1/2 pairs of pj's...

Ryan and Emelia need some pj's for this between season weather. I made them a top each using the same pattern as the summer ones. I decided to be clever and put in a v neck but i did a shocking job! LOL so i googled some instructions and did a slightly better job on the second one. still looks pretty terrible though. I had to add bands to ryan's sleeves so they'd be long enough (size 3 again, i think the sizing is pretty small)

I need to make the pants to match but I had cut out a pair out of fleece and i'm not happy with the shape or size so I'll have to try another pattern. perhaps i'll try the kwik sew pattern (that matches the shirts) but in a size 4...

PS: the nappy cover ryan is wearing is a gorgeous soft soft bum jumper made by alice!

pants report

the pants fit ok.
the waist only just fits, so need the elastic to be bigger (was 18cm + fabric, try 22/23)
the length in the body is fine (bit long but growing room) but the legs are way too short - need to cut the centre panels longer by about 3-4cm
width is great

I'm back!

Poor Miss Rory has no pants to wear! hehe Emelia was twice her size at birth, so never needed small sizes and for some reason I sold all ryan's smaller pants and jackets. I didn't want to buy any, so today I had a go at making some pants. Very difficult to find such a small size and I am not a pattern drafter but I managed to convert a pattern to sort of fit (not that I've actually tried these on Rory yet!)

They are Ottober 1/2006, pattern #3 for the baby trackpants. the smallest size was a 62, so I drafted a 56 and cut them out with no seam allowance. made them up as far as the waist elastic and tried them on Rory - WAY too big!! so I went back (luckily I'd bought a decent amount of stretch towelling from Alice!) and made more alterations. As premmies are generally quite long and skinny I folded 2cm out of the middle of the front and back pattern pieces. As the pants were quite long I cut the panels out and joined them, again all this was done with no seam allowance.

I had a hard time sewing the stretch towelling - I'm not used to stretch! (the colorado cotton is very low stretch). silly me didn't think to cut the top and bottom panels against the grain, as they were meant to be cut (i only decided to cut the pieces after cutting out the whole legs) so it was very very stretchy. I applied the elastic the ottobre way, which as usual looks great, but it more fiddly, especially with such a tiny waist!

Hopefully these will fit and I can make a couple more pairs - i will try to decorate the other pairs with some ribbing, ribbon, iron on designs etc etc

no craft lately!

due to pregnancy related problems i ended up in hospital for 4 weeks before Aurora / rory was born. I did get my scrapping stuff brought in and did half of a mini album as well as a few cards, but i was very uninspired and not in the mood to scrap so did nothing of note. also didn't make it to the sewing circle for obvious reasons ;o)

hope to get back to something soon but am just coping with Rory in the SCN and an infected scar for myself atm...

stuff done - yay

LOL gotta love a descriptive title huh?

well, the stuff i done (great grammar too ;o)) is this morning i cut out a top and pants for emelia to take to sewing circle ** and just now i have scrapped a layout for scrappin dreams. of course i've now realised i can't post it til it's on the site DAMN! lol will have to remember to come back here in a few days...

** i don't think i posted about sewing circle - this is run by our local community college and is not a class but just 2 hours a week on a monday evening when you go to the college (like senior high school) and can spend the time sewing. you have to take your own machine and materials, and there is no teacher though everyone can offer help. hopefully i'm going with 2 girlfriends i've met online and it will be nice to have that dedicated time :o)

EB Scrap Swap layout

my swap partner sent me a package that had lots of oranges, greens and some browns and reds. orange is a challenge! but I eventually realised i had the perfect photos and i was really happy with how this turned out! i still have to find out the date and stamp it in the centre slide.

Sewing at last!

gosh it's a long time since i've done anything creative!!

anyway, i finally got to do an ottobre pattern. if you go to the website and click on the little magazine at the bottom 2/2005 (the one with the boy in blue shirt and girl in green dress, then go to page 7, i made that little top. cute huh.

it was more complicated than i thought but only because it used different techniques. so instead of creating a casing and threading elastic through it, i had to stitch elastic onto the hem, then turn and top stitch. looks great even though it took a lot more effort in the making. the other funny thing i had to do was to attach the ribbon for the bow. not sure if it's just my shonky bow tying, but if i sewed the ribbon on horizontally the bow sat vertically LOL so i had to unpick that and sew the ribbon on vertically and now the bow sits perfectly ;o)

i suspect the top will be a bit big for emelia and will be put away for next year, but i'll try it on her shortly and see (she' only just woken up and is calling to be gotten out of bed right now)

if this top looks nice on here i'm planning on splurging on some batik fabric like they've used in the mag (around $30 / m unless i can find a cheaper source) and making her another.

stop confusing me! LOL (and more supplies for the craft i'm not doing)

people on my blog list (see right) keep changing where they're blogging to. don't they know they shouldn't confuse a pregnant woman like this? LOL

i have been busily increasing my sewing and scrapping supplies but haven't actaully done anything lately. i have lost my scrapping mojo and it's been wAY too hot to sew.

i have traced off a heap of patterns from ottobre 2/05 and i've cut out a couple. just have to sew...

hopefully i will scrap this weekend, as i got my scrap swap pack from my partner at EB and also my DT pack from scrappin' dreams (gorgeous papers i've never seen before!).

january crop yesterday

and i did basically nothing! i just couldn't get inspired, i wasn't feeling the best. i started the morning by sorting gill's ribbons into colours, then read some magazines, then went to spotlight with mum, where i got a pair of serra sharp scissors on sale as well as some patterns (sale) and fabrics (mostly reduced). i had bought a cheap pair of scissors last year but they are soooo not as good as serra sharps...

