Sunday, May 06, 2012

A boy needs a book bag

I made a book bag for Romily when she started pre-school and it's been great - I made it oversize so it would accommodate all kinds of large format picture books and the bag hasn't yet met a book it couldn't fit.
Tristan starts preschool (kindergarten) next year and so I decided the time was right to make one for him too. Things are always so much easier the second time around, aren't they? Especially when your clever husband helps you work out that it's right sides together when you're making a bag with lining. When you turn the bag and its lining inside out after stitching them together they're the right way around the first time!
(Note this bag has the same button as Romily's!)
If you knew how many times I had to redo Romily's version, you would know this is a breakthrough. Of course, all you clever sewers out there knew this already, but I am a bit hopeless when it comes to space/logic/maths ;)
So, back to the bag. I ordered some cute 2D Zoo and matching green fabric from Jody at Fabric Shoppe, which arrived super-speedily (as always) and went at it on Saturday evening while the kids were in the bath (in the adjacent room). I finished it off after I put them to bed. Time spent all up: 1 hour. I even remembered to sew in one of my 'Handmade by Cascade Lily' tags!

Tuesday, May 01, 2012

RoboPants

Someone has outgrown all his long pants...who might that be? Yes, it's Tristan, who is now 108cm tall. While I bought him one pair of pants, I really wanted to make a couple of pairs for him - let's face it: in a few more years neither child is likely to want to wear 'homemade pants'! I am also determined to use up as much of my stash as I can - it's quite embarrassing how much fabric I have parked in tubs!
So I pulled out some robot Kokka fabric I've had tucked away for a couple of years. I didn't have quite enough for the yoke, so I used some contrasting fabric (also from stash!). The pants are based on the Aqua Shorts pattern from Ottobre 3/2008, which I've made several times. It was easy to lengthen them and I just added a little width around the waist/yoke, as the Aqua Shorts pattern only goes up to size 98cm - Tristan is very slim around the waist, so it was really only length that needed to be changed! The pants are a little long, but at least they'll last him through winter. And when they turn into ankle flappers, I can convert them into shorts :)

I am very happy with how the pants turned out - I didn't make any mistakes! I think this is the first time I've sewn pants without having to unpick something. Tristan seems well pleased with them too!

Perhaps I might actually be learning a thing or two after the past five years of practice :) I have two more pairs cut and one is half-sewn. I'll potter away on them in between working, mothering, studying and whatever else takes up my waking hours.

I've also been quilting! My Christmas Baubles handquilting is coming along very nicely and I've just finished making five mini-quilts for the sample swap that's being run as part of this year's Sew It Together. I'll show you what I've been making once the swap's complete.