Category: Family

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A “Library” Easter Dress

Sadly, I never got around to making my Valentine’s Day pumpkins. I promise I will procrastinate Halloween again so I can carve some hearts in February! Since I’m touching on other major holidays in this post, how about I cover Easter too!

I had to settle for making a dress for the girl child since I procrastinated on those pumpkins so long they ended up in the trash….a shame really. I didn’t get fun or food out of them this year. I totally didn’t slack on the Easter dress though. I dug through my stash of patterns a whole week before Easter! Woooo! Go me! I was deciding between the Oliver + S Garden Party dress or the Library dress. I even put it to a vote on FB but came up with a draw. So, I asked the 2 year old in the house. She grabbed the pattern and said “This one mommy.” There was no way to refuse that. So, the Library Dress it is!

The next day the little miss and I hit up the store and got our material. I have tons of fabric in my stash but not enough of a main fabric for the pattern and who doesn’t love buying new fabric. I didn’t think to write down the good info on the fabric though.

 The pattern has a view with a collar and without, and short or long sleeves. I went with no collar and I decided to omit sleeves completely since it was a week before Easter and it was already in the 90’s here. I didn’t want to add extra bulk by lining the entire bodice so I opted for double fold bias tape to finish the sleeves.

I went to town transferring the pattern and cutting everything out. I prefer to make clothing a bit longer for kids who are growing so quickly so I made the size 2T pattern but went with 3T in length. Except for a few small errors in the directions when it came to piecing the waistband to the bodice, it was easy peasy. Pleats are not my favorite thing in the world to sew, but there were not that many and I do love the look.

 Then, I got to the part where I had to pin the sides of the skirt together and finish the sleeves….something was off. I don’t know if it was a mistake I made or something to do with leaving the sleeves off, but the skirt was not lining up by a half inch. I even hit up the forums on the Oliver + S site to see if anyone else had that particular issue. I didn’t really get much response (not that I expected it though). In the mean time, the dress just sat like this while I tried to figure out what to do.

In the end I just decided to cut off the offending half inch from the arm hole and call it a day. Everything lined up beautifully after that and my little miss kept begging to put the dress on.

 

I love the buttons down the back too. On the forums, some of the others out there kept talking about putting a zipper in. I don’t think I would like the dress as much. As they say….it’s the details that make the dress. I still have not figured out who “they” are but since they are backing me up on this, I’m going with it!

 

And a shot of all the kids and while I did do Easter baskets before the egg hunt, I totally forgot to bring them to their grandparent’s house.

 

Here are some close up shots of the details and the fabric as well.

Dress Front

No Collar and I used the contrasting fabric for the facing.

 The piping to edge the waistband matches the arm hole bias tape.

Dress Back

Buttons.

I loved making this dress and can’t wait to make it again. Going with a different view to get a different look. I have some great corduroy sitting in my stash that would make a great winter dress with the long sleeves….

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Valentine’s Day …. Pumpkins?

I have a confession.

I don’t always have it together.

Sometimes I even let my children down.

This past Halloween I just never got around to the carving of the pumpkins. Here they sit…on the floor of my garage, like a tossed aside and forgotten child’s hopes and dreams, project. Yet this project will rot if I let it sit there much longer.

So, since Valentines day is coming up….. well, I need to find some great ideas for these Valentine’s Day Pumpkins! Off to search Pinterest. There are others who completely let their children down, right?

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Little Boys and Bow Ties

Time to revive the blog! I have been away for a few months. Major life changes going on here. We moved cross country and now live in Arizona. We have been here since the end of July. All I can say is that it is HOT in August in Arizona, but this winter has been beautiful! It is the end of January and I have my windows and doors open and it is hitting around 73 -75.

After much inner turmoil I put the boys in public school. I’m a firm believer in the Montessori method of learning and very much against common core and testing and every single thing about public schools really, but we just couldn’t swing the funding here in AZ for Montessori. I gave homeschooling a go from the fall through Christmas time. It worked in the sense that I could use Montessori on them at home, and that they were learning TONS, but I was drowning. And my super social boys were having trouble not interacting with more people on a daily basis. I have them in soccer, and swimming, and we go to the gym 3 times a week, but it was not enough. I will keep our home classroom up and running to supplement school…and I will bite my tongue and clench my teeth while dealing with their terrible common core crap homework because this ended up being the best choice for our family.

Now, after that crazy long intro and background info, my middle child came home from school yesterday and said that he had to dress like he was 100 years old for the 100th day of school. Really?!?! I need more notice! Anyway, I pulled out a short sleeved button down top for him and I remembered this blog post with a free bow tie pattern. I got the okay from the middle child for a bow tie with a request that it be red. So, I dug through my piles and piles of scraps and I whipped up an awesome bow tie! Now that I see how easy that was, I will be making a bunch more! I made the ones with the clip in the back so that once it is tied, it is tied.

Some gel and baby powder in his hair turned it that lovely grey/white color and I popped the lenses out of an old pair of sunglasses.

If I do say so myself, my 100 year old kindergartener turned out pretty cute with his “red” bow tie.

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A dandelion skirt set

We are getting together with Mr Cassie’s family. The first time that all of us and his siblings and their families will be together in almost 5 years. We had a family picture taken that last time and we are planning on it again. We are all from the Chicago area and the Chicago sports teams seem to be important to everyone (everyone except me, I hate all sports) so the Bears colors/theme was chosen for our picture.

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Halloween Costumes

I know, I know…this post is coming a bit late. I have been both busy and a slacker.

This year I mainly focused on Miss Faye’s costume. Owen decided to go as Superman…which Hugh had done a couple of years ago so we already had that one. Hugh decided to go as Wolverine, but not the cartoon Wolverine, the movie Wolverine. So, I hit the store and bought him a muscle shirt and the claws. Easy and done. For Miss Faye, I decided to make her a ghost. I kept seeing the tutu ghost costumes all over and I knew that would be easy and adorable so that is what I did.

 
The tutu skirt was easy. I just bought 2 yards of tulle and cut it into strips. I know you can buy it in the 6 inch roll but it cost more that way. The strips were just looped around a piece of ribbon. Easy and done.

 If you look closely you can see sparkles. I did splurge on one roll of glitter white tulle. I only put a few pieces in the skirt as it was really stiff and scratchy.

 For the top, I used a long sleeved white onsie that we already had in Faye’s drawers. I added eyes and a mouth out of black scraps from my stash.

 I put a quick and easy running stitch around the edges in white to make it stand out.

 Here I am with Miss Faye in her costume. I didn’t get very many pictures that day. I’m thinking I will dress her back up to get some better pictures. As you can see I made myself up with a sugar skull. If it had not been raining and gross I would have attempted fun clothes to finish the look.

….and here we all are, heading out to trick or treat in the rain. Don’t mind that Owen does not have red bottoms on. I had them but we could not find them anywhere.

ETA…I took some pictures of Faye in her costume. She moves around so much that these were the best I could get.