then finally, after lunch, i swapped photos with rebecca for inspiration, and did a layout of zoe for her. that was fun though i think my layout might have been a bit too simple and girly for her. she did one of emelia for me which is just gorgeous, i don't know how she comes up with her ideas! i have to journal it so will post it sometime...

then i started a layout i didn't finish. that was it for 6 hours of scrapping time ROFL

more scraplifts ;o)

it's all i have the brainpower for lol

these ones scraplifted from the current scrapbook creations. note that one page is for each child's album - one of my little tricks is to do identical or near identical pages for each, the 'designing' is what takes so much time, so while emelia's took probably 1.5 hours, ryan's only took about 20 minutes LOL

new jammies for ryan!

today i made up 2 pairs of pj's for ryan. (I'd cut them out on Sunday). took me about 2.5 hours i think. it makes life so much faster with an overlocker - thanks mum LOL (i just visited hers)

these pj's were made from more of the colorado cotton from alice's co-op, using cornflower blue and new lime green. I hadn't thought to but ribbing used is some white mum had stashed away, and top-stitched everything with white to tie it all in. the two pairs are opposite colourways (ie: blue sleeves / green body and vice versa)

the pattern for the shirt is the raglan shirt from the sewing for toddlers book (thanks to a cyberfriend, emjay) and the shorts patter is from the same one i used to make emelia's pink christmas dress (yes, it's a girl's pattern but perfect for boxers!) believe it or not these are a size FOUR (ryan is a size 2, going into a 3). at least i know they'll fit next year!

scraplift challenge

I set a scraplift challenge in a group i'm part of - we had to go to the blue bazaar website and scraplift a layout by the design team.

here is the layout i scraplifted http://www.bluebazaar.com.au/bb/album_showpage.php?full=&pic_id=6359

Maternity Top #2!

I made version number two of this pattern. Love this fabric (and it doesn' t look like an apron LOL) and it looks great with my chocolate brown pants.

anyway, i gathered this one across the front which sits nicer than the pleats of the last one. put sleeves in and decided to do gypsy style elastic which i'm not so keen on but don't hate. I didn't cut this one bigger and while it fits it only just does so!

overall i'm pretty happy and i must say i love this pattern it's so quick and simple :o)

Pattern used is butterick 4201

christmas stuff part 3 - santa sacks

these are unfinished, but i just ran out of time (and energy) before christmas! i got one of my scrapping buddies to scan her foam stamps with the kids' names and i blew them up and printed them out to use as templates. the fabric was christmas quilting fabric from hobbysew and the red sack is made from colorado cotton ordered through a co-op (thanks alice :O)) on aus co-op. i should have put the names on the bottoms of the sacks but too late now. before next christmas i will have to make a third one of course LOL plus create drawstrings on the top of each...

Scrapbook Swap page

This was done last night (first page in ages!) for a scrapbook swap in a baby group i'm part of. the other mum sent her photos to me and i was able to scrapbook them however i wanted. this was a total scraplift, though i used patterned papers which i think improved it. i wnated to scan and enlarge the pciture on the left but we didn't have any photo paper, it's a bit lopsided - heavy on the right page.

christmas stuff part 2 - cards

next year i must remember to make 'normal' sized cards, so they don't cost more than twice as much to send LOL

again with the basic grey - this time their new blitzen range. machine stitching and ribbons also, bazzill card (doodlebug)

i had a drama with the photos as i'd spent HOURS getting them just right for printing and they came back with the C cut off but also too wide to fit on the card!

christmas stuff - cd tins

now that christmas is over i can show these off. i think people really liked the cd covers, inside the tin were some cd's and dvd's with pics of the kids on them...

they looked much nicer in real life than in the photo of course.

i used the basic grey fusion range to do them. the flowers are punches, the funky one for the big one. the tag pocket is sewn on and rub ons for the r&e.

i dimensional magicked random bits of the patterns which looked really effective.

these were given to grandparents and aunts & uncles

this afternoon's effort...

i'm really proud of this! i don't like it, but i'm proud of it LOL

i thought it would look really funky to have the two fabrics together but ummm, no! it looks like i'm wearing an apron ROFL! anyway, i am pleased with how long it took me and with the job i did on it, very neat. I'm also very happy that i successfully altered the pattern to fit. I have some other fabric so i'm goign to try to make another tomorrow - this is my only sleeveless maternity shirt and it's goign to be 38'c for the next 2 days (AAAAGH!)

this shirt was also really cheap to make - about $7 in fabric from spotlight and a $5 on sale pattern :) (a butterick one)

aagh i can't get the stupid photo to appear below this text instead of above!! grrrr

emelia's christmas dress

i made emelia a little dress for christmas. it was a little trickier than i expected but i was still pretty happy with it. i did the bias binding facings as the pattern explained but mum told me of a better way to do it (the way i did it means that all the raw edges were left showing) . it's a nice size for her and she should be able to wear it next year too :o)

yesterday's scrapping project

i wanted to make this for geoff for christmas but i just couldn't find the time or energy until now (after a week on holiday).

here's a bigger image of it

really want to get into scrapping for others again but i just don't have the energy for making whole albums. I've been thinking of cards but then I decided this might work. if I was to make them I would offer a few different colour / design choices, and would charge about $15 plus postage. you'll have to imagine that i've completed the calendar (which would be a month to a page, tear away at the end of each month) as i have too much of a headache to make it now. also, the photo just sits inside the photo corners so it can be replaced monthly or as often as desired. the whole thing (other than calendar, photo etc) has been sealed to protect it.

i posted it on a group i'm part of and someone reminded me that calendars really need to be sold before now, so i'm contemplating if this is a dud idea or if I could simply sell it with say 15 months worth of calendar. or whether i even can be bothered LOL