Lined tracksuit

It's amazing how necessity can motivate me.  During May, we were planning to go camping to celebrate a friend's 50th birthday.  We knew it would be cold, so I had been looking around to find warm tracksuit for the girls.  Unfortunately, all the tracksuits I could find were woefully thin.  So, 2 days out before our camping trip, I popped into Spotlight and picked up a tracksuit pattern (Kwik Sew 3773), some polar fleece and some interlock (tshirt) knit material.  In my naive enthusiasm, I decided that I should line the tracksuit to give it some extra warth - what was I thinking?!



Left - small pink stars interlock knit; Right - multi-coloured hearts on red polar fleece

 I finished the trackpants in time for our camping trip and I was so glad that I did. While we were camping, the temperature fell below zero and Samantha ended up sleeping in her new trackpants inside her new sleeping bag.  She said they were "snuggly warm for camping". :)  Yay, a happy customer!

Anyway, last night I made the hooded jacket.  It definitely took extra time and effort to line both the pants and the jacket but I think it was worth it.  Now that I have some idea of how to put the lining into the garments, it should go much quicker next time.  And using the fleece and knit was easier than I expected.  This was my first attempt to sew a knit fabric and I'm really pleased with the reults.  Mind you, I think fleece is very forgiving.

I don't have an overlocker (serger) but it seemed to work okay using the 'overlocker' stitch on my sewing machine.  I just love the fact that I didn't have to finish off any raw edges - what a bonus!  I did my own thing with the pocket on the front - it came out reasonably well, but I know what I would do next time to make it a bit better.

I had some fleece fabric left over, so I made Samantha a scarf as well.  She's been wearing it around the house today, funny little monkey.

Anyway, I have to sew a tracksuit for Asha now.  And I'm going to line that as well.  But after that, they can make do with a few unlined trackkies - it is a lot more work!  At least now the girls will be set for winter camping (this year anyway).  :)

Ladybug dress

Over Easter I managed to make a dress for Asha - the ladybug dress she has been asking for.  Again, just a simple A-line pinafore that I have done several times before (too easy, New Look pattern 6504) but I added an appliqued ladybug on the front.  All up, it was a day's work and Asha is thrilled with it.  I made size 3, as that is the smallest size in the pattern and I did shorten it slightly, but I probably could have still chopped 2 extra inches off the bottom.

On my sister's wise advice, I added some black dots on the wings.  I think they really do make it look much better

Ladybug size was based on a saucer from the holiday unit where we were staying at Easter!

And modelled by the happy recipient.  With this length, it should be okay for quite a few months!

The fabric came from Spotlight - I used a yellow soda denim (which has a small amount of stretch) and then a few quilting scraps to make the applique.  The dress itself sewed up very quickly, but the applique took me a few hours to do.

I'm pretty happy with how it all turned out.

A-bunting we will go ...

I have been meaning to make this for a while, but finally got around to doing it yesterday.  A friend had a little baby girl a couple of months ago and I thought I would make some personalised bunting flags to decorate the room.  Making the bunting flags was super easy but everything associated with appliquing the letters was time-consuming.  Not particularly difficult, but just took a bit of time.

I practised on the letters with the straight edges first before tacking the 'e' and the 's'.  Those two letters took a bit more concentration.

In total, eight flags (six with letters, two that were blank)

The technical stuff  - for the lettering, I used Cooper Black font 350pt in Word.  The flags themselves were cut with a 9.5" base edge and 10.5" length from the base edge.  I used 1/4" seams and the binding was simply some ready made binding I picked up at Spotlight ages ago.

I hope the little girl likes it (or at least her Mum and Dad do!)  :)  I now have 2 orders for similar bunting flags from my own little girls ...

EB Potholder Surprise!

Yesterday I received a lovely package in the mail - it was my EB potholder swap!  Five colourful potholders made by some talented ladies - thank you!! 

There is divided opinion in the house as to which one is the best - we all have different favourites.  Both Samantha and Asha love the crazy house potholder (they each think it's a picture of themselves in the house).  But Samantha also loves the purple heart potholder, while Asha is a firm fan of the chocolate and pink bird potholder.  Pete likes the colourful scrappy potholder (I think it's the bold colours) but he is also impressed with crazy house.  And I have to admit, I can't pick a winner.  I keep changing my mind!

I won't delay, I will post up the pics straight away for everyone to see.



