Springing into 2012 Gardening

It's been such a warm winter that today is St. Patrick's day and it already feels like early June (according to the local weather man).  I really should have planted my tomato seeds two weeks ago, but that weekend was too windy and last weekend I was out of town.  Today is beautiful outside, so I planted cherry tomato seeds.  I learned from my mistakes last year.  I didn't realize how big of a pot these plants actually need, so I kept having to re-pot them.  I also dumped an entire bag of tomato seeds into a few pots since I didn't know what the germination rate would be.  Needless to say, I was overwhelmed with plants (I had almost 40 of them, I believe).

This year, I'm starting smaller and smarter.  Many people use special small pots for their plants.  I took one look at an empty egg carton & realized each compartment was the perfect size.  I planted 22 seeds.  I really only want 6 plants, so any more that sprout will be sold at our yard sale.  I know lots of people like to deal with seedlings instead of actually growing them from seed themselves.  I'm not even 100% sure these seeds are ok; they have been sitting in the freezer all winter.  So, we will see what sprouts!

Oh, Baby!

I AM FINALLY DONE WITH THE ENTIRE BABY OUTFIT!!  Did I mention that I am super-ecstatic about this?  Today I finished the second headband:

And the dress!!

Front view of dress:

Back view of dress:

And, because I needed a model & couldn't resist, I enlisted my old teddy bear to show off the entire outfit (although he's not wearing the bloomers because they're not visible under the dress & they're way too big on him).

Outfit #1:

Outfit #2:

Outfit #3:

I'm DYING from cuteness over here!  I am so amazed at how well all of this turned out.  I never in a million years thought I would be sewing anything, let alone an entire baby ensemble.  

I am going to go relax, clean up my mess of a sewing room, and take a break from sewing for a couple of weeks!  I have spent weeks working on this project, and I am in a bit of sewing overload right now.  I'd like to thank both my co-worker (thank you Mary!) and my sewing teacher (thank you Nancy!) for helping me understand the pattern directions for this project!  The dress instructions were difficult to understand and I appreciate their help!

Designing on the Fly

Today's goal was to make the baby hat and hopefully start on the second headband.  The hat seemed to be a breeze at first.  It was looking like I was going to finish it up well ahead of when I expected to.  But then I almost finished the sewing and flipped it right-side out to complete it (all the sewing was done on the inside while it was inside-out)....and it looked terrible.  I know I followed the pattern steps correctly.  It was just....a bad design.  Ick.  I could not give this to my best friend for her baby! 


Let's review: the hat in the pattern is supposed to look like this:

It basically looks like an upside-down tulip, which seems like it would be really cute on a baby.  What I sewed resulted in a puffy, bloated tulip-y mess.  So I had to improvise (need I remind you that I am still a novice sewer?!?)  It did take me a little while to work out what I was going to do and go over it a few times to make sure that I had my plans straight.  Basically, I flipped the hat inside-out again, cut off all of the scalloped bottom edges of the hat, and made the hat look like a long beanie-type hat.  It's the best I could do with my limited sewing & designing abilities, but I think it's pretty cute:

Not bad for having to redesign it on the fly, huh?  Once the hat was all rounded away (bad joke, sorry), I did start on the second headband but that will be completed another day.  And I intend to finally fix the snaps on the dress as well!

One Tiny Step Closer

I am THIS CLOSE to being done with the baby dress.  Having never used hammered-on snaps before, I ended up destroying more snaps than I needed, so a trip to the store is in order to buy more snaps.

However, I did make one of the baby headbands!  This headband is adorable.  Do you see the tiny bow?  I mean, DO YOU SEE the tiny bow?!?  It is SO cute!  (For comparison, it's being modeled on a clothes hanger; The headband is about 1 inch wide.)  It wasn’t too hard to make.  I think the hardest part was figuring out how to turn fabric tubes inside out.  I’m pretty sure I did it the hard way and will try a different tactic when I make the second headband.  I also hope the headband isn’t too big.  Again, I had to turn to the internet for baby measurements; however, I didn’t realize that while making the headband, you end up stretching it a little while you are sewing it, so I hope it’s not too big.  I will try to make the second headband a little smaller.  Now if you'll excuse me, I'm off to find more snaps.

