Win! Pick Me

Just found a contest to win fabric, patterns, notions at above all fabrics!! I'm such a textile junkie. So, I took a look around and found so many patterns I want to make for Julianne--a ModKid skirt, Julia; Miss Kitty Top and Dress by Pink Fig; School Phot Dress by Oliver + S; Polkadots dress kit; Little Bow Chic Dress.

Now, if I could find time to sew it all!!!

Fabric Shopping

Today, I talked the kids into going fabric shopping with me. Actually, I just told them we were going and braced myself for the grunts, pouts, and whines.

First stop, Stitchers Playhouse where I scored some oh, so cute Michael Miller guitar print fabric , some "cufflink"(which isn't as leaf-y colored as it is on-line), and some turquoise 60". All were 35% off!!! Their summer fabric, most of it, is marked at 35% off!! So, of course I HAD to get something. Now, if they would just post their fall classes so I could sign up for something.

Next stop was mentioned by Jenny at Southern Institute. She blogged about this fantastic fabric store in Nashville, Textile Fabrics. I just had to go. AMAZING!!! My favorite is still Stitchers in Smyrna (because TF kinda overwhelms me a bit), but this one is huge. If they don't have it, you don't need it. I found so many things that I want to go back and buy when I have an idea of how much I want/need. It's too costly to just buy and figure it out later. They have everything. I'm loving the Halloween fabric they have out (especially the grey owl print). I'm not sure the brand but it is gorgeous.

Then, we headed over to Children's Corner. They had several bolts on sale for 50% off. I was able to snag this, this, and this. They were super busy with a class and other things.

Final stop, The Fabric House. I only got 1/4 yard of this and this for a camera strap. But they have some beautiful decorator fabric, and I'd love to go back and customize a new comforter and drapes for the bedroom.

Can't wait to sit down at the machine to do a little stiching. Maybe tomorrow. I've got a LOOOONG to do list before school starts back in a couple weeks.

Julez new dress

My five year old thinks she is really 16. She loves to have her hair straightened, make-up on, and of course clothes that look like her Aunt Nicole's. We've seen the cute little elastic waist dresses around, but not in her size. I knew they wouldn't be too hard to make, so I picked up some supplies at Wal-Mart when I went to visit Dad (it's the only walmart around that still has fabric). I didn't want to spend a fortune on a dress I didn't have a pattern for or really know what I was doing. I got some sassy rocker girl fabric that sparkles, a tank top, and some extra wide elastic (I think it's 1 1/2" wide).

First, the girls (I made Emma one too) tried on their shirts and I marked right under the armpits to cut it off. Cut off the tank. Next, iron on a small strip of fusible interface to the cut edge to keep it from streching too much. Then, I sewed the elastic on to the right side of the tank. Cut the skirt. I measured the girls and doubled the waist measurement and then determined how long I wanted it. Julez's is pretty short--about 12 inches. I sewed two rows of elastic thread to gather the waist and give it stretch when I sewed it to the elastic. Next, I hemmed to where I wanted. It ended up a little short, but we wear shorts under all our dresses anyway. Attach the skirt to the bottom of the elastic and you're done. Cute, big girl dress!!

Macy Giggles Dress

What a wonderful Mother's Day weekend! Saturday started with me taking a sewing class at my favorite spot, Stitcher's Playhouse. I was able to make Julezee a super cute dress from this pattern:
I hope to have my pictures uploaded tomorrow. We used a navy, yellow, and white daisy print-super cute. She loves it because its a great twirling dress. I then went to the ballpark (my second home) and spent some time selling snow cones with some pretty great friends. (I'm so blessed with our friends--we've made amazing friends in the four years we've been here). Then, dinner at our favorite Mexican place. Tomorrow, I'm hoping for a trip to the strawberry patch to pick some berries and pick up a cake--yumm!!!

New (repurposed) dress for the princess

Last spring/summer, I bought a couple cute skirts at goodwill for $.99. They've been sitting in my sewing closet since then, waiting for me to do something with them. I finally got around to repurposing one of them into a spring/summer dress for the princess. Since we were out of school today for Presidents Day, I thought I'd do a little sewing. The house was clean (kinda), and it snowed, so we didn't want to venture out (and because I needed an excuse not to get out of the sweats). Nothing fancy. I used the existing zipper to make the top more fitted. Added straps out of the extra fabric cut to make it fit. She'd tried it on several times already and didn't want to put it on for the final picture. It's made out of the stretchy, cotton-y fabric. Looks like its going to be a favorite this summer.

Snow Days and Sewing

Since we've been out of school since Friday, I've had some time to do some sewing. I finished Julianne's valentines outfit (because my first try didn't go over well with the princess; she needed to make some modifications to her liking). Then, I made my niece's American Girl doll a wrap skirt and simple top using this tutorial (Julianne got a purple one too). I also made Elizabeth, Julianne's AG doll, a valentine's day outfit to match.

