Happy Baby Girl Onesie

I embellished this pink onesie for Rosie's dance teacher Kyla who is having a baby in a few weeks. Rosie had specific ideas about what to make. Kyla is fabulous: full of energy, always smiling, and a very talented dancer. She always wears a smiley t-shirt for the recital and stands in the wings to remind the girls to have fun and smile. Rosie thought her new baby needed a special shirt to attend the recital in June.
I have to admit that I always feel flattered when my kids ask me to make something for them. This project went very quickly. I used yellow poly/cotton broadcloth for the applique and a layer of interfacing behind it for stability. I embroidered on water soluble stabilizer, which is fine because the applique fabric won't stretch. The design is from Embroidery Designs.com.

We got some little matching pants and I put the smiley up high so that the pants wouldn't cover it.
Rosie's teacher loved it! It will be fun to see the baby in it at the recital.

I'm linking to Sew Darn Crafty at Sew Many Ways.

American Girl Smocked Dress

Hello Friends! Today I am sharing a smocked bishop dress that I made for my daughter's American Girl doll Nellie. I remember smocking this dress in the waiting room at the hospital. My Hubby had to have surgery for kidney stones and I knew I'd be a wreck, so I pleated 2 doll bishops to work on while waiting. Luckily, Hubby was fine and I ended up finishing both dresses. The fabric is a blue floral cotton trimmed with Swiss embroidery. I just zigzagged the trim over the gathered fabric without cutting away behind it on the sleeves. It still looks good, but it's sturdier than the traditional method. The dress opens all the way down the back and closes with soft velcro, for ease in doll dressing. We like to set up displays with our AG dolls. I think this dress will be nice for a Spring display, despite the snow that fell here yesterday!

Cupcakes...made by Rosie

Rosie celebrated her 11th birthday with a rock climbing/ swimming party. She found this cute idea in a cookbook and thought it would be perfect to go with her theme. She made these on her own; I was at a quilt guild potluck, so she had the run of the kitchen. The cupcake above is the Rosie figure, but she made one for each kid at the party.

 Don't you love the candy bikinis? How about the tasty "donette" swim tubes?

Here's a picture of everyone. She spent about 5 hours making these, but it only took about 5 minutes to eat them! Training for future Thanksgiving dinners, perhaps?
After the party, 4 of my 5 kids (everyone except the baby) got strep throat. It has been quite a week! I'm trying to photograph some of my American Girl sewing to share with you. See you soon in Bloggerville.

Vintage Button-on Suit...in PINK!

This adorable vintage boy's button-on suit has a fun story behind it. Last summer I was on vacation at the beach and went to a gift shop that I've enjoyed visiting since I was a little girl. They carry beautiful new linens, baby gifts, books, china, crafts, etc. On this visit, they had a rack of vintage children's clothing from the early 1940s. Of course, it attracted me like a bee to nectar! As I was browsing through the many little boy's suits and a few little girl's dresses, I overheard the knot of people near me chatting. The lady in the group was the child who wore the dresses and her 3 brothers were the owners of the boy's items. She had a set of twins and a single brother. Many of the outfits were in doubles for the twins and some were monogrammed. This little button-on suit attracted me right away (along with a pretty blue one I'll share another time). This was also the suit the people were talking about. "Can you believe my Mom put that on a boy?" "Oh, my brother would die of embarrassment if he knew Mom dressed him like that!" "Who would buy pink for a boy!?" Meanwhile, I was thinking "look at the delicate collar and cuffs, the French lace, the scalloped pants top, the mother of pearl buttons" and "I wish people dressed children like this today." Well, it had to come home with me. I paid $14 for it and I wish I could have bought the whole rack. I thought this was a size 1, but I held it up to Andy and it's still huge, so it must be more like a 2. It does have a little tag, but any writing is faded away.

Quick, Easy, and Cheap Curtains for my Living Room

We have been trying to make our living room less formal and more practical. With 5 kids and only one TV, there were frequent arguments minor disagreements over what to watch. For Christmas, we bought the family a new TV for the living room and took out the coffee table to make more space. The 2 love seats face each other and it has become a favorite new spot to watch TV, do homework, play Barbies, or read. I had some formal swags and tiers that I had made for our old house about 17 years ago! I wanted something brighter and more casual.

I was at WalMart the other day and spied this pretty, striped home dec fabric on clearance for $5/yd. I looked through my excessive hoard stock of patterns and found this simple, reversible topper. I bought the black scroll fabric at JoAnn's for $7/yd. It only took 1 yard of each to make both valances, so I only spent $12 on the set!

Of course, I plan to choose one side to show at a time, but I put one of each up to see which I like better. I can't decide! My kids all voted for the stripes, which I like because it's light and has colors. But the black is very elegant and sets off the dark wood in the room, too. For $12, I have 2 new looks for my living room! The best part is, these only took 30 minutes each to make. The pattern I used is Butterick 6568. Leave a comment and tell me which look you like! Have a great day- back soon!  Lisa