Baby Love

This post was inspired by my dear friend Tracey's "What I'm Working on Wednesday," launched today. Go on over to cute2carry.com/blog and join in on the fun!

Most of my friends know that I sew, so they'll often come to me with a picture, an idea, a website, and say "can you do something like this?" I love it! Some of these requests have turned into great ideas. And I like the challenge of trying to come up with my own way of making something or creating an entirely new design.

My friend Melanie recently approached me and asked if I had anything in stock for a baby gift. I didn't have anything "ready made," but I do have some "go-to" ideas I like to use for baby gifts.

One thing I like to give is hooded towels. [Check out my hooded towel tutorial here]

Another gift that always goes over well with new moms is a nursing cover. Melanie found out that the mother-to-be is going to be nursing, so we decided to go with that.

I've made a few nursing covers for friends, taking ideas from different tutorials I dug up and changing or adding things as needed. I like the idea of a reversible cover (a woman has just gotta have options), so the first thing I had to do was choose two coordinating fabrics. The directions I got from Melanie were as follows:

"She's having a girl"

"Nothing too girly"

"She's kind of contemporary/liberal"

That's it.

Well, I came up with two fabrics from Heidi Grace's "Reagan's Closet" collection.

The nursing cover measures about 24" by 36" with a curved neckline made of 18" of boning for "peeking in" on the little one.

I added a convenient pocket to both sides for storing nursing pads or even a small wash cloth while nursing. The neck strap is adjustable with "D" rings, and the straps are sewn into the seam of the cover.

Melanie also asked me if I could come up with some kind of coordinating diaper/wipes holder. So I did what I usually do...scoured the Internet and stores for inspiration. As I looked around at some of the different options I thought that's great, but where's the changing pad? So I decided to make something that holds the wipes, a few diapers, and a changing pad all in one convenient location...kind of a portable "changing station." There are tons of ideas out there for these types of things. Again, I took in all the different versions and just put things together in a way that worked for me.

I used the same main fabric that I used for the nursing cover, but then I chose a super soft white Minky fabric for the inside. I wanted something very cuddly for Baby to lie on. I also sandwiched a fusible fleece layer between the two fabrics to give it a little extra "cushiness."





When folded, the "changing station" measures about 13" x 9" with a thickness of about 1 1/2", and is held together by a tab with a velcro closure.




Unfolded, the changing pad is 13" wide and a generous 26" long.



The pocket at the end of the changing pad is 7" deep and can hold a portable wipes container and 2-3 diapers (I didn't have any diapers to put in the picture...no more babies in our house!).











I think it will be the perfect addition to any diaper bag. I hope the mommy-to-be enjoys this gift as much as I enjoyed making it!

As Time Goes By...

[We are back from our wonderful vacation in beautiful Banff National Park in Alberta, Canada. If you haven't been to that part of the world, GO....it's breathtaking and awe-inspiring!]

There are some things in life that just make you more aware of the passage of time and make you feel older...your high school reunion, your own kids starting school. But the thing that really marks time for me and makes me feel my age is my brother.

My brother is almost 12 years younger than me. To put that difference into perspective, he was in kindergarten when I graduated from high school.

I can clearly remember the night he was born...September 3, 1986 at 10:37 pm. There was a severe rainstorm that night (the kind my dad calls a "gully washer"), and I was a little irritated because my mom and dad had picked me up early from gymnastics when my mom's water broke. He was a month early (after almost being 3 months early) and only 5 lbs, 4 oz. I remember thinking he looked like some kind of reptile because he was long and skinny, his skin was all wrinkly, and he was severly jaundiced. He didn't have a name for 3 days...we were originally told he was a girl, and then..surprise! It's a boy.

Here we all are: me, my sister Kristine, and my brother Sam. I'm about 13, Kristine's about 9, Sam's about 18 mths.

[Don't you love my hair (just one in a 8-year series of bad hair-dos), my sweater (which I'm sure came from a yard sale), and my cheesy plastic pearls? I'm also about 90% sure this pic was taken at either K-Mart or JC Penney. ]

Anyway.....

Here's my brother now:

He is 22 (so young!), married, and has a baby, Jake. Without getting into a lot of details, my brother chose a much harder road to adulthood than my sister and I, but he is really working hard to remedy that and has turned out to be a great Daddy.

And little Jake....well, he is simply the sweetest, happiest baby I have ever met! Always smiles and rarely crying.

Jake turned one last week, and of course, I had to make him something. Back in December, I wrote about the Quiet Book I made for my niece for Christmas. My sister says she loves it and takes it everywhere. So I made one for Jake for his first birthday.

The outside cover:

The inside cover:

Try me on!

The one I made for my niece was more "girly" (lady bugs & flowers), so I had to make this one my "boyish" (cars & turtles).

Lift the clouds...

What's inside????

It's a baby turtle!

Once again, I "super" sewed everything down to make sure no little choking hazards would come off.

Count the buttons (or play "I Spy") and pat the caterpillar:

I tried to cover several different activities on my pages: textures, counting, zipping, buttoning, velcro, "peek-a-boo," and "I Spy" to name a few.