TuTu's

After seeing all the adorable tutus on etsy this summer, Julzee and I decided she needed one. What little girls doesn't need a bright tutu? She definatly picked out the best colors to use--we went a big rainbow. I think it would be just as cute in two colors, or even three similar ones. We also signed her up for dance classes this weekend. She'll be in a combo (ballet, tap, tumbling) class in just a couple weeks. Brother isn't excited since he'll have to go to all the practices too! I was able to get some really good shots of her last weekend posing for me (these haven't been edited yet). The one laying down was her idea!! She's such a model.

Sew Much More

Our small group is working on a service project for the underpriveldged in Brazil. Our goal is to make 250 reversible dresses to send to them-everything from X-Small size one dresses to size 9's. This is the third year for the service project for this small group and my second. Last year, I didn't know anyone, but signed up to help sew, and now am part of the best small group ever. Even the guys got in on the action yesterday cutting and folding fabric.

If you want to help, we need more than just sew-ers on August 29th at Life Point Church. We'll need cutters, and folders, and ironers, and much more. there will be more information about it soon, and I'll post as soon as I get it.

From Casey's blog: "Sew Much More is a missions project that our church small group organizes to complete 250 reversible dresses that our church's mission teams present to little girls in Mexico, Brazil, and China. It is the "brain child" of our friends Aaron and Julie Meier.The plan was to complete all 250 dresses between 8AM-8PM in the church's multi-purpose center."

First Day of School--for Julezee

Jules started school today. I don't know if I was more upset at her starting school this year, or when I first put her in childcare at 10 weeks old. they were both pretty hard. I think the fact that she signed herself in today was extremly difficult. She's a big girl now. She couldn't sleep last night. Every few minutes, she was coming to me, "I'm excited about starting school." It was after 10 before she finally went to sleep last night.

She's going to be going with her cousin Emma for a few weeks--at least until Em starts Kindergarten in a few weeks. Both are really excited--not sure how their teacher is going to be.



--on a side note--I'm making Emma's nap mat for school and it's so cute: lime green with bright colored guitars; so her!!!

Future sewing room planning

I want a space, not really a whole room (although that would be nice), to sew and work on my crafts and have a place for everything. I've been looking for a while for a nice cutting table and some storage ideas without spending a ton of money. Here are some of my dream pieces:

1. Cutting table #1
2. Cutting table #2
2b. Dream table/storage
3. Notions wall storage
4. serger/overlock machine (from Mid-south sewing-If Eric's reading this)

I've got shelves for the closet for storing fabric, but I need some space and some time to do it all. This summer has flown by and I don't seem to have enough time to do all I had planned--where has the summer gone?

Finally Finished and a New Doctor

I finally finished sewing Jules' outfit that I had wanted to finish months ago (I bought it a year ago and cut it out in February!!) She looks super cute in it--goes great with those bright blue eyes, but I'm afraid she won't wear it because it's not PINK. Why does EVERYTHING she have to wear HAVE TO be PINK!!! I mean I love pink, but everything??? Anyway, she's cute and did model it for me. It helped that Eric's sister said it was cute--now she kinda likes it. She has to be just like her aunt Nicole.

We also went to a new pediatrician today. We've been with Dr. Will at Skyline Pediatrics for seven years--since before JD was even born-and I truly hated leaving him, but it became an all day event to go to the doctor--I needed something closer. We're now going to a doctor in the boro area. We met with Dr. Henschel. I really liked him when we met today. He sat and talked with us for about twenty minutes and explained everything he was doing to the kids and what he found--a slight heart murmur in both of them. He says it's nothing to worry about. He's probably hearing it because they are both tiny kids (JD only weighs 43 lbs at 7 years old). He said he'd check it again next year, but he wasn't concerned and we shouldn't be either--it's a common sound to hear, especially in skinny kids and he hears it about 30% of the time. We will definatly be going back to see him--he was great.

Emma's birthday presents

I'm working on getting my niece's birthday gifts together. We gave her a camera at her first party, but her "real" birthday is Monday and I hated not giving her a gift on her actual birthday. I'm working on a doll sling, diaper bag, and diapers for her hundreds of baby dolls. Found the yellow fabric in my stash, think it came from Joann's tutti frutti stuff. Hope she likes it all!

(Little Man wouldn't let me show his face modeling a "girl" toy.

Smocking--my new project

I took a smocking class at stitchers last Tuesday and have a follow-up this Tuesday. I can't seem to get straight stitches out of it, but at least the wearer will be a moving target. I'm excited about what it's going to look like when I'm finished. I'm making a black bishop dress with zig-zag smocking in bright, rainbow colors--so cute and not babyish like most of the smocking I see.

