Spring Swimwear

E grew out of her swimsuits I made for her mid-summer last year. Crazy kid! I whipped up two from my fave KS pattern for her spring swimming lessons. Love this pattern- super simple, fits beautifully and the fabric I get from Chez Ami is superb. I pull the leg elastic in a couple more inches than the pattern calls for- all in the bum area. No wedgies!

I pay only $3-$3.50/yard during their clearance sales and can get 3 suits easy out of 1 yard. The lining is a little spendier from Sew Sassy but it’s really nice and I can get 8 suits or so out of 1 yard (runs about $8/yd). I always line the whole front of her suits. It gives the suit a bit more structure and softness in the front and eliminates the odd panty piece that isn't sewn down in front. The swim elastic runs about $0.45/yd and I use a little under 2.5yds per suit. All in all these suits give a heck of a lot of bang for the buck and I’m always quite pleased when I see her out and the beach in the summer up against much of the RTW swimwear out there.

Suit #1:








Suit #2 (This fabric was from fabric.com). This fabric is more like your average swim fabric out there…super stretchy and less stable. She usually is up a size in the KS pattern with the CA fabric but I could have made her usual size with this fabric. It’s a bit loose in areas but the elastic keeps everything in place. I LOVE the print…if I wore any suit but black this fabric would have been for me! I lined the whole suit since the background was white and it wasn’t very thick or stable.

She was clowning around here…loves making her crazy faces :D



See how I matched the horizontal stripes? Yay! Next time I’ll pay more attention to the chevron of the vertical stripes in the back seam. I’d like a smooth V up and down and hadn’t thought much about it until it was sewn up. She was just ending a somersault here.



Lastly a fun pic- she’s quite good at her kick overs now…going from her bridge and kicking back over. She’s even started to pick up going seamlessly from a backbend-bridge-kick over! Still needs a nice cushion underneath though since every few she loses her balance holding her right foot up.



Nice to have a computer again for blogging and sharing pics- thanks again Cassie and Alex! :x

Painted Easter Skirt

Last week E wanted to paint...she'd told her swim instructor that 'Mama never lets me paint.' The day before she'd asked and being busy I'd said no. That I guess means never in 5yo drama-ville! I don't know why we decided on fabric...but we decided to paint her a skirt. We grabbed an old sponge to cut up for simple stamps and an old sheet I'd thrifted for muslin and got to work...mixing paints, cutting stamps and all that. She's responsible for most of the eggs and the carrots and tops...I did the tulips and stems and a few of the eggs. We had a good time- I meant to post this a week ago but we've all been sick here... :(

Process pics:





All sewn up! :) Here's a few close-ups first:










Happy Easter all! Hope we can shake the sickies before Sunday...it's getting old!

Applique, dress, and yoga pants

Having fun playing around with applique with some torn pants...looking back I wish I would have either made this simpler or else gone all-out crazy with them. Ah well...they're pink and that's what E cares about :)






She kept making funny faces so I tickled her to get a big giggling grin:


Reading her favorite series- The Magic Tree House books:



This dress I'd made awhile back when I was starting out with knits...the neckline was all stretched out and the bodice was 3 sizes too big. I made my own puff sleeve using my patternmaking book but later realized the conversions and measurements I was using was for adults and so therefore her puff sleeve looked like I sewed some chef hats to her arm. I finally drug it out of the basket, cut the skirt off and made a new top for it. I love the new sleeve- the bodice fits great and I adore the organza trim! It'll be worn a lot this spring!



Yoga pants for older sis (the panda is the tag I made from grosgrain and canvas panda fabric from Japan...I hope to make some cute pants for Romi sometime with the pandas as the cuff :) ) I was having a bit of fun with photoshop if you couldn't tell :D