It's not all selfish sewing here...

While I have been doing lots of sewing for me lately, there have been a couple other projects in the queue for others as well. This one was for Little Bear (who had just finished eating a blue sucker when I took these... truly, he's not freezing to death here!):

It is the Varsity Cowl Neck Pullover from Peekaboo Patterns. I recently saw this made up by Stacy Sews and it looked like something my boy would like (he is into cozy sweaters) and so I picked it up during a recent sale.

I used a knit from my stash. It is pretty snazzy because it is solid on one side and has the stripes on the other, making it perfect for the contrasting neck and hem bands.

The pattern is very straightforward and the instructions are very clear and easy to follow.

Little Bear is 5 years old and is wearing a 4T-5T in RTW. I sewed up the size 5 for him, and it fits about how a Gymboree 5T fits him (so there is a bit of room to grow for him). So-- the fit seems spot on!

And it is, indeed, very cozy.

And perfect for my active boy!

I already have plans for another (maybe two...).

Halloween 2015: Jay from Ninjago

This year for Halloween, Little Bear decided he wanted to be the character Jay from Lego Ninjago. It was a pretty appropriate choice for him, as he is into all things Lego and ninja right now (he is even enrolled in a Ninja Zone gymnastics class!).

This costume was pretty straightforward. I used Simplicity 1037, using views A, B, D, and F and made the size 4. I was really pleased with the fit-- I measured him and everything fits very true to size (a pleasant surprise compared to some of their adult patterns!).

A couple things to note about the pattern: It does not include any instructions/advice for the additional ties (arm/wrists and legs) pictured on the cover. That wasn't a big deal (and I ended up not using them), but I was fully expecting them to be included somehow as they are pictured. Also, the instructions for finishing the tabard piece (D) are pretty lacking... I fudged my way through the suggested bias binding, but it is far from pretty. But, you know, galloping horse and all that. (Thank goodness!)

The only modifications I made to the pattern were to add shoulder armor to the tabard and then create the headband (both self-drafted). I was pretty happy with how the shoulder armor turned out, but the weight of the armor pieces pulled the tabard backward (making them appear to be shoulder-blade armor-- doh!). So I added some velcro to the underside of the tabard shoulders to connect with the top of the robe shoulders in order to help hold everything in place. It helped some, but the fix was no match for my active ninja boy! He could easily defeat the velcro with all of his jumping-crouching ninja moves. But for trick-or-treating, it worked fine.

This was a fun costume to make.

And I know he is happy because he has asked to wear it every day since I finished it!

One whole hand!

On Sunday, Little Bear turned 5 years old! To celebrate, he wanted to have a Transformers Rescue Bots party. So I got to craftin'!

First on the list was a "Pin the Autobot Symbol on Boulder" game.

I used a projector to trace the image of Boulder the Rescue Bot and then painted him with acrylics. Then I printed and cut out Autobot symbols for the kids to stick on him (the goal was his chest).

I also put together some simple party favors, including bubble wands decorated with Rescue Bot stickers I made using Avery Shipping Label stickers. Since the wands were orange and green, I went with Blades and Boulder characters to match. I also purchased a .pdf of some Rescue Bot bookmarks from So Happy Shop on Etsy and printed them out on cardstock. I finished them with some homemade tassels using a tutorial, "How to Make Your Own Tassels," from Sew4Home.

There was also an array of treats, including a cake. Rather than a fancy Rescue Bot-themed design, I was surprised when Little Bear decided he wanted a chocolate cake with chocolate icing and sprinkles.

I used Smittin Kitchen's "i want chocolate cake" cake. It turned out beautifully. This is the first time in recent memory that we actually finished off an entire cake! Sooooo good!

Bonus: I had a sous chef to help me with the baking!

Last, but definitely not least, Little Bear finally got his very own personalized name pillow.

Happy birthday, Little Bear! I love you!!!!

Halloween 2014: Baby Beefalo!

This year for Halloween, Little Bear decided he wanted to be a baby beefalo. What is that, you may be wondering? While it is an actual creature, he specifically wanted to be a baby beefalo from the game "Don't Starve" by Klei Entertainment:

I started with a pile of fleece, faux fur and Kwik Sew 2711 (a costume staple for me over the last few years!) in size XXS.

I only had to make a couple of minor adjustments for this costume.

The biggest adjustment was with the back closure, pictured above. I wanted the patch of fur on the back to be an unbroken piece, so I layered it on top of the costume opening, stitching half of it down and then securing it with velcro tape on the opposite side. That allowed access to the costume opening, but kept the back furry part pretty clean looking. The downside is it made the costume a little too complicated for Little Bear to put on/take off by himself. But it was otherwise effective.

