Fiddles!

My kids ought to be grateful I love them. Even though it was hot as bacon grease and I was feeling equally salty after dragging dirty clothes back and forth to the laundry, I dragged my behind down to the local library as promised and willingly sat among squealing small children for some story time brought to us by Fiddlin' Dan, the Mountain Man. As an aside,And for some reason, everytime I read the phrase Fiddlin' Dan my mind says, "Lieutenant Dan, I got yer ice creaaaaaam!"

I'm not going to lie and tell you it was the most entertaining experience of my life, particularly given that I saw Daniel Tosh perform live just a few months ago, but for the setting, it was actually pretty cool. Fiddlin' Dan is really great with kids. He even took note of what a handsome, strapping little man my favorite bowl of pudding is. Yes, I can be won over with flattery. Ain't no shame in that.

And my, wasn't he handsome and strapping in his little striped onesie? He was also rather enthralled with Fiddlin' Dan's talent for playing the spoons as evidenced by his rapt attention.

Of course pinky wanted in on the baby holding action and on the rapt attention action. It seems the girl behind pinky was less than thrilled with Fiddlin' Dan but the reality is poor girl was too busy giving a hearty dose of the side eye to the three hot mess little boys she hissed at for the majority of the time we were there.

And here's another shot of my youngest because my mama reads my blog and grandmas can never get enough pictures of their grandbabies.

This is his "did-someone-say-food" face.

And since I mentioned the successful, rain free laundry mission, now I can show you my latest completed sewing project, the Happy Animals t-shirt and the Bubble Stripe shorts both patterns from the Summer 2011 issue of Ottobre Design.

I really love how this turned out. I used interlock jersey from Joann's for both pieces. The top is a hunter green solid with lime green top stitching while the shorts are a split pea soup and green bean stripe. The embroidery is a design from this book which just might be my favorite embroidery book evah! ( And pick a chick, she's got another one! I'll just be adding that to my card now.)

And isn't this just the sweetest little lederhosen wearing kid in the world?

Next time, I'm gonna use a lighter brown color for the little dude's hair and eyelashes. Lord knows I don't want it looking like I dressed my kid in blackface. I think pudding might faint dead away from embarrassment.

How's that for pictures, grandma?

Babies are convenient things

You can, like, hold them and stuff and distract people from your fat belly.

A belt would probably work better to nip in the waist and give me a better silhouette but the kid was free and I feel like he owes me considering how much time I spend wiping his butt.

The skirt is something I threw together without a pattern, just two panels of some stuff Joann's calls Tutti Fruiti that feels like paper but the color was so vibrant I couldn't resist. Look for it again in a few days when I make pinky a dress out of it and maybe even another skirt for myself. I have three yards left I think.

Day three of MMM was a wash. I just loafed around the house all day in a target tee and watched some New Girl.

I might actually finish this challenge

It's probably too soon to make such a call but I can't help but feel optimistic about my chances.

Here's my first garment, the Sorbetto top from Colette Patterns.

Lord, I love a me a free pattern, let me tell you. I've made this once before as you will likely see during Me Made May so I decided to change it up a little. I went with a bargain basement white eyelet of mysterious fabric content that I pulled from the wallyworld clearance shelf a couple years ago. To help it fit better into my palette, I decided to be brave and smock the center panel. To accomodate the sitching, I placed the pattern three inches back from the center fold, giving me six additional inches to work with.

I marked my pleats on the fabric with a Mark B Gone pen in 1/4in columns and 3/8in rows.

Then pulled them up and tied them off.

Next came the smocking. I don't want to discuss how often I pulled out these stupid threads. This is only my third smocking project so trust me when I say I jack it up often. Halfway through, I finally got my rhythm and came up with a stellar row of stitching that made all the other ones look like they'd been done by Helen Keller on meth. So once again, I pulled stitches.

The waist is a little blousy for my tastes and some sort of mishap resulted in uneven darts that I didn't notice until after I french seamed the sides but overall, I really like this top. I especially like the pretty red gingham bias tape trim. It reminds me of this absolutely terribly ugly square dance dress I had the poor fashion sense to adore to pieces when I was about 7 years old.

Hopefully, I won't look back on this top and be horribly embarrassed as I am by that square dance dress. I can't even figure out how in the world a little black girl in Brooklyn ended up with a red gingham square dance dress. In fact, I had two, one red and one yellow. Maybe this explains why I'm so in love with my color palette.