Velcro the shapes....


Who's at the door? (With an unbreakable mirror inside!)

I'm really happy with the final result and I hope Jake loves it.

Happy Birthday, big guy, from your Aunt Jenn!

"Focus on the Journey, not the Destination"

My husband loves to travel. He's lived all over the world (England, the Middle East, the Caribbean...) and traveled to even more places. As for me, I didn't even see the ocean until I was 22, much less cross it. We never went on "vacation" growing up. We either drove 22 hours in our 1977 Chevy Impala ("The Boat") to Louisiana to visit our family or we went camping. And by camping I don't mean a nice RV in a campground. I mean middle-of-nowhere, sleep-in-a-tent (or on the ground), restroom-behind-a-tree camping.....my dad liked to really rough it.

But my husband really believes that a big part of who he is today he can attribute to having experienced so many different places in the world. It's important to him that we take our children places and let them experience different things. Unfortunately, like it is for most people, time and money are often roadblocks.

My husband is British, and although his immediate family lives here in the U.S., the rest of his family is still back in England. So we travel there every 2-3 years (depending on how long it takes us to save up!) for a visit. We try to go for at least 2 weeks and divide the time between visiting family and sightseeing. So far our sightseeing has been limited to the British Isles, but as our kids get older, we are hoping to use England as a jumping off point to see other sights in Europe. And my husband has a list of other places in the world he'd like to go, from South Africa to New Zealand and lots of places in between.

How is all this travel talk sewing/crafting related, you might ask? Well....what's the number one necessity when you travel out of the country? Your passport!!! When we travel, I usually carry some kind of backpack so that I can keep all the crap you need when you travel with kids at the ready, but still have my hands free for snapping photos...or herding my kids, whichever. And I carry all the travel documents.

A couple of months ago while wasting time surfing craft blogs, I stumbled across a cute tutorial for a passport cover over at bunnybum. And I thought to myself, what a great idea! That way when I pull out the passports at the airport, I can quickly identify which belongs to who with no effort. Plus, they just look cute!

We are getting ready to take a vacation to Banff in Canada this summer, so this week I took a little time to whip up some of these cute covers out of fabric scraps I had in my stash.

Mine is the one on the left, made with some Michael Miller "Peace Blossom" left over from a custom order; my daughter's is in the middle...Ariel, of course; and my son's on the left...using some of the "world traveler" fabric that I used when I redid his room (his room is decorated around maps and traveling).

I didn't make one for my husband....his passport is from the United Kingdom and is different from ours anyway.

This tutorial was really easy to follow and took no time at all. Two 6" by 12" scraps of fabric and about 10-15 minutes and you're done!

Bon Voyage!

Time Is Free, but It's Priceless!

Yesterday was that great day known as Mother's Day. The day where all of us moms are supposed to be showered with presents, thanked endlessly for all we do, and treated like a Queen. We get to sleep in and get breakfast in bed. We don't have to cook, clean, or referee a fight. Our spouse arranges a Day of Beauty at a spa.... What? That didn't happen in your house? Ok....it didn't happen in mine either.

My Mother's Day started out pretty much like any other weekend morning....I get up with the kids between 6 and 6:30 (my kids are and always have been early birds) and my husband sleeps in. The day was quickly turning into just another weekend where I do what I do everyday, while my husband gets to putz around in the garage, tinker with one of his bikes, or run errands (without kids, of course). So I took the bull by the horns. I took charge of my own Mother's Day fate. I told my husband:

"I am going into my sewing room for the day. I am going to sew and watch movies. If the kids come to me with any of their typical drama, I am sending them to you. You have been warned."

And I locked myself in my "mom cave."

And what did I sew? Why, something for myself, of course! :)

We live in Arizona. In case you haven't heard...it's hot here. Very hot. Not that I'm complaining...I'll take the heat over cold, tornadoes, earthquakes, or hurricanes any day. But it does make you really think about your wardrobe choices. For me, it means cool cottons, no sleeves, and usually flip-flops.

This year I decided I needed to venture away from my typical summer "Mom wardrobe" of V-neck t-shirts and shorts. I decided to make myself some cotton dresses. I happened to have a pattern lying around that my mom had given me ages ago (Simplicity 9620), so I decided to go with that. It's a simple dress....no buttons or zippers. You had your choice of necklines and I went with the V-neck.

I managed to make two of them yesterday (while watching "Slumdog Millionaire" [LOVED it!] and "Twilight" [yet again!]), and I'm pretty happy with the results.

The pics aren't the best....my 4 yr old daughter took them for me. She was trying to get me to pose and do all the things I make her do when I use her for my sewing model.


So what was my Mother's Day gift? Well, my kids got me a card and some tulips, and they both made some really cute crafts at school. But the BEST gift I got yesterday was time, uninterrupted (pretty much!) time, to sew for myself!

Hope you all had a Happy Mother's Day!!!

