Chocolate and Pink

No, my Christmas tree is not up!  This was from a few weeks ago.  :)

I bought this fabric a year or two ago from Chez Ami.  I love that it coordinates, but not overly so.

Sorry- the first pic is a bit grainy as it's a phone pic.  It's my favorite of the bunch though with her smile- she'd just gotten the matchy doll dress/tunic.  I made the leggings later to go with.  She has a white shirt underneath...too cold in MN for short sleeves this time of year!
 
I had seen a Hello Kitty dress at Target with the ruched elastic waist and the kimono-like sleeve (not set-in).  I decided I wanted to try it out and it worked pretty well! 
 
Next time I'd lower the sleeve a little more, and give a bit more ease in the elastic.  I tend to cinch things up a bit much as I don't want it floppy.  It fits fine now, but I'm thinking it will be too small next year and I like things to fit for a long time!

I made the leggings slightly cropped like her Lands End ones.  I made them with plenty of growing room too...I don't know why as she tends to wear the knees out in a year of regular wear.

My serger sure speeds things along for me!  I cut and sewed this dress, the leggings and the doll outfit in an evening with interruptions- not too shabby!  Now a coverstitch...that's my next wishlisted item to save up for.  Nothing could stop me then!

I whipped up another 4 pairs of the same style of leggings.  These ones are full length or more.  The brown and pink are cotton/lycra, the grey is mostly bamboo with cotton and lycra (so soft...almost pj-like as leggings, actually) and the white is a thinner c/l.  Not the most practical, but they're meant for under skirts.  They have a bit of ruching at the side and a double lace hem.  I'll be getting an outfit shot of a skirt I made for her sometime here and will get a closeup of that pair.

As you can see, the grey and white have lots of growing room, but since they're tighter leggings, they tend to pool about the ankles and aren't in the way.

I made J a quick headband to keep his ears warm on his route after measuring mine.  This was a tester one...I'll need to get a little black fleece so the gals at the post office and the kids in the hallway here stop teasing him about his dogpaw 'hat' that's missing it's top, lol!  His fault for losing his old one!  :D


Another thing we've started lately is making our own yogurt!  It's soooo good! 

Ours takes a little longer to heat and cool.  We also wrapped it last time in the oven with the heating pad (heated, then unplugged) and a rice bag.  Seemed to come out the same though.  It's a wee bit runny for our 'greek' yogurt, but still thicker than regular.  We strained it to thicken it up a bit more and are messing with the temps and whatnot a bit to get the perfect batch.  Someone mentioned a bit of dried milk powder so we might try that too.  At any rate- the recipe is delicious as is!  We drizzle a little honey or caramel on it to sweeten it at times for a little dessert.  Or add fruit for lunch.  It's good alone too- never thought I'd say that about yogurt!

 I'm making another batch today...it goes quick here!

Some of my fav. fabrics :)

They're not HTF, but that's ok w/me! I got these from another sewingmama who was destashing...I loved them the moment I saw them and hadn't happened upon them for sale until hers! I knew a tunic and legging set were in order for the coordinating fabrics!



And my practice pair of leggings (I redrafted an Otto pattern and wanted to test in on some not-so-special fabric)


She loves the fabric of these...it's for valentine's day, but I figured there was plenty for these leggings too. Closeup of the fabric:

I'm getting there on her fall/winter wardrobe! I have one planned dress left...then a few pairs of leggings once I get my Jalie/kwiksew patterns from the coop. A holiday dress, but I'll probably leave off on that until closer to then... She is planning on being Mulan for halloween, so we shall see how that comes together!

Thanks for stopping by :D

Raglan finished...I think

I'm finding that the better I get at sewing the pickier I become. That is why, after a 3rd trial of the raglan pattern, I have put it away before I tinkered with it some more...it looks pretty darn good I think...seems to be about at the level of a pattern I could have bought. I know, I know...I'd have wasted a lot less time buying one to begin with, but this is a learning process for me. Besides, then I can go ahead and draft my own raglan from my basic tee pattern. It's all good. At any rate, my french terry isn't here, and the more I stared and critiqued the more I wanted to change it just one last time...just a bit less of a curve in the bodice is all...make the line a little straighter whilst keeping the sleeve the same. I wouldn't even bother with a test-shirt as I feel confident enough that it wouldn't have a huge impact either way...I'm just picky. I may do it before using the pattern for that dress I'd mentioned earlier...but I just couldn't pick it up again quite yet :P


Pics of the navy showing where I took the excess out from (didn't find much help around the internet...just kinda went at it on my own):

3D to 2D...after this step I retraced and smoothed the lines/trued the side hems with the prev. test pattern:

