The old blog has been pretty quiet this week. And it might have to stay that way a bit longer. I’m spending every minute of my day painting our house. The outside! It’s raining today, so I’m here with you, but tomorrow it’s back to covering myself and the house in paint.

I think it might have been raining when I made this May Day crown too. It definitely was a very chilly May Day, which was too bad because my friend had a fantastic party with a may pole and everything. The day before the party my kids helped me cut out some petals out of felt, then in the evening I sewed them all up into flowers. I put some on a crown for my son and made my daughter and myself these flower crowns. They were super excited to wear them and the crowns have found a permanent place in the dress up box. I was pretty happy with how they turned out too. I didn’t really use any patterns, but I did look at this, this, and this photo for inspiration. With some scraps and a stitch here and there, you can pretty much make any flower. Sounds like a good rainy day project…

Meg from Sew Liberated asked if I would kick off the book tour for her new book, Growing Up Sew Liberated. How could I say no to a fellow Meg, especially one as talented as Meg McElwee? I loved her first book, so I knew this one, which is devoted to the littles, would be fantastic too.  And it is! Not only is it full of beautiful things to sew, but the projects are organized around a child’s day: waking up, eating, playing inside, going out to play and getting ready for bed.

This shirt I made from the book, the crossover top, is in the “greeting the morning” chapter. It is meant to be a simple top, but is so perfect for jammies that I couldn’t resist. I had some super soft knit squirreled away for something and this was just the something.

This is a very quick and easy project. There was one step that tripped me a up, but I still finished the whole shirt in about an hour and a half. Next time it’ll be under an hour for sure. And there will be a next time, because the boys need summer jammies too. Obviously my heart fabric makes the shirt a little girly, but the pattern itself works for boys as well. And really all the projects in the book are refreshingly unisex.

And quite simple to customize as well. Like these shorts: the pattern was for sleeping johns (what a great name!) but seeing as it’s suddenly 90 degrees here shorts were in order. I added the ribbing detail on the bottom because I had the ribbing out for the shirt–and because it’s cute. Meg has designed clothes and accessories with simple details that are lovely on their own, but also would look fabulous all embellished up!

Many of the projects are just right for gifts as well. We are pretty much past the bib stage in our house, but the all-by-myself bib, which is cleverly based on an envelope style shirt (there’s a pattern for those in the book too!), looks pretty much like the perfect bib. I’m big on giving useful gifts–for babies and older kids–but I want something that is awesome as well as practical. Honestly, pretty much every project in the book fits this description. It’s nice to sew a pretty gift, but unless it’s going to get played with it, it’s not doing anyone any good. A play cape, an art satchel, a sleep sack, a cloth doll, an adjustable messenger bag, I would enjoy making all of them and I know they would all be well received and loved.

Growing up Sew Liberated is a fantastic book, simple as that. Please follow the book tour to see other sneak peeks and beautiful projects from Meg’s new book!

Growing Up Sew Liberated Blog Tour

Join Interweave Books in a celebration of the launch of Meg McElwee’s new book, Growing Up Sew Liberated. The launch kicks off with a 15-day blog tour visiting education blogs, sewing blogs, parenting blogs, personal blogs, eco-living blogs, and some that are simply a combination of all of the above.  You’ll meet some extraordinary women, see stunning photography, hear inspirational stories from Meg and many of her friends, and of course learn more about the book. Perhaps you’ll find some new favorite bloggers to follow along the way? Join us each day as we visit with:

6/6         Elsie Marley

6/7         Made By Rae

6/8         The Artful Parent

6/9         Rhythm of the Home Blog

6/10       Uncommon Grace

6/13      Simple Homeschool

6/14       Burda Style

6/15       Maya Made

6/16       Wise Craft

6/17       JC Handmade

6/20      Frontier Dreams

6/21       Made

We’re still working little by little on the kids’ room. The paint is on and the crib is up! Three kids in a room! Ooff! Here is the before post if you forgot what it looked like (because it was so long ago) and a during. That big board up on the wall isn’t minimalist art, though with my moody, out of focus shot it does look like it.  I’m going to paint a map of our neighborhood on it and I would love your thoughts. I’ve got an overhead projector that I can use to trace a map, but I’m stuck on colors. We live by some lakes and parks, so there will be shades of green and blue. But what about the streets? I was thinking white, but is that too much white in the room? Or I could do the blocks white and leave the streets the color of the board. I still don’t know what to do about marking the places–kid drawings? Polaroids? stickers? Remember I was a philosophy major not an art major. I need your help!

Under the crib I’ve got it covered. A few casters and wheels on some old boxes and blazzam! Storage! There is finally a place to put puzzles and linens. The wheels look cool, but I’m holding my breath with two boys in the house. Isn’t that bear creek crate bomb? I was at the expensive thrift store (ha!) and it was only $1.50. Score!

I think I might make a bumper out of that black and white ikea bunting fabric. The baby isn’t so much a baby anymore, so the bumper won’t be to protect his little head. It will block his view of the other kids so he can actually fall asleep. Well, that is the theory anyway…

Edited to add: It was brought to my attention that it isn’t actually Anthropologie who makes the Primal Cuts dishtowel, but a very talented indie designer Sara Selepouchin. She sells her butcher’s diagram dishtowels and many other amazing things at her shop, girls can tell. They are beautifully designed (the coffee one is my favorite) and professionally printed–definitely not a slap dash affair like mine.

