Preparing for Baby

Not me, thank you very much. Not yet anyway, I'm having enough fun juggling two right now to think about a third just yet!

Has anyone else noticed that everyone seems to be pregnant or having babies lately? Dana over at MADE just announced that she's pregnant with another little girl on Tuesday - so excited about all the adorable baby projects that are sure to follow! And of course Katy over at No Big Dill just had her 6th child - a little boy! I can't wait to see all the fun boy stuff. I imagine that making boy things after having 5 little girls to sew for must be exciting and intimidating. Then there's Rubyellen over at Cakies who just had her 4th little girl. There's something in the water...and I'm not ready to drink that Kool Aid quite so soon after the last one.

But, if you are pregnant, or you have a friend that is, The Dating Divas have some great ideas on how to prepare for baby. They included some great ideas for essentials like preparing your husband, getting maternity pictures taken, getting your other little ones ready for the new baby, and of course making time for yourself - something that we ladies forget to do!

And you might even see my Hospital Survival Kit for New Mothers over there as part of the roundup :)

Go check out all the fantastic ideas to prepare for a new little one over at The Dating Divas. And in just a few weeks, I'll be blog swapping with them - so excited!

PS - have you taken a guess at what I've been up to lately to win a mystery prize? If you're a follower on Facebook, I've been giving little hints along the way :)

Scrappy Flower Headband: guest post with Nature's Heirloom

Hello MOR readers!! I'm so excited to be visiting Jen's blog today! My name's Nikki and I have a little blog called Nature's Heirloom where I like to share my musings, whatever they may be that day or week.

I LOVE sewing things for my little girl, especially when it's a hair accessory. Yep, I'm an accessory-aholic. So I'm going to share with you one of my favorites, a scrappy flower headband. Not only are they adorable, but they also help you used up scraps, AND they're super easy to whip together. Plus, I can use these for her, or for myself. BONUS!

All you need is some scraps of 3 different fabrics. One needing to be at least 29 inches long and 2 1/2 inches wide. Also, a sewing machine would definitely be helpful, and scissors.

Start by folding your long piece of fabric in half, width wise. Cut from the fold to the ends, tapering down as you go. The fat end should be around 2 1/2 inches wide.

Next, either serge the edges, or if you don't have a serger, leave the edges raw and sew a straight line 1/4 inch around the edges. Over time, the edges will fray a bit, giving the headband a different, but equally as cute look.

Next, cut a couple strips of your fabric for the flower about 1 inch wide. How long you will need them will depend on how big you want your flower, and how "tight" the flower will be pleated. So the length is up to you. But more is always better to start out with. Also, cut a couple leaf shapes of your third fabric.

Lay one "leaf" off to one side of the headband. Sew around the edges about 1/4 inch in.

Lay the next "leaf" down where you want and sew.

Now, take one strip of fabric and pleat it a couple times so it fans out (pleates being tighter on the bottom, more loose on the top). Press with the iron.

Add a few more pleates. Press again.

Repeat until the strip is completely pleated.

Start laying out your flower, making a large circle.

Once you make a full circle, sew it down.

Circle the rest around and pin in place.

Sew it down. You can do a cirlce, but I like to do a triangle.

I'm not sure why.

Now, you can either finish it off with a button in the center, which I do often, or you can do a fabric center, which I will now show you.

Take a short strip of the fabric and pleat it to make a "mini pleated flower".

Place that in the center and sew down.

And you're done! It only takes a few minutes, and you can whip out a whole bunch of them in one sitting!

You can also do different variations, like instead of one big flower, you make smaller versions of the pleated flower, and group them in threes. You can see a bunch of my variations on my post HERE. These will fit a child or an adult.

I hope you enjoyed the tutorial! If you make any, feel free to add them to my flickr group HERE! I'd love to see them!!

Thank you Jen for letting me visit your corner of the blogging world!!!!

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Thanks for the awesome tutorial Nikki!

Make sure you go visit Nikki over at Nature's Heirloom and check out all of her great projects that she somehow finds time for in between caring for her 3 kids.

Some of my favorites are her Simple Burp Cloths, Little Man Toolbelt, and Fall Pom Pom Wreath.

King of the Sandcastle Shirt {a Silhouette project}

After making a shirt for Haley using my Silhouette, I got brave and decided to give the Silhouette a challenge. I chose a more detailed image for an applique to see if it could cut out tiny details on fabric.

Oh yeah, it can.