Update: I finished the construction of the dress--complete with hand sewing and all!! It's not too bad. I've still got tons of smocking to do, maybe I'll get around to it before she's too big to wear it. I've got a list of things I want to sew this summer--just two more weeks and I can devote part of the day to sewing. I may teach the kiddos how to do some and they can help out.

My new project...

My new project for Julezee is Simplicity 2994. A cute halter with ruffle skirt. There are about 500 pattern pieces and I think I'm going to go crazy sewing them all , plus three ruffles and I'm not too good at ruffles. We're doing it in all blue and white. I bought the pattern and the fabric late last summer and never got around to sewing it, but I was surprised that I had it all cut out when I opened up the pattern envelope last night. So far, I've cut out all the pieces and sewed the shoulder ties. That's it. There are too many pieces. But, I hope to get into it more this afternoon when we return from small group.

I also bought a Collars pattern yesterday at Stitcher's Playhouse with some beautiful white fabric, pink piping, and pink satin ribbons--I think the material and pattern and all the stuff to go with it is only going to cost me about $15.00--you can't go to Wal-Mart for that. It's going to be beautiful for Easter, or maybe just a fabulous summer dress. I plan on putting her monogram on the front yoke in light pink--another use for the embroidery machine E got me last year for my birthday.

Kimono top

I enjoyed making this adorable little kimono top for the Princess last night--finished up this morning. All-in-all, it only took a couple of hours, and that included making the bias tape. I've never made bias tape before and that was an experience, but really not too hard. My plan is to make a little skirt or capris to go with the top in the red gingham.

I got the tute for the kimono from this website. And the bias instructions from this site and this site.

I'm off to Stitcher's Playhouse to see a trunk show and pick up some new fabric for something.

Girly dress from man's shirt

I used this site to make the cutest dress for Julezee. It's a Goodwill .99 shirt, but looks even better as a dress. It really only took a couple of hours to do. The pleat at the top (blue) took forever, and I'm still not too happy with it. But, the important thing is that she loves it. She's begging to wear it to Nana's tonight--with Pantyhose. I've got a couple more shirts to reconstruct before summer gets here. Can't wait to see how they turn out. I decided to do the capri pants too. Can't tell much about them from the picture below, but they are super cute too.

More sewing...and sewing for a mission

This weekend was completly devoted to sewing. I spent Saturday learning to sew on Minkee fabric--a bright fuschia Julianne picked out. (I finally got a picture at Christmas with her in her new dress) I took the class at my favorite little sewing shop, Stitchers Playhouse in Smyrna. We reconstructed one of the Children's Corner patterns, Louise. The class was fun; only two of us, so Ms. Ann gave us a ton of personal attention and help. Of course, lunch was delicious as well--homemade chicken salad, apricot bread with a cream cheese/mango spread, and lemon cake--yum! Back to the dress, we did a high waist, long sleeve dress. Sorta like what you see in Land's End. Julianne wants cooler weather to get here so she can wear it, secretly, I do to, she looks so cute in it.

After the sewing class, I spent a little time helping out a small group at FBC Smyrna with a sewing mission to make 250 dresses using the Lucy pattern. I got the easy job of closing the dresses for the hour and a half I was there. They exceeded their goal in less time than they had anticipated. Over 250 little girls will have new dresses to wear soon. Julianne is modelling a dress similar to the ones we made--this was her birthday dress for her invitations.

New at this Stuff

Hi all! I'm very new at this blogging stuff, but I am fascinated with how many crafty people out there blog. I've learned so much from you. I hope to post some of my creations here and get some feedback on what I've done so far.

A little about me...I'm married to an amazing man I met in college, (we have two beautiful kids), I only sew easy stuff (mostly because I'm scared to try anything hard), I make my kids' birthday cakes every year, because my mom made mine, I have one younger, very beautiful sister, and a very funny four year old niece. My sister-in-law is just as beautiful, but really thinks she's twenty, when she's only fourteen. I live in Tennessee and yes, I love country music, and springtime (or the two weeks before it gets hot and humid). It's either summer or winter, there's no in-between.

I love to go to the beach, but I hate the sand that gets into everything. My kids make the trips amazing--seeing things for the first time, experiencing the slap of the waves and the ripples they make on the beach. I love seafood and can eat my weight in boiled shrimp and crab legs.
Watermellon and homemade ice cream are other favorites of mine.

I teach 8th graders Reading and writing at a large middle school. I coach middle school cheerleaders, and I'm the new yearbook sponsor at our school.

I love learning new things, and will try to sew almost any free pattern I find on-line. I used to sell my dresses, but decided I'd rather sew for my little girls instead. But, if you see something you like, I'll gladly make it for you.