Corey, my dh, has been out in San Francisco a lot for work this winter, so I have had an unusual amount of time to sew--but I haven't made any blog posts, 'cause I've been sewing and doing other stuff! Now, he wasn't able to come home when he was supposed to, so he told me to come out to San Francisco for a week. Right now, I have time at the hotel room, while he is at work, and no sewing machines, so here's a blog post of a lot of the sewing I've done in the last couple of months.
The first picture is of my bassinet. This bassinet was bought new for my Mom when she was born. It needed a little repair, which you can see at the center of the bassinet. Then, I made a new liner out of pre-quilted cotton, bought a 100% cotton bassinet mattress from ebay (kind of a little futon), and made a new skirt and ruffle for the bassinet. I was going to make a skirt that hangs from the top of the bassinet, like you usually see, but dh wanted to know why was I going to cover up all that pretty wicker? I thought about it, and decided he had a point, so I made the skirt around the bottom. I like the way it turned out pretty well. The fabric is from Wal-Mart's dollar a yard pile. I grabbed two bolts of it, to use for all the cloth nursery stuff--crib bumpers, ruffle, curtains, diaper stacker, etc. It's green and blue and cream, with just enough pink running through it for a girl baby, without being too much pink for a boy.
The second picture is a sampling of the diapers of I've made lately. I used the pattern in last Fall's Ottobre magazine, and made 3 dozen for me, and 3 dozen for my friend. Most of these do not have a waterproof layer, and are meant to be used with soaker on the Ottobre website. The solid blue ones, though, are all-in-one diapers, with the blue being the waterproof layer. I used fold-over elastic on the blue ones, and put the elastic on the inside of the rest, serging the edges with woolly nylon. The third picture is of some of the pocket doublers, and some of the stuffers for them, that are also included in the Ottobre pattern. I think, if I use this pattern again, it may simply morph into a pocket dipe pattern, just to make life easier.
The next pic is a sleep sack, made of mint green flurr from the Joy of Sewing co-op, and the one after that is a Sew Baby Snappy Wrap, made of the same fabric. I used some of the "hookless" velcro instead of snaps, though.
Now, a quick break for knitting. This is my first attempt at a sweater, from a free Lion Brand pattern online, using CottonTots yarn (which was nice to work with). I don't remember what I used for a hat pattern. The cute doggie buttons are from Joy of Sewing co-op.
The next two are Asian Baby Carriers, also known as mei tai's, done roughly in a frankencozy style, with the wide, pleated straps. I used tapestry pillow panels I bought at a sewing convention in Chicago that my aunt took me to last fall. I have two of the ones with the bee panels, and may sell one of them, but I haven't decided yet. The black fabric on the bee ABC's is a gorgeous fine black wool, from http://www.fashionfabricsclub.com 's outlet store, and the houndstooth fabric I used on the Celtic one is a cotton, with just a little lycra in it, from the same source.
Then, we have two pics of newly made shirts for dh. One is a wool flannel, from Fashion Fabrics Outlet, and the other is a western shirt, made from flannel bought on sale at JoAnn's right after Thanksgiving. He loves the wool, but hasn't seen the other one yet.
The sleeveless top is from a McCall's maternity pattern. I hated the way the sleeves looked, so I skipped them, and hemmed the armholes with clear elastic in the hem. Fabric is from the Joy of Sewing Co-op.
I have pictured 4 tops made from the mock wrap maternity top pattern in the August, 2005, issue of the Burda magazine. I changed the pattern to make it big enough for me. A couple of them I also lengthened a little, which I think is an improvement. The blue and pink one are lycra cotton knits from Fashion Fabrics Outlet's dollar a yard bin. The white is from Wal-Mart's dollar a yard table, and the mint green I've had in stash so long I have no idea where I got it.
The dress is the Russian Settler's Dress, from Folklore patterns, made in a plaid seersucker bought on ebay. I added a little width to the front, and tucked nursing openings into a center pleat. The back is pleated, and the pleats held down with rows of ribbon. It's a wonderfully comfortable dress, which I expect to get a LOT of wear out of this summer.
And, lastly, we have a pair of jeans that I changed from panel-style to underbelly style, 'cause I hate panels. They make my tummy itch! I used the directions in the current issue of Sew News magazine, with 2 inch elastic, 'cuase I have a ton of it and find it comfortable.
