The Birthday Dresses

Here are pics of the dresses.

After measuring my girls, I made a size 7 top, with the length of size 8, but the bodice was too big. When will I learn that New Look patterns seem to run big, especially for my skinny minnys? :).  The instructions for adding the bias tape at the armholes was clear as mud (and I still think they're drawing was wrong) but I did manage to figure it out.  If anyone is interested, I took pictures of the process in case I needed it later :)

The instructions for inserting the lapped zipper sucked, but I did find an excellent tutorial online.  In the future, I think I'll just stick to invisible zips.

10 years old!

I can't believe that my daughters just turned 10. Or that I decided to sew them birthday dresses two weeks before we left for Florida :).  I wanted the dresses to be a surprise, so that meant only sewing when they were with their dad... and completely cleaning up any evidence before they came back home.  But I did manage to finish them two days before we left. 
Unfortunately, the dresses were a little too big across the chest, but that was fixed with a couple of strategically placed safety pins...

Here's a pic of them at the California Grill restaurant in the Contemporary Resort at Disney World. The shrugs were necessary because of the air conditioning.

We were able to watch the Magic Kingdom fireworks from the deck after dinner :).

I'll post a pic of just the dresses soon. Pattern is New Look 6042.

Halloween Again

Here you go Sylvie :)

I got off easy this year. My daughter Rachel wanted to be Stitch (from Lilo & Stitch).  We bought her the hat when we were in Disney World in May, and my boss happened to be going to Orlando in October, so he was tasked with picking up the gloves :).  I had intended to make the jumpsuit, but couldn't find the right colour fleece. Luckily I saw this suit at Value Village and it was perfect. It was a Men's size Large, so I did need to hem the sleeves and legs, but that was easy.

My other daughter wanted to be a pirate. As I was looking for a pattern, I was told that it wasn't just any pirate - it had to Elizabeth from Pirates of the Carribean.  I didn't see the movie so I went searching for a picture.  I picked up McCall's 5446, morphed the jacket and vest patterns, and made the shirt out of fleece for warmth.  I think see looks adorable, and she loved it.  She was very proud when a "teenager" told her that she liked her costume while we were out trick or treating :)

Next up ... the traditional Christmas Eve nightgowns.  Stay tuned...

A new toy :)

Konad Nail Stamping. I know I'm a little late to the party, and I did buy this mainly for my daughters, but it is pretty cool. My friend Sylvie showed this to me at her house, and I had to buy it.

Here is my first full manicure using the stamps, a subtle animal print using You don't know Jacques by OPI as the base, and Gold Get 'Em by Revlon for the stamping. Several people commented on my nails when I wore this.

It's a tradition.

Every year since they were 4, I have made my daughters nightgowns for Christmas that they open on Christmas Eve.
They didn't think they were getting them this year, but they did.

And here they are on Christmas morning, with their brand new sewing machines!

Maybe I'll have a nightgown to open next Christmas Eve!! LOL

Almost done

I've been continuing to enter my fabric stash into MyStuff on my iPod and am almost finished. At this point, I have 105 pieces of fabric and a total of 170 metres (186 yards).

The best part about this exercise is that I now have all of my fabric in one room of the house and it is sorted neatly, and easily located, in numbered bins. I figure I have about 10-20 pieces more to enter, that are currently in a bin under my bed, and I'll be done.

The exercise has also been successful in stopping me from buying any more fabric; at least for now ;)

After reading about the size of Gigi's stash, I don't feel so bad, but she also cranks out many, many more beautiful, garments than I could even dream of!! :-)

Scary...

I use an iPod app called My Stuff to keep track of my pattern stash, and wish list, because I don't have WiFi access at my local fabric stores. The number of patterns I own is a bit scary considering how many I actually use :)

But last week I decided to start cataloguing my fabric stash as well. I'm already at 56 pieces of fabric and I haven't even started! And I'm not entering any pieces of fabric less than one metre, of which there are several.

I have stashes of fabric spread throughout the house, all aging quite nicely. As I pull each piece of fabric out, I can remember exactly what I was going to make with it. I just never did.

I'm sure I hope that this exercise will keep me from buying any more fabric for a while until I actually sew something, but then again, there are several good sales on right now ;)

This and That

I attended the PR Weekend in Montreal a couple of weeks ago. The organizers did a great job, and I enjoyed the weekend, but the weather was hot and humid and the dorms where we stayed didn't have air conditioning. Luckily it was OK as far as sleeping since the room had a fan, but I must say I was uncomfortably hot for much of the weekend. I just can't take the heat anymore. Must be an age thing :) But I do feel like my sewing mojo got a boost, and it was nice to meet a couple of women who I have only known through reading their blogs.

Although I have wanted a coverstitch machine for some time, it was watching Jeanne Binet from Jalie at PR Weekend that really got me itching for one. And thanks to a classified ad posted on PR shortly after I returned, I am now the proud owner of this Janome CoverPro 900CP! It was just delivered yesterday, so I haven't had a chance to play with it yet... I have a Christine Jonson top just waiting to be finished. It may actually happen now!



The end of another school year means another apron made for my daughters' teacher. Unfortunatley, I forgot to take a photo before I wrapped it. I used the Amy Butler pattern from the In Stitches book again, see last year's version here, using these fabrics that my daughters picked out...



It looked cute.
I hope that spending the time actually making a gift for a teacher shows them that I appreciate the work they do and the care that they give my daughters all year.

Dresses!