The other adjustments included color-blocking the sleeves and legs, creating the tuft on the hood, the tail, and the little horns.

Watch out! Baby beefalo is gonna charge!!!

He loved the costume!

Finally!!!

A quilt for Little Bear!!!

The design is from Abbey Lane Quilts and is called "Meter Maid." The pattern was straightforward and easy to follow. I also appreciated that it accounts for directional prints in the cutting directions (a big plus since I was using some directional prints!).

The bulk of the fabric was from a fat quarter set I purchased at Quilt Festival last fall from Hearts to Holly Quilt Shop. I added a couple more from my stash, and chose Kona cream for the solid frames.

Since the frames were solid, I really wanted to do something interesting quilting-wise as I knew it would show up really well. I decided to do circles (traced from a spool of thread) in the narrow parts of the frame and outside border, and the fun loopy design in the wider frame parts and border. I used Aurifil Mako 50/2 in Pale Flesh (2315) for all of that. Then I quilted the prints with a simple meander using Aurifil Make 50/2 in Dove (2600).

I love that the quilting is so visible on the back!

I also love that I was able to use up the last bits of fabric from the front in the back. They add some nice color, too.

And the label... I decided to name this one, "Vehicles Vroom!!!"

As I was taking pictures, I noticed this:

Doh! I think that happened in the wash. I prewashed all of my fabrics, so didn't think to put a color catcher in with it when I gave it a wash after completion. At first I thought it might be the wash-out blue marker I used-- except that I didn't mark that part at all (I only marked the circles), and that is the only spot in the quilt where the stain appears. I'll definitely be more careful in the future and use a color catcher. Fortunately, Little Bear doesn't care about the stain. :)

It only took four years. Ha! But, he finally has his own quilt made especially for him. Yay!!!

Yesterday in the quilt cave...

I thought I'd do a little update on the progress I made during my quilt cave day. My husband stayed home so I was able to spend most of the day in my cave (other than quick stops to get lunch, make dinner, and go an emergency thread run... nothing worse than running out of thread in the midst of quilting, which I nearly did!). It was like my own mini quilt retreat! I was able to check a few things off my list:

I even got some binding strips cut. Woo!!!

Lists can be powerful tools for me. I love seeing those x's as items are completed. It truly gives me a sense of accomplishment. Blogging does that too oftentimes. But putting it out there in the world makes it "real," you know? Sometimes, I'm wanting to go with the flow and see where it takes me without the pressure I put on myself to keep up with the blog. Thus, lack of blogging. I want to make it a priority because I know it keeps me focused. At the same time, I have so much routine and focus in every other aspect of my life that I am finding I don't really want focus-- I want freedom. And I'm lazy. Blogging (writing!) takes so much effort for me. And it is not quick. Clearly, what I really need is to change up my blogging perspective. I'll add that to the list.

Look at that! I did some crafty musing there for a bit. :)

Moving on...

Here are all five of my recent roll o' fabric tops are quilted and ready for binding:

Now I'm about ready to start a new project:

It's time to make a quilt for my Little Bear.

He turns 4 next month.

Mind.
Blown.

Halloween 2013!!!

Tomorrow I leave for Houston to attend the International Quilt Festival (woo hoo!!!!!!), so I have to write my annual Halloween post a bit early. While I am bummed I won't be at home to share in the festivities with my family, I am at the same time super excited to have the opportunity to go to Festival this year (woo hoo!!!!!!!).

In recent months, the hotness at our house has been a video game called Guacamelee! from Drinkbox Studios. My boys absolutely love this game. And truly, it is pretty darn awesome-- the art, the music (seriously, the music is incredible; we even bought the soundtrack!), the story, the mechanics, the different endings... way cool! So it was no surprise that when it came time to choose their costumes, Big Bear and Little Bear both wanted to be characters from the game. Big Bear wanted to be a yellow skeleton (because they're super fast!). Little Bear wanted to be a green skeleton (because they're green!).

I started by perusing eBay. There I found sombreros of appropriate hues (thank you, noveltwholesale!), as well as some gently used glow-in-the-dark skeleton pajamas. Then I got to work on the rest.

I ended up making ponchos, tattered pants, and red sashes. I didn't use a pattern for the ponchos or sashes and just kind of winged it. For the pants, I used Kwik Sew pajama patterns, 3126 (toddler sizes; I made a T3) and 3604 (boys & girls sizes; I made a Medium).

Above is a picture of the green skeleton from the game next to Little Bear's rendition.

The ponchos are made of fleece, including the appliqued stripes. I decided on fleece because Halloween night around here is typically cold (and wet... but, as always, we are crossing our fingers for a dry evening!). The green poncho was a bit of a challenge, as there were angles involved. It made me glad that it was a small size as I could lay the whole thing out on the table.