God bless childhood memories.

Imagine this in red and try not to shudder.

Now I'm on to my button up skirt. It's two thirds completed. I just have to do the hem, buttonholes, and waistband which I hope to finish by tomorrow. After that, it's time to start cutting the dress. And wouldn't you know it, while in wallyworld, two and a half yards of red roses on white lawn just hopped right up in cart and refused to let me leave until I agreed to take it up. So there's an addition to my palette challenge.

Pink: It was love at first sight

This is what happens when you can't find your camera and let your ten year old take your picture with your crappy cell phone instead. Or maybe this is all part of my evil plan to hide the poorly blended metallic charcoal eyeshadow I was too lazy to fix.

The world may never know.

Both my blouse and my skirt were free downloads from Fabric.com. The Bossa Nova skirt is made from a Joann's plisse I bought on sale last summer. This has to be the easiest skirt I've sewn maybe ever. If you can sew a straight line, you can make this skirt. There was no swish thanks to the stiffness of the plisse but the overall line is great. It's also the first skirt I've ever made that was the perfect length as is. I think I'll definately be sewing this again.

The Fringe(less) Festival Knit top however . . .

Ugh.

Between my genius idea to use a slinky slub rayon for my first knit garment and the nonsensical directions for how to sew in the scarf tie, I was ready to throw the entire hot mess into the nearest fire and piss on it for good measure. In the end, I'm glad I didn't, not just because third degree burns to my rear end sound like the opposite of a good time but because, miracles of miracles, I actually love this top. This probably isn't the best way to style it given that it's making me look a little pregnant in this picture, but I think hemming it up to hip level will fix that.

The color just so happens to coordinate perfectly with my favorite shoes, shoes I couldn't find because they were hidden under the girlchild's bed.

She's lucky I love her.

I'd tell you all about her outfit but there isn't much excited to tell. I didn't use a pattern, just cut and sewed some things together until I liked the look. Thankfully, she agreed. Other things I'm thankful for? A little girl who doesn't mind going to church with her mama in matching outfits.

How much longer do you think I have before she ashamed to be seen in public with me?

No, really, I need to know when I get to start to embarrassing her in public. That is, after all why you have children, yes? It certainly isn't because I enjoy playing 20 questions with an eight year old who is supposed to be doing her homework.

Wearing O' the Green

Once again, I waited until the last damned minute to work on a sewing project for a deadline. We'll pretend it's the baby's fault and not the fact that I am a procrastinating heifer who can't do anything without added pressure.

See?

Kids are useful. You can blame them for so many things and then threaten not to feed them if they even think about revealing your secrets.

Plus you get to dress them in cute outfits.



Pattern: Sweet and Simple Baby Bubble
by Jeanne Baumiester
Microcheck from Baltazor Fabrics
Buttons and whipped piping from Farmhouse Fabrics



Pattern: White Waves Sundress (modified)
from Sew Beautiful Issue # 140
Tea Green Broadcloth from Baltazor Fabrics
Swiss laces and ribbon from Farmhouse Fabrics

Miss Ma'am looks like a Shamrock Shake, doesn't she?

Lookie, Lookie!

My friend Elizabeth decided that little skunk/raccoon/squirrel looks like an Emma and thus, this is the Emma dress that I hurriedly finished this morning. I'd forgotten all about Daylight Savings Time otherwise, this dress would have been sitting under my presser foot still and I would have made it to church for Sunday school.

The pattern is vintage Simplicity 7466, purchased from The Quilted Heart over at Etsy. It's sewn from cream Imperial Batiste purchased from another etsy seller whose shop seems to be inactive. There was supposed to be a pretty embroidered collar with lace trim but it would have hidden Emma's sweet face. I'm saving it for another project I guess, maybe a little blouse? I trimmed it with brown and pink piping leftover from another project. Since piping is made from bias tape, I took apart some of it and used it to bind the armhole openings.

We won't discuss all the mistakes I made. Suffice to say, once all my Easter sewing is completed, I'll be taking apart at least the back bodice pieces and redoing this properly. But at least the smocking looks good, for a first attempt anyway.

Overall, I do like how this turned out and I think it will look faboo once I've fixed it, including lowing the collar as my kid has informed me that the neckline is choking her out.

Good! It's authentically vintage now since poor little girls in the 50's had to sit in church wearing uncomfortable dresses and praying for the sermon to end so they could get out of it.

Next up, St Patty's outfits!