to the purple room.  It just made sense as all our baby stuff matches Serenity's current room, and her current tastes lean heavily to pink and purple so with just a little decorating we can make the purple room perfect for her without painting anything, which I'm not allowed to do at the moment. 

The color of our bedroom is really eggplant, which is a little more mature of a purple than I would really have chosen for her, although I love it for myself.  But Mom and I went shopping yesterday to find fabric for a new blankie for Serenity that will brighten it up!  With some lavender or pink curtains, I think it will turn into a great little girl room! 

So here is the result of SEVERAL hours of fabric shopping... lots of pinks and purples!  I asked her earlier what kind of blanket she'd like, and she said purple and monkeys, (although I'm not sure she really understood what I was asking her about, oh well, I love both those things too!)  We ended up with lots of textures!  We have satin, flannel, cotton, and a fuzzy minkee or two.  I'll share more about the quilt pattern later!  The Dora print will be a pillowcase, partially because my pattern works better with more neutral designs, partially so that it's easy to change the minute she outgrows Dora. =)  Don't get me wrong, Dora has some very good qualities.  But I've spent the last few months waking up to various Dora songs stuck in my head, and I think that is the first part of her childhood I won't miss! =) 

Baby Quilt: Sleeping Animals

This baby quilt pattern is one of my all-time favorites.  I had this quilt made by a friend of my Mom's that had two bears appliqued like they were sleeping under the quilt, one awake and one asleep.  I've made it for two of my own friends now, and just finished the second one yesterday.

My friend Doris (best friend from high school) asked for a Winnie the Pooh quilt for her baby girl that's due in January.  I spent a really long time trying to figure out a pattern and finally thought of doing this one!  So I used my normal applique method of finding color pages and free handing very very simple shapes.  I used fleece and steam a seam so I didn't have to turn under any seams.  I did stitch everything down on my machine just to be safe.

The super cute winnie-the-pooh print is made it take so long to find a pattern.  I needed one that would show off the various scenes on the print.  Usually I do more scrappy quilts. =)  I finally decided to turn them into eight point stars to frame the print.  Pink background, as requested by the mama-to-be =)   I hope she loves it!  And know she's too busy at this point to be checking out my blog, as it's just going in the mail now.  

Frog Prince Quilt

Here is a quilt that I made a while ago for my friends the Hoppers.  They planned on a frog theme for their son Nate's nursery, so I decided to make him a frog prince quilt!  I used a couple of applique techniques, including the freezer paper kind for the hearts and circles, and then using iron on steam a seam for the frogs and stitching around it on my machine.  I just sketched a very simple frog, gave him a crown, and added golden balls to complete the story. =)  The pattern is simple, I just used various sizes of squares and rectangles to give it a fun, flowing look. 

It's a great design for someone new to quilting or applique, because the piecing is all straight lines, and there's just a little bit of the applique.  I usually use coloring books or just sketch very simple things to applique, I don't get enough practice to consider myself good at it, I feel like I relearn it every time!