Crazy House potholder - a family favourite (made by Rebecca)




some free-motion quilting detail & the peek-a-boo girl in the window



Chocolate and pink bird potholder

Colourful scrappy potholder (made by KraftyKira )

Purple heart potholder (by Narelle)

Samantha keeps tracing the heart with her finger

Lavender paths potholder (again by Narelle)

The family voted and the crazy house potholder will hang as a feature in the kitchen in our new home (if/when it gets built) so I'll be putting it away for a little while so it doesn't get dirty.  Asha has already managed to get one of the potholders a little grubby, so I can see they will be well loved.  Thanks again ladies.

And many thanks to Rebecca for organising the swap, for being so patient and for including a treat in our packages!  You're awesome.  :)

One ruffle skirt completed ...

Finally I finished the ruffle skirt for Samantha.  It took a few late nights and loads of fabric. :)




Nie Nie skirt from Pink Fig Designs

  I changed the pattern slightly as I wanted a flat front, not the full elastised waistband.  (The back is elastised, so that gives a bit of growing room).  This took a bit of fudging from one of Samantha's old skirts and then took one ruffle before I was able to match up the fabric directions with the pattern.  But I think it works quite well.  Now that I have thought about it, I have also figured out how I would make it if I want the back section to easily allow elastic replacement.  Maybe I will try that next time.

Also, I used my ruffling foot, rather than manually gathering the ruffles.  That saved on a lot of time but I wasn't quite sure how much material it would use compared to gathering.  Turns out it used less fabric - I'd hate to think how full this skirt would be if I had manually gathered the full required amount of fabric.

The last two ruffles are 80 inches (2m) in length, so very long.  It adds up!  :)

Things I learnt - don't use a stretch denim.  It adds a lot of weight to the skirt.  Unfortunately, that's all I could get at the time when I bought the fabric and it does look good, but it makes it a heavy skirt. If using denim, go for lightweight denim.  Samantha does like the skirt, but she says it is heavy, so I'm not sure if she's going to wear it as much as she would if it was lighter.




Modelling her new skirt!




Time for a twirl!  It's a skirt made for twirling. :)

I'll make one for Asha, but will use lightweight denim.  That's next on the list ... 

Next project - a ruffle ra-ra skirt

Okay, so I'm on to my next sewing project.  Samantha has her birthday party coming up soon and if I can pull it off, I plan to make her a ruffle skirt for her party.  (As an aside, I can't believe my baby is turning 4!!)

I am going to make a modified version of the Nie Nie Skirt (by Pink Fig Designs).

Pic from Pink Fig website here

Instead of a full elastised waistband, I am making it flat at the front (like a yoke panel) with an elastised back.  The rest I will adapt as necessary - it's just strips of gathered/ruffled material.  This looks like a pattern that would suit an overlocker perfectly.  But it's all good.  It'll just take a bit more time to hem and finish off the seams with a sewing machine, that's all.

Anyway, the fabrics I am going to use for Samantha are

denim and two quilting cottons from Spotlight

And once I make this skirt for Samantha, I'll also make one for Asha.  The fabrics for her skirt are ...

denim and 2 cottons again

I have cut out all the ruffle strips for Samantha's skirt.  Will start hemming them tonight ... this is going to take some time ... wish me luck!

Sleeved pink dress with a ruffle

The lack of dresses for girls with sleves was part of the reason I became interested in sewing again.  The daycare centre has a very sensible sun-safe policy (which I completely agree with) which prohibits sleeveless shirts and dresses.  The problem is, many sundresses for little girls are strappy little things with no sleeves.

Anyway, I figured I'd start with something simple, so I selected this New Look pattern 6960.

I decided to view A/B, but without the embellishments

I knew it had a zip in it (one challenge) but what I didn't realise is that it also used bias binding to finish off the armhole seams.  I have never really used bias binding before, so that was a new experience. It certainly gives a neat finish to the seam, probably not a bad thing around the armholes. 

armhole detail - can you see how it is finished off?