Unsung Heroes

This week (May 3rd - 9th) is National Teacher Appreciation Week. My son's school sent home a note from the PTA last week reminding everyone to take the time to show thanks and appreciation to their child's teachers. The note had some suggestions for things to do each day: bring an apple on Monday, have the child write a note on Tuesday, bring a flower on Wednesday, have the parent write a note on Thursday, and a "spirit" day where each grade wears a different color on Friday.

Well, I had already planned on making something for my son to bring in at the end of the week, but my son, being the black-and-white, walk-the-line, rule-follower he is, insisted that he had to do what the note said...if it is written and came from school, it must be.

I could have sent an apple, but what is his teacher going to do with 25 apples? And I'm SURE she has plenty of apple magnets/pictures/pencil cups/mugs/dust collectors and would probably thank me for not giving her another one. I told him we'd pass on that one. The note from my son was easy. (Give my son blank paper and office supplies and you won't see him for an entire day.) He made cards for his regular teacher and his reading teacher.

Then there was the flower day. I think buying cut flowers is a big waste of money. Potted plants I can go for. But cut flowers just wilt and die and you're left with nothing but a dirty vase. So instead I had my son make bookmarks...I printed them out with a cute little poem I found about teachers and he drew flowers on them and added his name and the date. I laminated them, added a ribbon, and voila! We fulfilled the flower requirement to his satisfaction.

Tomorrow is the day I'm supposed to send in a note from me. I've got a couple of thank you cards to fill out and I'm going to send the gifts I made for them. Last year I made tote bags for the kids' teachers, and they were such a hit that I decided to do it again.

My son's main teacher collects all things ladybug, so I chose a cute ladybug print for the lining and accents and paired it with a nice denim for her bag.

The bag is a nice size for books, papers, etc and has an outside pocket and a tie closure. I also used my dear friend Tracey's great lanyard tutorial to make a matching lanyard for her school identification:

For my son's reading teacher, I had no idea if she collected anything or what types of things she's into. But I know she's young, so I picked something I liked and thought was a little "retro chic."

I used Robert Kaufman's "Fruit Basket" in the brown colorway, paired with a nice bright green for the lining and accent. (For some reason, my greens look a little "off" in this picture...but in person the green pears and the green lining fabric are very close).

I also made her a matching lanyard out of the "Fruit Basket" fabric. I hope they enjoy these totes as much as I enjoyed making them.

And I hope they know how much I appreciate all the guidance, support, knowledge, and fun they have given my son this year.

Don't forget to take a moment and thank all the teachers in your child's life this week!

When Life Hands You Lemons....

When life hands you lemons....break out the tequila and salt!

Unless it's Alexander Henry's "Juicy" lemons, then you make a sundress!

This dress is basically a "pillowcase" style dress (you can find many excellent tutorials for pillowcase dresses...here's a link to my fave)....except I've made a few modifications. One change I made was to give it more of an "A-line" shape. It's 2-inches narrower at the top than the bottom. The A-line is just such a flattering shape and works well on my skinny-mini daughter (she's a couple months shy of 5 and only 33 pounds sopping wet and in her clothes).

SIDENOTE: Can I just take a minute and talk about how jealous proud I am of my daughter's hair? It's just the right thickness, just the right mix of blonds, slightly wavy, and a nice soft texture. Mine is ultra thick (a blessing and a curse) and a coarse texture that frizzes unless laden with product. So not fair.

The other modification was to add pockets. My daughter LOVES pockets. She's always carrying "treasures" in her pockets...it makes laundry time interesting.

Another change I made from the tutorials I looked at was to cut the neckline at a slight "scoop," making it a little bit lower in the front than in the back. The front has the illusion of a drawstring, but is gathered by making a casing and then threading through a piece of elastic that is an inch or so shorter than the casing.

Like most of the tutorials, I used binding for the armholes and ties. I tried sewing a casing at the armholes then using ribbon for the ties, but I found that with the curve of the armholes, I had a hard time making nice-looking casings...I was never satisfied with the result. I cut 2 1/2 inch strips of my fabric to make a 1/2 inch binding. The binding was really easy, and you could always use pre-made binding.

I added some ribbon detailing to the pockets and along the hem just to give the dress a little bit of added charm. I happened to find this cute gingham check ribbon that was the same shade of green as the stems of the lemons. I think it adds a nice touch.

When all is said and done, I'm happy with the result. I will make a few "tweaks" to the next one (I think I'm going to change the pocket placement slightly). I hope to have one of these cute dresses up soon in my shop!

They Say It's Your Birthday...

Back in December, my dear friend and Handbag Goddess, Tracey, invited me to appear as a guest on Artiste, a conglomeration of artisans on Hyenacart.com.

Well, Artiste is celebrating their first birthday this month, and they have graciously invited myself and others who appeared as guests over the past year to once again guest for the big event. In addition to the guest artists, there are wonderful items being offered by the Artiste "regulars," as well as giveaways, lotteries, and a scavenger hunt!

Cruise on over to Artiste and check it out! The celebration begins at 9pm EST April 5th!