A Christmas Dress

So much of Christmas sewing is secret, but the dress I made for Miss N is not. Her mother knows about it and as an almost 3 year old, N doesn't read my blog, so I can show it to you here.

I used the Geranium Dress pattern with the expansion pack for the collar, sleeves and the sash. I have long wanted to do a dress with a sash. I loved sashes when I was a little girl. The fabric is Sarah Jane's Peter Pan line. When I first saw it, I just knew the plum and pink had to be a Christmas dress for N. It's hard to tell here, but there are also gold metallic stars on this fabric.

 I found the perfect fancy buttons in my button jar. They add a bit more holiday sparkle to the dress. You can see the gold stars better her.

 And here is the lovely sash all tied up in a bow. It gathers at the side seams where it is attached to the dress. I also had just a bit of pink left so I put a small border around the bottom of the skirt. I love that detail.

And of course, there had to be pockets. My girl loves pockets. I cannot wait to see this on her. We will be there for Christmas this year, so I will get to see it in person.
Have a great Thursday and I'll see you soon.

Big Box of Goodies

I love getting a big box of goodies, but even more, I love sending a big box of goodies and imagining the happy faces opening it. I sent such a box to my oldest and it arrived yesterday, so I can now share all the handmade goodies in that box with you here.

 The first item is this blouse I made for my daughter. I had to have her send it back to me as the sleeves were too tight. I found a wonderful video on you tube to show how to adjust sleeves to fit better. I had to find and order another half yard of the fabric to do it, but Etsy came through for me. The adjustment was so easy and now I have a new skill in my tool box.

 Next up is this fleece robe for Miss N with sock monkeys all over it. I found the fleece at Fabric.com and the pattern on Melly Sews for just $2. This is a great pattern and so very easy too. It seems Miss N needed a robe of her own because she kept stealing her brother's robe, even though it was way too big for her.

 Here is the back of the robe. The one adjustment I made to the pattern is I sewed the sash to the center back of the robe, instead of making belt loops on the sides. I like to keep kids robe belts with the robes. This works great.

There was so much fleece left over, so my sister suggested a pair of sleep pants. I found a free pattern on line (just google it) and they took about 15-20 minutes start to finish. I didn't hem them as I thought they could be rolled up now and then down as she grew. She is already loving them and they are so soft.

 Next I made this little pouch for my daughter to carry things in her purse. I had made one for her years ago and it is so worn and dingy from being in a purse for more that 5 years.

 I used a bunch of 2 1/2 inch squares from my scrap box in green and a simple fold over velcro closure.

 I also made her an Open Wide pouch in large, for her knitting projects. She has several that I made over the years. It has been so long since I made one, that I had to actually look up the directions to refresh my memory.

The chicken fabric is some of her favorite and I just recently found some more on line at Fabricworm. The pom pom is one I made back when I was filling my days with such things during my cancer treatment.

 Next up, two new Geranium dresses for Miss N. I recently bought the expansion pack as I already had the pattern (you can get both together as well) I wanted to be able to add sleeves since the seasons are changing and getting cooler back east. This is a Sara Jane border print I have had for awhile.

 The top is the last bit of one of my favorite Sara Jane prints which I have used in several quilts.

 Then, there is this cutie. As I mentioned earlier, one of my daughter's favorite prints and I had made her a boxy pouch out of the one fat quarter I had that someone had given me. When I saw this on Facebook at Fabricworm I just had to grab some. The floral print is from the same collection.

 I used a fat quarter of a yellow print for the lining of the top. It matched up well with the flowers.

 Add some fun buttons from the button jar in my sewing room and voila!

These buttons were bought for something else and not used. I love that they sort of blend in and don't really show much from a distance.

 This is a close up of the cute fabric with the chickens. It is an Alexander Henry fabric.

 And lastly, some fall/Halloween decor. I googled fabric pumpkins and dove into my orange fabrics to make these for the kids (and their mom)

It was just a quick little fun project. And that concludes the contents of the big box of goodies. Thank you for reading along with all of this. Linking up with Amanda Jean at Crazy Mom Quilts.

A Sarah Jane Finish

I have been collecting Sarah Jane prints and hoping for inspiration. I finally found it and now my quilt top is done.

I love all these prints and this is the best way to show them off. The block was a freebie from Fat Quarter Shop. I had enough different fabrics to make 16 blocks which made a nice size quilt. I chose the grey gingham for the sashing and the darker grey dots for the corner stones. I love the look. I plan to use some of the leftovers to make the back, I think. Stay tuned.
Linking up with Crazy Mom Quilts.

