Skirt Makeover

A couple of years ago, Anna published a tutorial on how to make a simple girly skirt. My daughter, Merissa, made my younger daughter, Olivia, three new skirts from this pattern. We altered the pattern by making it an elastic waist skirt, rather than a drawstring type closure. It's a simple circle skirt design, which worked wonderfully.



Olivia keeps getting taller and taller, and only slighter wider, which allows her to wear her clothes for a long time. Merissa gave a good length to the skirt, which has allowed Olivia lots of time to wear these skirts. However, it is now time to fix the skirts to make them so they are not as snug. The length is still fine and she could get lots more use out of these skirts, so I decided to take the skirt apart and make news ones from them. First, I unpicked the seam, then I took out the elastic.



Next, I added some a decorative, cotton, embroidered tape, where the seam had been. I overlapped the edges to give a wrap appearance to the skirt. Once the tape was sewn on, I then sewed the skirt shut, from the bottom to about 3 inches below the waist, so that Olivia could get in and out of the skirt. The waistband is closed with a hook and eye.



A Faux wrap skirt. :)

Josties coming to town

On September 15th, our local homeschool group will be having Dale and Lisa Jost sharing with us. Dale will be speaking on "being a Christian man in a post-Christian world and how to model it for our kids”. Lisa will be speaking on "building character into our children". Since these topics appeal to all parents, we would like to invite those who homeschool and those who do not, to join us for an evening of learning and growing.

On Wednesday, September 16th, the Josties will be sharing their musical talents with us. They will have just started their Western tour, and we are thrilled they will be stopping by to bless us. The concert will be held at Grace Baptist Church in, Airdrie at 7:00 p.m. Please come join us for a wonderful evening.

If you have any question about either event, please feel free to contact me.

Carol

Sewing Class projects

I know as a mum, we often times feel we need to do everything. I fall into that camp from time to time, especially when it comes to sewing projects. I find myself not wanting to purchase things that I know I can sew, but then, I don't have the time to actually make it, so then nothing ever gets done.

This same thing happens when it comes to teaching my own boys sewing. Sad? Maybe, but I can't teach everything. I have to pick and choose what I am going to teach and then allow others to help in the teaching process. I have taught my boys *some* sewing. They have used my machines and I have taught them how to trace out their patterns, onto trace-a-pattern interfacing, label their pieces and to store them. We all know, there's more to sewing then just that. They need to know about fabric and whether or not it has nap, one way direction, width of fabric, selvage edge etc. Well, I did teach them about selvage edge, but never had them actually cut their fabric out. So, this past week, I put them in a sewing camp with a wonderful instructor. Alison has so much energy and my boys really like her. On top of that, Alison has a lovely store, she offers great classes and has a wonderful assortment of fine fabrics and is expanding into more fabrics. I want to support her business, so putting my boys in her class was a win win situation. My boys learned how to use different machines and played with different features. Their class was for two hours a day for four days, since Monday was a holiday, otherwise it would have been 5 classes. My boys enjoyed themselves so much. They are eager to start more projects.

My boys learned how read their pattern instructions, follow instructions from their teacher, finish their raw edges, add pockets, insert elastic into the back of their pants, and all the other fine details that come with making a project. Alison allowed them to choose whatever project they wanted. This was a great first project for them.

Here are pictures of Samuel and Joel in their new pj bottoms. Samuel made pj shorts and Joel made pj pants. These are made from flannelet fabric with the camouflage print. Their shirts they are wearing don't match the pj's but that's OK.

I am eager to have my boys work on more projects, and sew ;) are they.

Bridal Apron

Here's the apron, that started my thinking on a bridal shower gift. Working with Emilie's colours, I found the perfect embroidered, cotton fabric, that was of the right weight for an apron. I found the lovely cotton gingham fabric to use for the bias tape features. The pattern I chose to use was Butterick 4945, using view D. Of course I had to make my own modifications to this. All of these lovely items were in my 'stash', for the right project, for the right time.

Changes I made to the apron were:

-I added 3" to the length, but I did that at about the waist line, not at the hemline.

-I did not go for a smaller size, as I like to have good coverage when working. I decided to use the size Large, to make sure there was good coverage, for when and if the Lord blesses Emilie with a child. It's nice to have an apron you can wear in your pregnancy, that doesn't tie around the waist, and you can adjust the straps.

-I ditched the facings on the upper sides and put biased edging instead.

-I used my favorite treatment for the shoulder/waist straps. I made long straps that thread through loops I have made, using the bias tape, so that I can adjust the apron as needed, both for the shoulder area and the waist. I saw this treatment on an old apron, from around the year 1910 and have seen it in antique and vintage apron patterns. It's my favorite way to make an apron adjustable.