On a completely unrelated note, are you loving the baby mohawk? People think we shave his head that way, but it just grows that way somehow. I tell people he was just born cool. It's a burden he'll just have to learn to bear as he gets older :)

Using the flocked heat transfer material, which Silhouette so sweetly included in my prize bundle, I ironed on some wording then used my Silhouette to cut out and iron on some fabric for a sandcastle applique.

Here's how you can make one too!

Supplies:

• White flocked heat transfer material
• Fabric for the sandcastle
• Small scrap of fabric for the flag
• Iron
• Silhouette or X-Acto knife and cutting mat
• Sewing machine and thread
• You can download the King of the Sandcastle Silhouette Studio template found HERE

Step 1: Create your wording.

You can download the Silhouette Studio file for the King of the Sandcastle Shirt HERE. If you don't have a Silhouette, no worries! Just google "sandcastle" and you can find plenty of images to print and trace onto fabric to make your sandcastle and wording.

If you want to make everything from scratch, use Silhouette Studio to create your wording. I typed "king of the sandcastle" roughly 5 1/2 inches wide and 2 1/4 inches tall. Next, I inverted the wording so when I ironed it on my shirt it would read correctly.

I positioned a square of my flocked heat transfer material on the sticky cutting mat and sent it through the Silhouette using the pink blade to cut it.

When I peeled away the negative space, this is what my wording looked like. Use tweezers to remove the little pieces inside the lettering.

Step 2: Make your sandcastle

To make the sandcastle, I used the "Echo Park Sandcastle" design from the Silhouette store and sized it to fit my shirt (approximately 4 inches tall by 4 inches wide). I wanted to cut the flag out of a different color of fabric, so I ungrouped everything by right clicking on the castle and choosing "ungroup," then I moved the flag away from the rest of the sandcastle so I could cut it out of different fabric.

Next, iron on some sewable interfacing to the back of the fabric you want to use for your sandcastle. Make sure the interfacing is an inch or so larger than you want your final image to be. For example, my sandcastle was 4"x4", so I Ironed on a 5"x5" piece of interfacing to the back of my fabric. Repeat with the fabric you're using for your flag. Cut out and remove the paper backing.

Step 3: Cut out your sandcastle and flag.

Follow the instructions for cutting out fabric on your Silhouette. Place your fabrics on the sticky carrier sheet with the right sides facing up and the interfacing down on the carrier sheet. Make sure you pay attention to the positioning of your fabrics relative to your design in Silhouette Studio. You want to make sure your fabric is lined up where your design is located in Studio so the Silhouette will cut your fabric in the correct places. I like to double cut my fabric to make sure I have clean edges.

Send your carrier sheet through the Silhouette for cutting.

Remove the negative space around your sandcastle. Use tweezers to remove those little pieces of fabric in the windows.

Step 4: Iron on your images.

Position your sandcastle and flag where you would like them on your shirt.

Follow the instructions on your interfacing to iron on your sandcastle and flag. Mine said to place a damp cloth on top of my image and iron.

Once ironed on, stitch around the perimeter of your sandcastle and flag. Usually, applique is sewed on with a zig-zag stitch, but I chose to use a straight stitch because I wanted the edges to fray a little to give it some personality.

For your wording, position your words with the shiny side up (the letters should be right reading now) on top of your shirt and using a hot iron on the "cotton" setting, place a washcloth on top of your image and iron for the amount of time indicated on the your interfacing instructions. Silhouette flocked transfer material suggests 45-60 seconds.

Tah-dah!

Every man needs to be king of some kind of castle, right?

It's a great little summer shirt, even if you don't have a beach (*sigh*)

Check out my sidebar to see where I link up each week!

The (not so) Reversible Tunic (Dress)

Have I mentioned how much of a Pinterest junkie I am? Oh, it was that obvious huh? Yeah, well I'm definitely addicted. I have found so much inspiration and so many great projects just by browsing through all of the amazing eye candy every day. When I need inspiration for a project, I just go to Pinterest. It's like scrolling through Google images but with no weird pictures of cats in sweaters and stuff. Ok, there are a few of those too, but it's mostly awesome artsy pictures.

How many of you have seen this awesome Reversible Tunic by Kelly from Sewing in No Man's Land floating around in Pinterestland (and all over the blogosphere for that matter)?

I was practically drooling when I saw this tunic appear on my Pinterest screen, and I was pretty sure I could make one for myself.

Wait...did I just decide to make something for myself? I should have just stopped there. Embellishing an existing piece of clothing I can do, but I decided to go ahead and make myself something from scratch. Can anyone tell me how I got it in my head that I could venture away from children's clothing and actually make myself something? The minute I began the project, it was almost as if everything I knew about sewing completely left my head and I became a madwoman with a needle stabbing wildly at a pile of fabric.