It’s Blooming Up Cuteness!

Well, I did start the dress first.  However, I got stuck on one part of the pattern instructions and got frustrated, so I made the bloomers instead today!  (I don’t understand how the directions for the dress are so hard to understand, yet I was able to make the bloomers without any difficulty.  *sigh*)

Front:

Back:

These bloomers are just TOO cute!  However, not having an actual baby to measure, I had to do some research to get this done.  When I first started this pattern, I wasn’t sure which size to pick.  The pattern wasn’t very helpful either, since it gave approximate weight for each size and did not give approximate age for the sizes.  A friend suggested that I figure out how old the baby would be during the summer (since this is a summer-y outfit), and look at baby clothes in stores to see how many months old equated to approximately how much weight.  Upon further investigation, it appeared that I needed to make the small size of the dress & bloomers.  I’m so glad I asked my friend about it; I was originally going to make the medium size, which would have been too big for the baby to wear.  I also had to do more investigation; the directions for the bloomer waistband stated to measure the baby’s waist for the amount of elastic to use.  Again, since I don’t have a baby to measure, I turned to the internet to figure out measurements for a 6 month old (the baby should be between 2 and 6 months old during the warmer months here).

I am SO happy with how the bloomers turned out!  They are too cute!!  I love the ruffled edges at the bottom!  And I am so impressed with how finished they look (i.e. they don’t look like something that was just thrown together).  In a way, I am glad that the dress directions were a little too difficult and made me stop.  Being able to make the bloomers (and in a day, no less!) and see one finished product from this big project has given me a LOT of encouragement to tackle the dress where I left off….but after I take the pattern to my friend and ask for her help in understanding it first!

Cuteness Awaits

Back in November, I purchased this pattern for a baby dress (see the dress the baby is modeling):

This past weekend, I found these fabrics and notions:

Can you see the cuteness coming together?!?!?  My plan is (crossing my fingers and toes) to make the dress and the headband that the baby in the picture is wearing out of the light pink material.  What you don’t see on the baby is a pair of bloomers that I also plan on making out of the light pink material.  Also, the dark pink material is destined to be a hat and another headband.  (You can’t hear me squealing with delight at all of the intended cuteness, but I assure you that I am.) 

Now, I do have a due date (pun intended) for all of this.  The entire ensemble is going to be a present for my best friend who is due in early April.  She is having two baby showers.  I plan on having this done and give to her for the second shower, which is March 9^th.  Just in case all of my good intentions are too lofty, I plan on making the dress first, then the bloomers, and then the hat and headbands.  The dress is the centerpiece; the rest is icing on the cake.  And what baby doesn’t look extra cute with accessories?

Bedside Organizer – Done!!

I did it!  I followed a pattern all by myself (and even modified it, I might add) and have a finished project!  It wasn’t all rainbows and roses, (it was tricky trying to figure out how to sew the seams around the pockets without sewing up the pockets), but I worked through it and figured it out!  I would like to thank my husband for ignoring all of the bad language he heard as I worked through the more difficult parts of the pattern and also learned how to really use my sewing machine (since this is the first project I’ve sewn entirely with my own machine).

I am SO excited that I have a new bedside organizer that I can really put to use!  If you look at the pattern from the previous post, you will notice that I did modify it a little.  The pattern shows two rows of three pockets.  Once I cut out the tissue paper from the pattern, I realized that it would just be too wide, so I made two rows of two pockets.  It’s perfect for my bedside!  I am definitely going to enjoy putting things in this organizer and not have them cluttering up my bedside table or stuck in my bedside stand where it will be hard to find them in the middle of the night.  Now everything I might need in the middle of the night is handy and in one place!