But not for me! I wish I could be more like Elaine, aka The Selfish Seamstress. Seems like the only time I sew lately is for other people. I've replaced a zipper and hemmed a friend's pants, hemmed same friend's shower curtain, let out and hemmed pants for DBF, and made birthday dresses for my daughters. For myself? Squat. What am I going to wear to the cocktail party at PR Weekend in Montreal? How about a toga?? :)

Here is a picture of the dresses I made for my daughters. They just turned 8 years old. The pattern is Simplicity 2380.



They each chose the fabric and the lace themselves. It was an easy pattern to sew, (thankfully, since I didn't start the dresses until two days before their birthday and they wanted to wear them to school on that day), and they are happy with them. I will definitely use the pattern again, probably for the short jumpsuits. But first, I have to sew something for myself to wear on PR weekend... at least an easy knit top...

Spring is here! Hibernation is over...

Apparently, I hibernate for 6 months. I can't believe I haven't posted here since September.
My excuses are:

1. I haven't really sewn anything all winter (except for the now traditional Christmas nightgowns for my daughters),

2. I started a few posts, but they never made it past draft mode, and

3. I had to cut down on the amount of time I was spending on the computer, which meant less time on Pattern Review and reading blogs.

I thought it was time to start blogging again, because I just registered for PR Weekend in Montreal. Why, you may ask? Because despite my lack of actual sewing, I am still somewhat enamoured with the "idea" of sewing...

I still wander around fabric stores, touching everything in sight and thinking about what I could make, but I am not allowing myself to purchase any fabric until I use some of my stash.

I still check out the pattern catalogs, and occassionally buy a pattern or two, even though I have MANY patterns that I have never used.

I'm excited to meet sewists who actually complete more than one project a year.

I'm hoping the weekend will inspire me to start actually sewing... gotta have something to wear...

And, I love Montreal, live just two hours away, and rarely get there.

I'm really looking forward to it!

Better late than never?

For some odd reason, I never finished my daughter's dress until last week, even though it only took about an hour and a half to finish...

Luckily, the weather is still warm here and they were able to wear their dresses to a birthday party yesterday. They don't usually dress the same, but sometimes it is cute.



Ignore the funny face on the one in the turquoise...

Wow!

I came across this on Yahoo news this morning and had to share it. You may have already seen it, but this is Danyl Johnson's audition for X Factor (another Simon Cowell show in the UK). He is an elementary school teacher. Personally, I didn't get the whole Susan Boyle thing, but this guy has star power!

Watch the audition

Long time no sew?

I haven't posted anything here for over a month, but only because I've been busy. My boss retired last week. She announced her retirement just 6 weeks ago, and my friend Sylvie and I made her a quilt as a retirement present. A king size quilt! We actually had it finished before she left. Although I had dabbled in quilting several years ago, I had never actually finished a quilt. However, Sylvie has completed several quilts, so I learned a lot from her. We had a good time working on it, it really looks beautiful, and my boss was happy with it. Sylvie has the pictures... I'll post one when she returns from her adventure in China!

Happy Canada Day!

Another school year over...

Another apron made.

If you've been following my blog, you may remember that last year I made my daughters' teacher an apron as an end of year thank you gift. So I did the same thing this year. I made the apron from Amy Butler's In Stitches again, and this time I made it in two fabrics as she intended. I love this apron. It goes together beautifully in one evening and I think it's a cute and thoughful gift.
I took a couple of pics before I wrapped it up. My girls tell me that their teacher loved it.

The Birthday Dresses

My daughters turned 7 last week. I know that every parent says this, but seriously, where did the time go??

In honour of the occasion, I decided to make them each a dress. Of course, they weren't ready on time, but I did finish one today, and the other is half done. I used Kwik Sew 3542 View B.

Both dresses will be in the same fabric, just different colours. One is pink, the other is turquoise (aqua?).

Here's the pink one:



I hope they fit...I'll post pictures of them wearing them in the near future.

On another note (pun intended...)

Last week I had the pleasure of attending a great show at our local performing arts theatre. I hadn't heard of the artist before buying the tickets (I bought them solely based on the newsletter I receive from the theatre, and was lucky enough to get front row seats).

My friend and I were totally blown away by this fabulous show, and I wanted to share with you. He was born in Cuba, but now lives in Canada. He sings in Spanish, but as one reviewer noted “Even if you don’t understand a lick of what he’s saying, you’ll feel him” - NY Post

Check out his website at AlexCuba.com and if you have the chance, see him live. I purchased his CD the day after the show, and have already purchased tickets for a show in August in a town two hours away...

Project Runway Canada

I finally watched the last episode of Season 2. (I LOVE my TiVo!) No surprise that Sunny won. He is absolutely amazing. Especially since you consider that he completed most of his collection in 8 weeks! Unfortunately, I will never be able to afford any of his clothes...

If you didn't catch it, you can watch Project Runway Canada here.

My new acquisition

My friend Sylvie is a little obsessed with sewing machines (she has several and multiple sergers...). She is always on the lookout on Kijiji and similar sites for machines. She has sent me a couple of ads over the last couple of months, mostly because she convinced me that I must have a machine with needle down (and I agreed after giving her Husqvarna a test run...).

Well, she recently sent me an ad that I had to check out. It sounded like a good deal, and the seller lived practically around the corner from me.

Meet my new Pfaff Tiptronic 1171.



I told my BF I got him a great deal on my birthday present - LOL.

I've had it for well over a week and haven't even had a chance to play with it yet. Tomorrow is the day!

Sewing Limericks

Someone started a thread on PatternReview.com of sewing limericks...I can't resist the opportunity to write a limerick...

There once was girl who could sew
At least that's what she said, but we know
Although much money was spent
On fabric and patterns, not rent
In the end there were no clothes to show!