The yellow poncho was much more straightforward. I think it turned out pretty darn close to the look of the in-game version, which you can see in the image above. Since the sombreros came with ball trim on them, I decided to add some to the ponchos as well, to help tie the look together.

My husband was concerned that the costumes be as "cosplay accurate" as possible. So I made the pants and sash. But I didn't have it in me to make shirts too... I mean, they'd just be completely covered up by the ponchos anyway, right? I feel a bit like a slacker, but really, the boys are both happy, and that's what really counts.

When they put on their costumes, they immediately got into character and were very excited to show off all of their skeleton moves.

What a pair!

Wishing you a safe and happy Halloween!!!

Back to School: Part 2

This week it is Little Bear's turn to go back to school! This will be his third year of cooperative preschool. He decided that he wanted a school bag, just like his big brother. I was happy to oblige!

I used the Mail Sack pattern from Pink Chalk Studio. I actually made this same bag 3 years ago when Big Bear was in preschool.

He chose the fabrics. His favorite color is green. Again, it went together fabulously. I shortened the strap by 2" as Little Bear is on the smaller side. I think it is a great length for him that he can grow into some still.

This time around, I interfaced everything (except for one pocket piece) resulting in the bag being a tad bit stiff. I figure as time passes, it will soften up. And as it belongs to Little Bear-- it needs all the durability it can get!

Sometimes, I look at him and it blows my mind. He's growing up so fast!

Halloween 2012

This year, both bears had opinions about what they wanted to be for Halloween.

Little Bear finally decided on a "scary dinosaur." As we happened to have a dragon costume on hand (in the right size, even!), and I didn't want to re-invent the wheel, we have Dragon 2.0 -- aka Scary Dinosaur!

Dinosaur ROAR!!!

Hopefully, I'll manage to get some better pictures of Little Bear as Scary Dinosaur today.

Meanwhile, Big Bear decided he wanted to be Perry the Platypus. I got to break out the sewing machine for this one!

I used Kwik Sew 2711 for the main suit, and then drafted my own tail, bill, and feet. I made a size Small, and shortened the legs by 1". The eyes are from Simplicity 3594 (the frog prince view). Because I had made the pattern before (Blue Kitty!), the main part went together both smoothly and quickly. The other parts took some time to figure out, but once I had a plan, they went together quickly (except for the tail... the quilting took a bit of time!).

Here he is with the actual Perry. I'm still a little amazed I was able to find the perfect color of fleece. Best of all, Big Bear LOVES it. Yay!!!

Tonight, we trick or treat! Woo!

Happy Halloween!

Little Bear is TWO!

Last week Little Bear turned two. Crazy! How does it go by so fast? My goodness. We celebrated his special day with a family party. And there was, of course, some crafty goodness involved.

Cupcakes!

Vanilla Bean Cupcakes with Vanilla Bean Frosting to be specific (recipe from How Sweet it Is) decorated with dark chocolate M&Ms (because LB is a budding chocoholic). They tasted amazing! I especially LOVED the frosting. The cupcake itself was a little on the dry side, but had great flavor. Little Bear definitely enjoyed them!

Like mama, he did seem partial to the frosting.

The festivities also included opening lots of presents, including a few made by mama.

First up was a quilted playmat.

I found this canvas panel when I was on shop hop a few weeks ago. As both Big Bear and Little Bear are fanatics of things that go (particularly cars and trains), I had to pick it up. The panel is a Clothworks design by Richard Neuman called "Choo Choo You."

I spent about four hours quilting it-- lots of stippling and outline stitching. This is the back, so you can maybe get a better idea of the amount of quilting on there. It was a simple project, but not quick. I am really happy with how it turned out, as were the Bears.

They spend part of every day playing on it-- building lego houses, racing cars and trains, and creating elaborate adventure stories. It is so much fun to watch them play!

I also made a flannel pillowcase and a pair of comfy pajama bottoms.

The pajama pants are Kwik Sew 3126 (which I have made before for Big Bear). I shortened them by 1-3/4" and also cut them to allow me to do a contrasting band at the bottom of the legs (I didn't have enough of either fabric to do a full pair, so I adapted it to allow me to use what I had left of each).

Little Bear loves his new comfy pants and they fit perfectly (yay!). Unfortunately, he is not a fan of the pillowcase. Every night when we put him in the crib, the first thing he does is pull the edge of the flannel back to expose the pillow inside. Then he sleeps on the bare pillow. Doh! So, a non-flannel pillowcase for him has been added to the queue. But not to worry, Big Bear is perfectly happy with the flannel one-- so it is definitely getting used!

The day after his birthday, we went to the Skagit Valley Tulip Festival.

I love this picture of us. Happy birthday, Little Bear!