Firstoff, I chose a very busy pattern that, while cute on Haley, looked more like hospital scrubs on me. Next, I made the mistake of not using one of my own shirts as a guide when cutting the fabric - this is something I do EVERY TIME when making clothes for both of the kids. I don't know what I was thinking. I ended up with a mumu/hospital scrub shirt that was wayyyy too narrow at the top. Luckily, since I have a daughter, I was able to alter it to make a cute tunic dress for Haley.

I didn't want to make it reversible like in the tutorial so I only used one fabric. I also made the tunic long enough to hit right above my daughter's knees so it became a dress. Because I decided not to make the dress reversible, I had to make the slit in the front differently. I used THIS method that I used when making the button closure in The Haley Dress.

Rather than making a casing for the elastic, I did things the lazy way and cut a piece of 1/2 inch wide elastic 1 inch smaller than my daughter's waist. Then using a zig-zag stitch, I stitched the elastic around the inside of the dress while stretching the elastic as I sewed.

The tutorial was actually really easy had I actually made it right the first time, and I have tenative plans to try again at making myself a tunic. But maybe I should just stick to what I know. I'm kind of glad things worked out the way they did though, I think the dress looks really adorable on Haley.

See how excited she was to model her new dress for me?

The thing I love about this tunic is that it's flowy and breatheable - which is perfect for wiggly little girls who love to jump and spin like my little ball of energy.

Here's where you can find Kelly's tutorial for the Reversible Tunic. Or in my case the Not-So-Reversible-Tunic-Dress :)

Happy sewing!

Linking up at THESE awesome sites!

Monogrammed Baby Snuggle Squares

**In case you missed it, I posted over at Nature's Heirloom on July 21st.
Here's the project I shared!**

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When my daughter was a few months old, a family member sent her 2 silky lovies as a gift. We gave them to her at naps and bedtime, and 2 years later she won't go to sleep without at least one of her favorite blankies. When my son was born, I knew I wanted him to have a couple of his own too.

These snuggle squares are made of flannel on one side and soft satin material on the other, so they're the perfect little lovies for cuddling and comforting little ones. Best of all, they're super easy to make.

Supplies for 1 Snuggle Square:

• 1/2 yard flannel
• 1/2 yard coordinating satin fabric
• Sewable interfacing
• Scissors
• Disappearing ink marker
• Printer and paper
• Sewing machine and coordinating thread
• Rotary cutter and mat

Step 1: Cut out your fabrics.

1. Wash your fabrics before use to make sure they don't shrink later.

2. Cut out a 19"x19" square from both your flannel and your satin material using your rotary cutter and mat.

Step 2: Make your monogram.

1. From your leftover flannel, cut out a piece of fabric 1 inch larger than you want your letter to be. Iron a slightly smaller piece of sewable interfacing to the back (the wrong side) of the fabric according to the interfacing directions. Remove paper backing.

2. In Microsoft Word, type up and print out your monogram letter, then carefully cut out with scissors. My letter was roughly 3"x3". Place it on the back of your fabric, making sure the letter is facing backwards when you trace.

3. Trace around your letter using a disappearing ink marker.

4. Cut out your letter.

Step 3: Attach your monogram.

1. With your iron on a low setting, iron your monogram onto a corner of your satin fabric on the top (or right side) of the fabric. If you're having a hard time ironing your monogram on, try placing a cloth on top of the fabric and ironing on a higher heat setting.

2. Set your sewing machine to a zig-zag stitch. Stitch around the entire perimeter of your letter, making sure to backstitch some at the beginning and end to secure.

3. This is how your finished monogram should look.


Step 4: Join your two fabrics.

1. With the right sides together, place your satin fabric on top of your flannel and match up the edges.

2. Pin and stitch around the perimeter of your fabric about 1/4 inch from the edge, leaving a space about 4 inches long unsewn for turning. (Make sure you use lots of pins when you pin the fabric because the satin is slippery and you don't want it to slide around as you sew.)

3. Clip your corners close to the stitching (but not too close!) Turn your blanket inside out and press with a hot iron on the flannel side. Make sure you press the edges of your opening inside so it matches up with the rest of your blanket.

4. Top stitch around the perimeter of your blanket 1/4 inch from the edge.

Done!

Let the snuggling begin!

I hope your little ones enjoy their snuggle squares as much as mine do.

Linking up to THESE great parties!