Geranium Dress x 2

I wanted to make some baby girl things, besides quilts. I know I'm late to the party, but I just got this baby granddaughter recently. Rae Hoekstra's Geranium Dress pattern is the best! There are several modifications included and you can make it look like a totally different dress with the different options and fabric choices. Here is what I did so far:

 My daughter requested the shorter version that is more like a top than a dress, since Baby N will be scooting and crawling this summer. A dress would not be practical. She said they would be very cute with bloomers. Okay, Google bloomers...found a pattern by Heather Ross in a book I happen to own.

 Perfect. The bloomers call for shirring around the legs. Never done that and was kinda scared actually. Googled shirring...perfect, a tutorial by Rae. I am now a cautious fan of shirring. It still makes me nervous until I am all the way around., but her tutorial is great!

 I found this awesome fabric by Sarah Jane called Sommer. I love the water color gingham.

 The tulip and bunny print doesn't have many bunnies. They are spaced very far apart, but that is part of the charm. After I bought this at my LQS,  I found a couple of fat quarters in pink, which I didn't know existed, and since that was all they had left, I bought that too. A little fussy cutting for the pocket.

                                   How sweet is this pocket? I love the bunnies.

               And then with no bunnies left, just tulips for the other pocket.

 And when you put the bloomers with the matching tops, it looks different, but still really cute. It's like having 4 outfits.

 And now, we are ready for summer. Thanks to Rae for such a great pattern, and Heather Ross for the easiest bloomer pattern ever. Talk to you soon.

It's a Girl!

 I have been saving these fabrics for such a long time. I love all of them, but I thought they were too girly for the grandsons. And now, I have a reason to create with them. In fact, I have a plan and have already started cutting.

 Then there are the pinks. I have lots and lots and lots of pinks. I have one quilt top finished and you can bet there will be more soon.  I love being able to use these pinks.

 Then there are these two Sarah Jane prints. I don't know if they will be quilts or not. They would be adorable dresses. Have to think on that. She's still brand new and tiny.

 I love this print too. I think it would make a great quilt back. I hate the thought of cutting it up.

 More pretty pinks and flowers. I am over the moon to have a granddaughter to sew for, can you tell?

I love the old fashioned look of these Heather Ross Tiger Lilly prints. Something good will come out of these too.

 Remember this? Well I got busy last week and quilted it up in just a couple of hours. I always felt it looked pretty girly. I love the way it turned out.

 And I used an Anna Maria Horner fabric for the back. It's from the Innocent crush line. This quilt came out so soft.

 Then there's this one. I know it's sideways, but anyway, I pieced this a couple of years ago and had long hoped to quilt it. So last week I decided to get it done. I love how it turned out.

 It's soft and sweet and not too girly, but maybe just a little bit girly. I was hung up on how to quilt it, so I went with straight lines and I think it worked out great.

And I had a bunch of the dots, so that became the back and the dark blue Squared Elements made the perfect binding. Stay tuned. Lots more baby girl quilts to come.

Sunday Stash #36-Catch Up Day

I know I haven't posted a Sunday Stash since January. I may not be sewing very much right now, but I still get new fabric occasionally. I haven't really wanted to photograph and post. I just am not feeling it. Well this week, I am going to fix that. It was 80 degrees here the other day, so I took some of my new stash outside and took photos and here we are. This represents a couple of months of purchases.

 This is my March color bundle from Southern Fabrics. I joined up for the year to get some of the great color bundles. So far we have had red, green and yellow. I believe you can join at any time, and stop at any time throughout the year.

 And, since yellow is my favorite color, this is my favorite month. Look at all that sunshine!! I feel a rainbow quilt in the future.

 This pretty piece is from my LQS. It is Cori Dantini's new line and thos flowers are so cute. I have a couple of panels from one of her past lines that I haven't made up yet, and thought this might help me to come up with a plan.

 I got these on a great sale from Quilt In A Day. All were less than $5 a yard. I like to buy a yard or two to put in my backings stash when I get a great sale.

One of my all time favorites from Sara Jane's Children at Play.

 I bought these lovelies from Monaluna. I thought they were so cute and perfect for a baby quilt maybe. I just had to have some mermaids!

I have been wanting some of this forever. This is Rae Hoekstra's line. I don't know why I waited, but I didn't want to miss out. So I grabbed these from Hawthorne Threads, on sale.

When they got here, I discovered how good these two lines look together. The wheels are turning, my friends. Have a great Easter Sunday. Linking up with Molli Sparkles.