making a home for kid’s clothes week
April 3rd, 2013
Five years ago, I sat down and wrote a list. I decided I was going to really do this sewing thing, even if my brain kept telling me I was no good at it. My plan was to focus on sewing kid’s clothes one week, then move on to sewing something else the next week and so on down the list. Well, I never got to the second thing on the list. Sewing kid’s clothes took over! Took over and became Kid’s Clothes Week.
Now it has grown into this amazing community of sewers, all motivating and helping each other. It has gotten so big, it has outgrown my blog. I told you a few weeks ago about kcw’s new blog and I hinted at something even more. Dorie and I are building a new website for kcw and it’s going to be awesome! The website will be a place to go for inspiration, and help with patterns, and discovering new people and blogs. And all of it will be about making kid’s clothes. There are a few good sewing communities out there, but sewing kid’s clothes is always tucked away in a dusty corner.
We want the new site to be for you, and by you. Over on the kcw blog today, we’re asking for your suggestions. What do you think the new site should look like? What do you think it should do? What features are necessary? What ones aren’t? This site has the potential to be a really fantastic place and we’d love your help making it.
And if you want to do more than suggestion box stuff, we need that too! We’d like a group of people to be the first registered users and do a little hammering and sawing on our new home. We built this amazing community together, we can build and amazing site together too! Head on over to the kcw blog and check it out!
I think it’d be cool to have a link party. I like looking at the things that people create and that’s how I discover new blogs. Or maybe host sewing challenges or themes? Like Halloween Costumes or something fun like that. :)
-Ash P
More kids clothes sewing blogs are like a new flavor of my favorite candy!!! lol! I look forward to seeing how it grows! :)
Sounds great — site looks great. Very excited. One thing, though, that my grammarian brain can’t let go. The possessive apostrophe in “Kid’s Clothes Week” is incorrectly placed. “Kid’s” indicates just one child’s clothes, whereas placing the possessive apostrophe after the pluralizing s, as in “Kids’ Clothes Week” would indicate the clothes of the kids, the children’s clothing. Cheers!
there was much discussion on this topic, as my mother is an English teacher. We went from no apostrophe to one before the s. It was a middle ground–not great for everyone, but good enough for most. :)
I’ve been thinking about this all morning – I’m so excited about this idea and sure you’ll make it great. Here are some suggestions – things that would draw me to a sewing website.
* A weekly round up of a particular sewing aspect. This could be anything – easy summer skirts, the use of piping, the colour green, nautical fabrics…anything! Would be great to see what people are doing around the blogosphere.
* Feature a weekly (bi-weekly, monthly, whatever) blog/blogger and highlight his/her work and what they’re doing. Something similar to WordPress’s Freshly Pressed. Maybe even have a quick interview with that blogger.
* A big geek-out section with lots of technical details – zips, applying bias/piping, setting sleeves. Maybe a round up here would be good – bringing together the best of what’s out there on each technical aspect and especially how they relate to kids’ clothes.
*A good search section for looking up specific patterns and getting feedback/having discussions with people who have made these.
* This last one is the one I like the most but most difficult to explain (probably because it’s not that clear in my head yet). When I started sewing I would say I was a whimsical sewist – I would come across a cute dress or top and make it, regardless of whether or not my kids actually needed it. Now that I have more experience I want my sewing to be functional and practical (with still a good dose of whimsy! :-)). It would be great to have a way of suggesting how to build a handmade wardrobe – key pieces that could be built upon with store bought things but still keeping the essence of the wardrobe handmade. Does that make sense?
Good luck with it all. I can’t wait to see what you come up with.
what? these are all amazing! you are now our official Idea-Lady! Thank you so much, Laura.
Ohhh, how exciting news… you and kids’ clothes week are part of the reason why I have bought an overlock machine. Hopefully this year I will be able to participate in sewing action as well.
What would make me come back over and over again:
– Photo step-by-step tutorials
– Photo based archive for patterns and tutorials, so that it is easy to find your favourites (if you have the time for it)
– inspiration from bloggers in the community (and also discovering new favourite blogs)
Good luck & looking forward to see the end result!
no way! I hope you don’t curse me when you thread it! Thank you for all the ideas–I hope I see your lovely creations during kcw.
As a knitter as well as sewer, I can’t think of a better inspiration than Ravelry. A place to post and find patterns. A place to share records of what you’ve sewed, along with changes you’ve made. A place to interact with people and groups. Forums as a place to get advice, do challenges and sew-alongs. Maybe down the road a place to sell fabric, notions, tools, etc, or at least have pointers to fabric sellers.
One of the great things about Ravelry is I can search for a pattern then find maybe 25 pieces made by different people using that pattern. They talk about using different materials, changing sizes, modifications, embellishment, all with pictures.
I’d be happy to join and help kwc in the early stages as I’m really enjoying sewing clothes for my 2 pre-school grandkids.
I think its a great idea. It will be a great opportunity for the sewers and knitters to show their potentiality and it will also inspire some of the new people to join sewing communities. It will be really exiting experience. looking forward to see your progress. cheers!! :)
[…] for myself which is extremely rare, if not entirely unheard of. (I’ll make up for it during Kid’s Clothes Week though). Because I was feeling impatient and restless I needed something that was relatively […]