Gathered Clutch

I saw this awesome tutorial when it first came out over a year ago. I have always wanted to make it, but never had a reason to. Until now.

For the last 5 years we have had the best babysitter. She loves our kids, they lover her, she has been dependable, makes some killer mac and cheese, and we really just love her to pieces. She recently turned 18, graduated from high school, and is now moving with her family across the country before going away to college (also across the country). I knew this would be the perfect birthday/graduation/going away/thank you gift for her.



This was so easy to sew up! I cut the pieces one night and sewed it together the next. It only took me a couple of hours total (once I had the fabric picked out-the hardest part for me).



I opted to add the card pockets (the flowered fabric) and the divider (the striped fabric).

We filled it with a gift card and a few other goodies. I know she is going to love it!

Maternity shirts

I always feel like I get in such a rut with my maternity clothes. I like having lots of choices, but I don't want to buy a lot of maternity clothes since a) I will only wear them for a few months, b) I will most likely stain them, and c) they are so darn expensive. If I can make my own for little money, then I don't have to feel bad about any of these things. Here are a couple of things that I made in the last week to help augment my wardrobe a bit.


I found the pattern for this shirt here. I got it as a free download when the designer first released the pattern, but now it has to be purchased. It is basically a cropped shirt with 3 yard long tails on each side. The tails are wrapped around and around to finish the shirt. I love this shirt (although I feel a little neurotic when I wear it, always making sure that the tails haven't shifted and are where they should be). I love that it can be worn at any stage of pregnancy. I always have the problem of my shirts getting to short before my pregnancy is over. I think this shirt will be a solution to that problem. Sadly, I didn't get very good fabric, so it is running all over the place (like nylons run, not running away). As soon as I get some better fabric I will make a new one and wear it and love it. The pattern sews up really fast, especially with a serger. I think my total cost for this shirt was around $3.00.


I made these shirts using the same technique as I used on the top of my nightgown, but this time adding elastic so they would stay in place. I have some shirts and dresses that need shirts under them, but it is too hot to want to wear lots of layers. Plus, my prego belly is getting bigger by the second, so I wanted something that I could wear through the end of my pregnancy and after. Once again I used some huge tank tops that I scored for $1 each at Walmart. For the bottom of the black one I sewed on 1/4 inch elastic. (I made it a little too tight. Oops!) I finished the white one with some 5/8 inch fold over elastic (I get mine here). The white one is perfect. I think I am going to buy some black FOE and redo the bottom of the black shirt.

Here is a close-up of the FOE on the bottom of the white shirt. It is basically just elastic that is made to crease in the middle. FOE is a great invention!

I have been wearing these shirts over the last couple of days and they are perfect for what I need them for.

Nightgown

I stumbled across this tutorial and thought it would make a perfect nightgown. I love it and hope to make a dress out of the tutorial at some point, but I was in greater need of a nightgown at the time, so that was what was on my brain when I saw it.

I am a girl of average height, but I am pretty thin. I have always had a hard time finding nightgowns that fit. They are all super wide on me (even the smalls and extra smalls). They always fall right around mid-thigh, but I like my nightgowns to go to my knee. And most of the summery ones don't have sleeves, which is a must for me.

The tutorial for this dress/nightgown say to trace a shirt that fits to make the top, then to make a tube out of your fabric for the bottom, then attach the two. I thought and thought about how to make the top and how to add sleeves that would be comfortable (I'm still kind of new at sleeves even though I have been sewing forever). I finally came up with the idea to use a knit for the top, as I could make the shoulder wide enough to make a sleeve without having to add a separate sleeve (I'm sure I could have done this with a cotton, too, but the knit made more sense to me). I traced one of my undershirts onto a huge tank top (that I bought for the purpose of using for the fabric, not for wearing), cut it out, then followed the rest of the directions in the tutorial.

This is what I came up with:


I love it! It is so comfortable. I think using the knit on the top was the perfect idea for a nightgown. The bottom is big enough that I can wear it 26 weeks pregnant, and hopefully will still fit in it by the end of my pregnancy. It is long enough that I feel comfortable wearing it around the house all day if I don't feel like getting dressed, but cool enough that I don't melt in the humid summer heat.

Teacher Appriciation Gifts

At the end of each school year I like to make a little thank you gift to show the teachers how much we appreciate them. And having a child with disabilities means that there are more people to thank, since we have therapists along with the teachers and aides who work with my son.

Being in the throes of morning (all day) sickness, I didn't have much energy to make something huge and grand, so I settled for these cute bookmarks.

These ones were given to teachers, aides, and a student teacher.

These were given to therapists and other people who help make my son's school year great.

They were super simple to make. I followed this tutorial, but modified it a bit for the set in the lower picture, just adding buttons instead of flowers. The greatest part is that I used scraps and stash fabric, so they didn't cost me anything.

They were well received by the recipients. Thank you everyone who works hard to make our schools what they are!

Valentine's Day 2011

I love Valentine's Day, so I always go a little overboard with crafts and decorations. Here are a few things I made this year.

First, I made the multi-colored heart garlands from the previous post. I love them! I wish I had a daughter so I could hang them in her room all year round.


Last year I decided to made a red and white meal a tradition. This year I decided that we needed some fun place mats to go with our fun meal. Using this tutorial, I made ten of these cuties.


We decided to have some friends over to share in our tradition. Since we were eating lots of stain-causing foods, I didn't want the place mats to get all stained and ruined by the kids. Using the same templates for the cloth place mats, I made these ones out of scrap book paper. I then covered them with contact paper so that we can use them again in the future. I love how they turned out.


After going to a craft day at a friend's house and watching my friend make her own cards, I attempted my own version (our original inspiration came from craft gawker, but I can't find the post). I gave one to my husband for Valentine's Day and sent the other two to my grandmas. I even made my own envelopes using some cute scrapbook paper (with the design on the inside).


At the same craft day, I made this felt flower hair clip (tutorial found here). I love having crafty friends!

Crochet Crazy!

At the beginning of the year I was a crocheting machine. Here is some of the stuff that I made:


Scarves for the National Special Olympics. The SO collects scarves for all of the participants, coaches, etc. Some friends from my local support group and I like to participate in this project. The scarf on the left is made of granny squares and the scarf on the right is just a single crochet with two strands and a huge hook (like I use to make baby blankets).


Heart garlands, using this tutorial, with changes as listed here. The purple one was made as a baby gift for a friend. The red/pink/white one was made to decorate my house for Valentine's Day (I actually made two of this one as I have two sets of windows in my kitchen).

I also crocheted a couple of shamrock garlands, using this tutorial. I forgot to take pictures before they got put in the seasonal box. Instead of making all of the shamrocks with three leaves, I modified the pattern a little by adding two extra chains in the beginning circle, then crocheting an extra leaf. I made half three leaves and half four leaves and alternated them on the garland.

On top of that stuff, I have made many more baby blankets. As I already posted about baby blankets before, I won't add any more pictures here. You get the point.

I sure love to crochet!

Jewels

One of my close friend's birthday is in the beginning of November. I decided she might like some jewelry for her birthday, so I broke out my beads and came up with this:


A matching bracelet and earring set.


She loves earring, but not long or huge ones. I think these turned out perfect, dangly and simple.


I also love the bracelet. Of course I do. I made it! I love the sky blue beads and the silver flowers. I think the white square beads change things up a little. I even threw in a couple of dragonfly beads. And the swarovski crystals have the perfect sparkle factor. Really, I just love it all!

And so does my friend. I'd say this was a success!