Ellen asked me to do a little tutorial for her handMAYde month and I was happy to oblige.  There were some fabulous tutorials for weddings, babies, and kids, but this last week is for knock offs. Being the cheapskate that I am this was the week for me. I was perusing everyone’s favorite store to knock off and saw these dishtowels:

Actually, last christmas I wanted to silkscreen a set of butcher diagram dishtowels for presents, but that meant learning how to silkscreen, so the idea kind of fizzled. Sadly, I still don’t know how to silkscreen. I thought maybe freezer paper stencils would work, but then the images would loose a lot of detail. Iron on paper or ink jet transfer? Well then you’d have to find and buy supplies and wrestle with your printer. I wanted a quick and dirty project. So I went downstairs to my studio, rustled up some supplies and this is what I got:

to market, to market dishtowel:

a tutorial in 3 easy steps

materials:

• large embroidery hoop
• flour sack towel
• fine point fabric pen
• image to trace (2 copies)

This is the fabric pen I used and it worked surprisingly well. I haven’t the faintest idea where I got it, but I’m guessing some crafty big box store. The flour sack towel I picked up at the grocery store a while back (3 for 5$). They shrink up a lot in the wash, so you should probably wash, dry and iron them before you start. The image might get all weird if you do it after.

directions:

1. fit your embroidery hoop on your towel where you want the image to go. Make sure to put the hoop on upside down–so the towel is right side up, but flat on the table.

2. Then just trace the image. I found it handy to have another copy of my picture  I could refer to as I traced. The flour sack towel is easy enough to see through, but it’s nice to know exactly what the image should look like without picking the towel up to peek under it.

3. Heat set the image with your iron. And that’s it! Quick and dirty–and pretty stylish too.

1.by ashley cubly 2.by ressica jachel 3.by a p’s 4.by lgjcunha 5. by day7577 6. by sew responsible

One last KCWC photo montage. It was such a treat to see all the knot shorts that popped up in the flickr pool. They all turned out so well.  I’m so glad you all liked my little pattern. There might have to be more pattern making in my future.

I loved reading all you had to say about KCWC on the last post! There seemed to be equal numbers of those who took the challenge and ran with it and those who got bogged down and stopped, which is to be expected. Sometimes KCWC comes at the right time, creatively, and sometimes it doesn’t. I know I had to give myself a few pep talks during the week.  Sabine’s comment sums the week up nicely, I think:

SabineC says:

May 19, 2011 at 4:46 pm(Edit)

This was my second KCWC – and I fully intend to play along with the next one, too!
I started off well, the sailor pants for my son came out in just one day of “patterning” and one day of sewing – as I had hoped. The tunic I had intended for my little girl went all wrong, though. Started on Day 3, I had to unpick almost every seam after the fitting on Day 4…. And everyone knows that unpicking a seam goes w-a-a-a-y slower than sewing one! So that kind of took the wind out of my wings. A splitting headache on Day 5 prevented any sewing then.

So there I was, on Day 6, far behind on my schedule and feeling bad because of it. Until I realized that that was not the spirit of KCWC at all! Sure, it is nice if you manage to finish more projects, and, well, let’s face it, there’s something terribly addictive of showing (off) your pictures on Flickr, for the world to peruse and to cheer at your work (and your sense of pride ;-) ) But there’s something else.
I think that the KCWC is about giving you that little nudge to go and to KEEP going, using different motivators: the online “audience”, the inspiration you get from seeing all those other wonderful creations, the interviews and articles on the Elsie Marley Blog; the idea that one hour a day is (most of the time) really feasible, the personal drive from “within” that makes you believe that “Yes, I can do it!” and the pride that you feel when you do succeed.

So I single handedly opted to extend the KCWC and finished the tunic on, well, Day 8 and Day 10. Which meant no public cheering, but when my almost 2 year old daughter saw herself in the mirror with the tunic on, she went all “Oh! Mooooooi!” (*)
(and if that doesn’t give me the nudge to prolong the KCWC even more, then I don’t know what will :-) )

See you next time!

Sabine

(*) In case you are wondering: yes, “Mooi” is the equivalent of “beautiful” in our language ;-)

If you played along then of course you are a winner, but the ones who one the contest were #9 for the I Love Paris doll kit:

Katie Strong says:

May 19, 2011 at 12:18 pm

After flaking completely last Fall, I approached KCWC Spring edition with a zip of manic energy. It was great motivation to use up my stash, to put to use the cute japanese patterns I spent so much time tracing a few months back, and to share the images on Flickr. I loved checking out other moms’ (and dads’?) creations every day. The part I liked best? I think it really upped my confidence. My kids are actually wearing the stuff this time around, too. Added bonus. Thanks again!

and  #21 for the Charlie Tunic Pattern

Wendy says:

May 19, 2011 at 2:28 pm

I bottomed out after day two, simply because I didn’t want to make my own bias tape, and the nearest fabric store with the right color was 45 minutes away. But the challenge did get me started again, even though I didn’t finish anything. I will be better prepared in the fall; all of the gorgeous inspiration in the flickr pool has me planning already!

Congratulations! I’ll be in touch soon!