The zip actually turned out great.  Probably the best zipper I have ever done.  Mind you, I have done some shockers in my time, so that's not necessarily saying too much.  :)  But this one turned out great and you can't even tell it's there - which is why I haven't included a photo.  It's really a nothing photo of the zipper.  :)

When it came to doing the hem, I decided at the last minute to add a ruffle.  So I cut 2 inches off the bottom and cut a few strips of left-over fabric for the ruffle.  I had bought a ruffle foot for my machine a couple of months ago, but this is the first time I have ever used it.  It's a wonderful piecing of engineering!  I love it.  It's very easy to use and make a great pleat.  It took me a while to figure out what ruffle setting to use and what stitch length but once I had that sorted, I was off like a rocket.  Again, I used bias binding to finish off the hem seam, just to make it neater.

the ruffle!



a close-up of the ruffle.  You can see how the seam was finished off as well.

 Anyway, here's the finished dress.  I will try to get a pic of Samantha in it tomorrow.  I made this so that she could wear it to daycare.  :)  She is excited to have a new dress for daycare, and it has a ruffle!!!

Feeling groovy ....

I have bought some fabric for Samantha's quilt.  At this stage I have no idea of the design, but I thought the Feeling Groovy range from Riley Blake was just great for Samantha.

Samantha loves the fabrics.  I bought a yard of most of the fabrics (there were a few brown/green ones I didn't get).

Now to think of a good quilt design that I can actually pull off - something bright and funky, and good for a 4 year old .... any ideas??  :)

Super Easy Chicken Roll

A friend at work shared this with me and I had to try it.  And she was right - it's super easy to do, looks a little bit fancy and was a huge hit with the kids.

What do you need?
- 100g proscuitto (or however you spell it)
- 2 skinless chicken breasts
- smooth ricotta (3-4 spoons)
- semi-dried tomatoes, probably about 1/4 cup
- fresh basil if you have it, finely chopped.  (could probably substitute dried basil)
- salt and pepper to taste
- cooking twine

What do you do?
Pre-heat oven to about 170 degrees.  Lengthways, cut each chicken breast so they are roughly the same thickness.  Belt the chicken with a mallet or similar (I used a very heavy rolling pin) until the meat is reasonably thinner than it was.  In a small bowl, mix the ricotta, tomatoes, basil, salt and pepper.

Now, you need to put it all together.  Lay out a piece of baking paper (non-stick is best but use whatever you've got).  Arrange the proscuitto in one layer, slightly overlapping as you go.  Then, over the top of the proscuitto, arrange the flattened chicken in the opposite direction (ie. if you laid the proscuitto in a north-south direction in front of you, try to arrange the chicken in a east-west direction).  You do this so that the chicken roll is a bit more stable when completed.  Then spread the ricotta-tomato mixture all over the chicken.

Now you are ready to start rolling it up.  Position the proscuitto-chicken in front of you so that it runs lengthways away from you.  Using the baking paper to help you, begin rolling the chicken onto itself.  It will probably only make one roll.  The hardest bit (or so I thought) was tying up the chicken roll so that it won't fall apart while cooking.  Start at the top end and wrap the twine around the top, tying it off with a knot (I think I used a granny knot or a reef knot - who cares, as long as it holds).  Then keep looping it around so you go down the chicken roll.  It does get a little bit messy but it's not too bad.  You do need a bit of twine for this, I suggest at least 3 times the length of the chicken roll.  When you have finished, it will look something like this ...

Pop it in the oven for roughly 45-50 minutes.  Let it rest for about 5-10 minutes before you slice it up. It comes out looking like this -

If you want to make it a more flavoursome, use regular bacon instead of proscuitto.  It'll be a lot fattier though.  The preparation of the chicken roll probably took me about 10-15 minutes and using the cooking twine was much easier than I expected.

I made this over the weekend and it was a huge hit with the whole family.  I have already been asked when can we have it again.  :)

Birthday Hat for William

One of Samantha's little friends, William, is having a birthday soon and I thought I would make a hat for him.  Don't ask me why, I have no idea what got into me. :)  Must have been full moon or something.

Anyway, I decided to use the Lazy Day Hat from Make It Perfect, my first "indie" pattern.  It's a reversible bucket hat and comes in 4 sizes (small, medium, large and extra-large).  Samantha picked out the fabric for the hat, although I had to convince her that William would probably prefer a colour other than pink (her firm favourite).  The fabric came from Spotlight's quilting cotton range (I don't know the details).

I cut out the fabric and interfacing one  night and sewed it the next night.  The sewing probably took me about 2 hours I reckon, in between chatting to hubby and watching bits and pieces of TV.

Anyway, this is what I finished up with ...

The "outside"

The "inside"

I'm pretty happy with it.  Samantha thinks it fits fine and now she wants one, in pink of course!  What do you think?