Project: Corduroy

With the feeling of Spring in the air, I've decided to get all the corduroy out of my system to make way for bulbs popping through the snow, buds on the forsythia, and huge doses of antihistamines and decongestants. Go March!

I made this adorable dress using a the Parisian pattern from ManiMina on Etsy. The collar piece absolutely gave me fits. I could not get the pattern to make sense at all so I ended up fudging it. After a couple of tries, I got it to work and actually made two of these. The armholes were too tight on this one for my niece so I adjusted the pattern 1/2" on each pattern piece so that it would work better for her.

The floral fabric is a very fine wale corduroy that I got at JoAnn's. It's soft and gorgeous and has washed up really well. The collar is linen because I thought that would really add to the Fall feel to the dress. Zadie has gotten a lot of wear out of this and both girls call it their "pretty dress" and beg to wear them when they're fresh out of the wash. I just love the vintage button I used for the closure paired with a satin ribbon.

Project: Men's Dress Shirt Dress

Since Spring isn't listening and we just keep getting more snow, I've decided to stop fighting it and just go with this Wintery theme: Corduroy! ManiMina on Etsy has some really great patterns. A few months ago I bought a set of patterns for recycling men's dress shirts into cute toddler wear. One pattern makes this awesome dress, another makes a top and skirt, and the third has you turn the arms of the shirt into a pair of pants.

I bought a super thick brown corduroy shirt at the Salvation Army for a buck. I thought it would be great for winter. When I took these photos the dress fit perfectly. Then two weeks and a growth spurt later, it was a tunic. I don't know how Mr. Lemon and I turned out this tall kid. I'm 5'2" and Mr. Lemon is no basketball player.

I decided to add some length to the sleeves since this would be worn when it's cold (and now with leggings, also super cute). That was not successful at first; the armholes, which fit perfectly with short sleeves, were way too tight when lengthened. I cut an ovalish shape out of some of the scraps and sewed them into the armpit area after ripping apart that seam. Now it's perfect. I will have to watch out for that when lengthening other patterns. It's no fun to hem sleeves so I added some cute bias trim that I bought on Etsy (it's Michael Miller) before I knew you could make your own.

The dress seemed dark to me so I went nuts with my sewing machine's very limited selection of decorative stitches and added a bunch of detail. I just put some pins in to give me some direction. That was quick, fun and really easy so I'm definitely going to keep doing that little trick.

Finally, I dug through my stash of vintage buttons and found some interesting ones to use in place of the hideous ones that came on the shirt (I bought a tin full of buttons at a yard sale for $3 a few years ago -- what a find!). The only really challenging part about making this dress, for me, was the thickness of the fabric -- especially where there were existing details in the shirt. It was a lot of bulk for my machine but the Huskystar once again pulled through.

I loved making this. I had made the same pattern with short sleeves for a friend in the Fall and will definitely use this pattern again. There are some other tutorials floating out there online for similar projects out of men's dress shirts so I'm going to try them all and report back to you.

New Projects

I've been on a crazy crafty roll lately making lots of things for Zadie. We're going on a little trip soon and I wanted to have some really fantastic toys to take with us. My favorite is this 21" cat doll. I bought the pattern from mmmcrafts on Etsy. It was a pdf and Larissa emailed it right away. It was an incredibly easy pattern to follow and I really enjoyed making it. I've been sewing a lot of stuff lately and with some patterns, I spend more time reading and re-reading the instructions to figure out what the heck they're telling me to do. That was not the case here. It was well written and the drawings were perfect.

The best part was picking out the fabrics. I couldn't decide between this teal corduroy and some red that I also had. I put them both on the couch and let Zadie decide. She pretty much charged at the fabric from across the room (this is a toddler who isn't quite toddling yet so it was funny to see) and jammed her little pointer finger onto the teal. She made her choice very clear. I didn't even realize that she could understand what I was asking.

I don't think I altered the pattern in any way (although I did embroider the face instead of using felt). The sleeves are cool ladybugs I picked up on Etsy for the Mod Sampler Quilt-Along project that I haven't finished yet (all the blocks are done, I swear!). The funny thing is that the sample cat in the pattern is wearing the same sleeves in a different color. I thought they were polka dots until I saw a closer picture on her flickr. The skirt was a challenge since I had never sewn elastic in like that but it was cool to learn something new -- and it was pretty easy. I used a Japanese house print that I got at Purl in Soho, some Echino, a solid -- really all just stuff I had. I didn't have to buy anything new (although I did and didn't even end up using it, as usual).

The shoes were my favorite: