Halloween 2015

Most you you have already seen these pictures, but I thought I'd add our Halloween pictures to the blog for those of you that don't follow me on Facebook or Instagram.  I don't really know why, but I got the idea in my head to make our costumes this year.  Don't get me wrong, I've almost always made my Halloween costumes, but my idea this year involved some serious time and effort.  I saw a tutorial on Pinterest for a Peter Pan costume that I thought looked adorable and easy, so I thought it would be awesome if we were all characters from Peter Pan!  Here is the result:

I sewed/made everything except Captain Hook's wig, hat, hook, and pants, and Tinkerbell's wings.  Everything else was handmade by me.  Crazy, right?!  I was super happy with how it all turned out!  I learned lots of new things in the process.  I can promise you right now that our costumes next year will be less work for me.  Ha!

Crib Teething Guard

Since Natalie has been pulling up to standing, she has started chewing on the edge of her crib.  I had already read about babies doing that, so I was prepared.  :)  In order to protect the crib from teeth marks, I made a crib teething guard!  I just looked at pictures of other teething guards online and made up a pattern.  I still have some fleece left over from my T-Shirt Quilt, so I used that as the bottom to give it a little padding.  The hardest part of this project was just measuring the crib to make sure everything would line up right.  The sewing itself was simple.  :)

Here's a look at her crib now.  I still think it's weird that her mattress is all the way down!

I do miss the crib skirt.  :(  It just doesn't look as good without it.  But on a happier note, here's the baby!  ;)

The Blue Dress

So, here we are, 2 days past my due date and no baby.  What have I done with my time?  Well, lots of being lazy, some productivity around the house, and even a little crafting.  I had enough blue fabric and thread left over from the lamp shade, curtains, and crib skirt to make a little blue dress.  :)  It really didn't take that long.  I was able to finish it in two sittings.  I'm sure an experienced sewer could finish it in one.  I'm proud of myself!  It's the first time I ever had to sew a curved line and I think it came out well!

The free pattern and tutorial can be found here.

  I think it'll go really well with the sweater set that I made her, don't you?  

The Finished Nursery

I finally finished the nursery!  I finished my last project last night, 3 days before my due date.  I'm still kind of shocked that I'm done.  I was convinced that I'd never get all the sewing done.  I'm still new at sewing and pretty slow...  BUT I finished.  :)  Yay!

I've known for a long time that her nursery would be in peacock colors.  I took the following picture last year at the San Francisco Zoo and it has been the inspiration for my plans.

So I'll show you the room in general, then go into details about what all I did.

From the doorway.

From the closet.  **Updated on 7.10.13 so that you can see her initial!**

Standing by the crib.  (Yes, there is a big coffee stain on the Winnie the Pooh book.  My dad did that a long time ago.  haha)

The first thing I finished was arranging the peacock feathers in the vase.  I bought the feathers at Michael's.

I love peacock feathers!

My first sewing project was the lamp shade.  I found this one on Pinterest.  She used pre-ruffled ribbon.  I wasn't going to find anything in the colors I wanted, so I made my own ruffles....  LOTS of cutting, pressing, hemming, and ruffling.  I then glued the strips onto the lamp shade (with Travis' help).

I also found curtain inspiration on Pinterest.  I found several cute curtain ideas, but this one was my favorite.  She makes it sound super easy and like it was whipped together, but it took me FOREVER.  Again, LOTS of cutting, pressing, hemming, and ruffling.  I eventually finished it.

While I worked on the curtains, I figured out what to hang on the wall by the dresser.  I crocheted a couple of flowers to glue onto her initial (instructions for these flowers can be found here), and glued on a peacock feather.  I also printed and framed the following two pictures.

This picture was found online here.

I made this on Photoshop.

**Update: 7.10.13 - This picture has been added so you can see her initial!**

The last project I had was to sew a crib skirt.  I wanted to do a ruffly one similar to the lamp shade, but the way our crib is made, not all of the colors would have shown.  So I made up my own crib skirt.  I think it turned out pretty well!

From the front.

From the side.

  So there you go!  What do you think?  :)  Now all we're waiting for is the baby to decide to show up...  

T-Shirt Quilt

I have a lot of t-shirts.  I have collected them over the years through high school, college, and grad school...  I still wear some of my t-shirts, even if they are old (one even has a hole in the back...), but there is a large number of t-shirts hanging out in a plastic bag in my closet - well, until recently.  I just couldn't throw away these shirts due to sentimental reasons, despite their bad fit, holes, and age.  So I had the idea of turning them into a blanket!  I know this is not an original idea, but it came to me none the less.  So I googled "T-shirt Blanket" and "T-shirt Quilt," and I found this blog.  Of all the websites on making a t-shirt quilt, I followed this one the most.  

~ I was talking to Marla on the phone right after my recent sewing machine purchase, and I was telling her all about it and my plan to make a blanket.  Her response?  She started laughing at me and told me I was like an old lady...  then proceeded to assure me that "that was a cool thing."  haha  Thanks, Marla!  ;) ~

I did make my blanket slightly differently than the lady who wrote the blog.  For starters, I wanted the shirt logos to be as centered as possible, so instead of making a bunch of (non-centered) big squares, I came up with 4 different sizes.  18x12, 12x12, 6x12, and 6x6.  (I added 1/2 inch to each of these numbers to account for the 1/4 inch seam allowance that I used.)  I had some white fabric that I had purchased to practice with on my machine, and I had enough left over that I measured out the 4 types of squares to make templates.  Since it was white fabric, I was able to see the logo underneath when I pinned it to the shirt.  Then I just cut around it!

After ALL of the shirts were cut up, I laid them out on my bed to see how I wanted them arranged.  I also figured out where I needed "filler" squares to make the blanket the size I wanted.  To make the filler squares, I just cut out plain fabric from the same shirts I'd already used.

Then I started sewing!  I would sew one row at a time....

....then attach the finished row to the one before it.

My seams weren't completely perfect, but (considering this is the first sewing project that I've done since 8th grade!) it came out pretty well!

After all 5 of my rows were sewn together, I went to the store and bought some fleece to be the back of my blanket.  I bought the cheapest stuff I could find (fabric can be pricey!).  Since my blanket was 60 1/2 inches wide (don't forget the seam allowance!), I wasn't able to find fleece that was wide enough to have just one strip.  So I bought 4 yards of fleece, cut it in half, and sewed those 2 pieces together.  Then I put the right sides of the t-shirts and fleece together and pinned it all the way around.  I sewed the edges closed, leaving a 1 foot hole in the bottom so that I could flip the blanket right side out.

~ When I had finished this step, I was carrying the blanket back upstairs to flip it inside out and Travis asked me, "Are you sure that you sewed it together right?"  (Joking, of course.)  I replied, "Of course!"  Then I got to the bed and laid the blanket down.  It was obviously still inside out, and as soon as I laid it down I shouted, "Oh, s#*^!"  BAhahahahahaha!  You should have seen his face.  I really freaked him out.  He truly thought that I'd messed up.  It was awesome. ~

When it was all flipped inside out, I pinned the hole closed.  Then I sewed an edge all the way around the blanket to give it that "finished" look.  I sewed the hole closed during this step.  And that was it!  I was done!

I LOVE this blanket!  It's so soft!  It feels like a giant sweatshirt.  :)

*All of these pictures were taken on my phone.  Sorry for the not so awesome quality.*