Emilie tried on her apron, and she looked so good in it. I wish I had snapped a picture of that one, oh well. Maybe next time.

Bridal Shower Gift

Last May, we (Merissa, Olivia and I) had the privilege of attending a bridal shower, for a lovely young woman that I have known for 21 years. I thought I would share the gift we gave her, to help inspire others to think of different gifts you can give. I don't always like to give what's on a registry, so I try to be creative and practical, if I can. Staying on the theme of practical, I also went with 'green', since that's what we do these days, right? ;)

We started with the basket and built it up from there. One of my favorite Bridal shower gifts I received, when I was getting married, was Tupperware. I liked being able to have lovely storage containers for my left over food or just to put newly made food in for take along lunches. With that in mind, we added several of the lovely Pyrex glass containers with lids. We have these in our home and we love them. Next, we added some tea towels, as every new bride needs some of those, plus they help keep the glass Pyrex from getting broken in transportation. We had to add a little something from the children, so we made a few gift bags that they can now use to start their own collection for their family. I actually started this gift, with the apron. One of Emilie's colours for her wedding was brown. So of course, I had to make her a brown apron with some lovely cotton, brown gingham bias tape to go with it. I'll give more information on it in my next post, which will be about the apron. To go with her apron, I thought I would give her a special, OOP (out of print) apron pattern, for 'one day' when she has a daughter of her own, or to share with her many new nieces she just received by marrying into a lovely family. It's the prized Simplicity 7856 pattern that matches the mother's wrap apron pattern. For some reason, Simplicity never brought back the girl's version of the pattern. The green box that is holding all the pieces of the gift, is for shopping. We also added in some reusable shopping bags, to help them start their shopping trips. Last, but not least, I wrapped the gift in a cotton fabric, that can be made into a lovely apron. If you look closely, you can see it has the 'B Attitudes' written on it.

We had so much fun putting this gift together. What a lovely couple they are! :)

I apologize that these pictures are not terrific. It was last minute, just before running out the door, that I got the bright idea to take pictures of the gift. I hope the pictures help to inspire more interesting, fun gifts.

Remember the gym dress?

For those of you from the S&S site who have seen my sewing for Olivia, remember this gymdress? I made this for her in Jan. of '08.





Darling Olivia keep growing and her once lovely, well fitting gymdress now looks like this:



It's gotten shorter and she now has holes in the knees. Look how short those pant legs are? It's time for a new gymdress. This gymdress served her very well for her sports classes. She will be in sports again, in the fall, so now I have to think of another gym outfit for her. She's so skinny that nothing stays up on her waist. This dress was perfect for her....so maybe I will just do another one. Oh, and remember her swimdress?





It's a very good thing I made that large tuck on the inside of the bodice. It has now been let out, giving her more room in the trunk, but the legs and skirt are just starting to get short. I am hoping I can use it in the fall, when she goes back into classes. If not, I will need to make a new swimdress for her. My outdoor fabric place shut up shop this year, I will have to keep my eyes open for good swimming fabric, elsewhere.

24 Years And Counting

I had hoped to do this post, earlier in the week, but we lost our wedding album. With all our renovations over the past few years, we keep moving things and losing them. The lost album in now found, so I thought I would share one of my sewing projects with all of you, from 24 years ago.

Long before I knew of sergers, I was finishing my seams with pinking shears and zig zag stitches. This dress was made using that finishing technique. It was really fun to pull out my dress, this week. Merissa was looking for some ideas for a project she was working on, so she dug out the box with my wedding clothes in it. When we unzipped the bag, holding the dress, I could *smell* the smells that reminded me of 24 years ago. :) Looking back over my sewing work has been fun. The dress was constructed very well, BUT the fitting on me, was less than perfect. Now when I see my wedding pictures, I just cringe as I see the one major area that needed attention, oh well. Twenty-four years later, I now know what to do. Too bad I can't go back and fix it up. I just have to humbly remember I did the best I could at the time. We had just finished Bible school and were on a small budget. While I usually enjoy lace and frills, for my dresses, I wanted elegant and simple. No lace, no ruffles, just simple satin that draped oh so beautifully. We had a wonderful day, even though it was very full. I'll save the story for next year, provided the Lord gives us another year.

Here are some pictures of the dress. There is the one in there of my father. I miss him very much. July marks 7 years since his passing, it's so hard to believe that time has marched on so quickly. I hope you enjoy the pictures and can laugh a bit with me, as you see my little fitting issues.

The dress



The Bride and Groom


Back of dress



My Dad


The dress, today, after coming out of the bag and box.




Just for fun, here is the engagement photo that was part of our wedding invitation, the napkin and the program.

I hope you have fun looking.

Just a note. If you click on the photos, you will see the full picture. I haven't figured out all the photo details for blogger. :)