3rd and final trial (told ya I'd use that awful red rib! I'll be painting a heart and calling it a valentines shirt...not sure what else I'd do with it! It's pretty girly with the lettuce edging) See the fit where the bodice meets the arm? Much better! :


The first two trial shirts finished...the turq. we are calling her amoeba shirt...it was a paisley stencil I'd had...but bleach tends to travel :) It's a grub shirt so we didn't care...maybe it'll be her art & science shirt! The 2nd I made a stencil out of the Twins logo:
So! Onto the next projects...I'll be posting my latest one after this. To leave off, here are some twill tags I'd done...not totally happy with them (ok really...what am I ever totally happy with??). I have hopes to improve the process though and may just be sticking to the skinnier/flatter tapes. Someday it'd be nice to order 'real' tags but whatevs...we're just happy there's a tag telling us which side goes where! A few turned out pretty cute though...they look rather sad all lined up in the pic.

These'll be the ones you sew on the sides:


And these are for the back neck (the folded variety):

Off topic: Em lost her SIXTH tooth the other night...she now looks like a hockey player. Can't say her s's...wonder when the top ones will come in? Her other one fell out months ago and nothing yet... She has her two bottom ones though (adult)...and her six year molars...found that out at our last dentist appt- didn't even know! I'll have to take a pic :)

Drafting the Raglan

So over the weekend I messed around with the Olivia pattern I'd mentioned earlier. My first try I semi-followed my patternmaking book's directions...so many of these things aren't made clear and you're left to your own devices for finishing. Which would be ok I suppose if one had any background in this sort of thing! I did it after E went to bed- my first mistake :P Should have at least measured her neck and I would have figured out that drafting only 3/4" in on the neck would be too narrow. It was good practice though- here's my first attempt (at least I'm not wasting fabric...all the fabrics are from tees that were stained or never worn...and I plan on making a bleached floral design on the turq/blue on (a quick project if I had an inverse of all my stencils lying around...which I do not. Someday E will be able to help me with the putzy finishings, and a Twins emblem on the other for a cute baseball tee). Ok, pic!:

See how narrow that is? The sleeve? I put my finger there to show about where I want the line to come on the next draft (I took some measurements along the neck and about 3" down from there to figure out how much I'd need to take the bodice seam in). Instead of redrafting from the original pattern I ended up slicing the needed amounts off the 1st draft and making the 2nd from that. It worked out fairly well...after tracing the shapes onto a new piece I trued the lines with my french curve.

Back view...not as bad, but still needed to widen the sleeve/draft the bodice in more.

Second tee:

Both together for reference (side note: my bindings are getting better each garment I make!):

Although I'm much happier with the 2nd draft, the rippling on the seam is bothering me. I'm not entirely sure if it's the fabrics (both tees have heavier fabrics for the body of the shirt and lighter weight sleeves) or the pattern...but I'm going to try and pinch out a little- that seemed to resolve the extra fabric problem there. Not entirely sure yet how I'll accomplish this...I might curve the seam a little bit less on the bodice...and make a dart to pinch out the fabric...but retrace so there won't actually be a dart in the finished shirt. Redraft the sleeve to match and then churn out one last (hopefully!!) shirt to test. I'd hate to think it's ok and do the nice project and end up with a dud! Oh well-it's all good practice for me. And really, I don't feel bad about this draft as I've searched the internet for raglans and MANY of the children's patterns have this same rippling...so I'm either as good as a pattern on my second try (not bad!) or hopefully the 3rd try will be better than a pattern I could buy. That would be nice :)

Here's my pattern after the 2nd draft:

After I perfect the pattern I'll be laying it aside in favor of a few quickie projects until my fall fabrics arrive from the coop...I'll be trying out some of the new french terry they have floating around...it's supposed to handle like a nice thick interlock- good for sweats, thicker tees, yoga pants, etc etc. It has a bit of lycra in it, which is important for the pants for recovery. I know many people out there like 100% cotton, but I find the tees and pants especially tend to distort without the bit of lycra for recovery. I got a bit of velour as well- I have a pair of velour yoga-type pants that have been well loved and show that :P So I'll make myself a pair or two...possibly a hoodie with it. Same with E...I'll probably salvadge my pants and make a pair for her out of them- love re-using! It's either that or the garbage...there's a lot of useable fabric left!

Ok...off to search the books for any info. on the alterations...hope to finish this tee tonight! I think I have one last grey tee I could use of mine that I never wear...then I'll be getting low on practice shirts lol! Although J bought me 4yds of this awful red ribknit from JA's for $1/yd so I can pillage that if need be :)