It's the Little Things

Due to extreme distractions and also lack of anything in particular to blog about, I skipped last week's   

entry.  Grandchildren overnight can be great fun and great exhaustion for us older folks.

                                                                  

 Here they are in a rare moment of relative quiet. 

Yes, I know! You really don't want to hear about someone else's grandchildren BUT this really is pertinent to the requisite theme of SEWING. See the pants on grand-daughter? I made them... from a t-shirt that had been hanging unworn in my closest. These are so easy to whip up on the serger.
I bought the shirt she is wearing as I didn't have any fabric to go with the print.

They think the fabric stash is a great place to come up with improvised costumes. This was an especially popular bit of yardage.

Another pair of stretchy little pants! They are not hemmed and the waist band isn't finished yet in wait for this week when I can make sure they fit. WHY don't I write down the measurements is what you are thinking. Well, I was NOT thinking.











Funny thing with this fabric. The monkey faces and the teeny hearts run in both directions. But when I cut and sewed them I found all the monkeys on the from are right side up.

And all the monkeys on the back are upside down.


















Haven't decided about a top for these. If I use the same fabric they will definitely look like and BE pajamas.


Yesterday I got really fired up and decided to use a crazy flannel fabric I had ordered online from
Jo-ann Fabrics. The selection in our store was pretty lame and I found some cute ones on their online store.

I like its cozy crazy quality. I am not the biggest fan of the endless pink and purple for little girls as well as all the bows and tu-tus. This is my idea of childhood. With her dark hair and eyes, my Angela can really "carry this off" as they say in the fashion world.
Because I was in the mood to do it immediately and had no pattern I went online and found a pattern On Craftsy I could download which I have never done before. I found THIS :

Here is my fabric cut and laid out. I used the same fabric turned vertical for the bib insert and used 

turquoise rick-rack instead of the ruffle.

Things were going really well and I was whistling away and thrilled to turn this out so quickly.

THEN the old nemesis, the button-hole came up to bite me!. I have never used the button hole foot that came with my new Janome and I decided now would be the time to use it. I made several practice button holes on scraps of the same fabric and it worked great, but when I tried to do it on the garment the seams somehow fought with the button foot and it stuck. I even spent waaaay too much time trying to remove one and then the next attempt got totally misplaced because what I thought was my start mark WASN"T.  Here is my solution. I used snaps ignoring the ill-advised buttonholes.

And then I covered up the whole mess with some of this giant size jumbo rick-rack I bought back when I had no idea what I would ever use it for. 

Then I cut an interfacing for the hem and added the same rick-rack as a finish for the hem to repeat it for balance. Since my model will not be here for awhile and is has been typically two when I want to photograph her (see previous entry ) , I am using a bulletin board for display. You will see I have cut up another orange t-shirt for a coordinating pant. I had that bit of green from a previous remake. So overall this went really well except for those little button hole things!!