Jersey Scarf

A while ago I came across a scarf online that I thought was really cute and I wanted to re-create, I have looked and looked for the original but I can't find it which turns out doesn't matter because I ended up making a completely different one.  I wanted to make it out of jersey but I was too cheap to actually buy some.  I'd mentioned to Michelle that I wanted to make this scarf but didn't want to buy the fabric and then she had the genius idea to cut up a yellow duvet cover that she was no longer using.  We had both seen this tutorial by Make it and Love it ages ago and Michelle knew she had to have one.  Honestly I thought it was okay but I was more interested in the other I'd found.  That is until Michelle got half done and it looked so darn cute that I abandoned mine to make one of my own.

This was a fun project that should have been easy and quick but three kids makes for a lot of poor productivity.  What should have taken us no time at all took 4 hours and in that time only Michelle finished.  I cut out the strips for us, (all 56 of them) and finished assembling mine at home later once Catie was asleep.

The only change we made to the original was the length, I'm not sure how hers looks so long in the photo because ours were much too short.  We ended up adding 20 extra inches of fabric to the length.  Here are a couple more photos.

I gave it a real test today and wore it out on a Home Depot run, I stayed nice and cozy despite the cold weather.

You should check out Michelle's, it's super cute too.

Little Girl's Apron Tutorial

I went to a craft day on Saturday and learned how to make these adorable aprons.  There were adult size and child size, I thought the child ones were so cute so that's what I made.

I made a second one that's going to make a great Christmas gift for a cute little girl and I made a tutorial at the same time, here's the second modeled so you can see the finished product.

This next part involves a ton of pictures so if you don't want to make one of these aprons you may want to stop here.

We'll start with a cut list.

Front 14 1/2" sq
Back 17" Sq
Bottom Trim 2"x16" - cut two
Neck Strap 3"x19"
Waist Ties 3"x26" - cut two
Pocket template - cut two

Your pocket should be 6" from the top of the point to the bottom.

You'll start by taking your two waist ties and your neck strap and sewing them along the side, right sides together to make a tube. On the waist ties you'll angle the ends so you get a point.  Turn the three right side out and press them flat.  You'll end up with this.

Next we'll work on the pocket.  Now ideally you'd want one side to be the flowered fabric and the other the polka dot but I used a fat quarter and just didn't have enough for the pocket.   The white made a nice stand in though.  I also think the neck strap would have been cute polka dot but I had to make do with what I had.

Take your two pocket pieces and put them right sides together, sew around leaving enough room to turn it the right way.  Trim your corners, turn right side out and press nice and flat.  Topstitch all the way around closing up your open gap.

You can see that after I turned my pocket my point is no longer very straight, I must not have sewn straight enough.  Oddly enough I did this later too giving a cute effect but try to sew nice straight lines.  For now put your pocket aside.

Next we're going to attach our bottom trim.  One quick note, since I had so little fabric my bottom trim is just a little bit more narrow that it should be, still worked great though.

Lay your front piece on the table and with right sides together layer your bottom trim on top lining up your raw edges, like so.  Line up the edges on the right side too, this will give you some over hang on the left but just leave it.  Sew this piece on and then move onto the next side.

Line it up opposite the first strip, like so

See how those two flaps overlap at the bottom?  The right one is sewn already, the left is the one we're working on.  When you get to the bottom you're going to lift up that right hand flap and sew as close as you can to your seam.  I put a pin in so you can see where my seam is going to end.

This is what it looks like with both sides sewn.

Now before these pictures get confusing let me point out that the fabric I'm using for the front of the apron is leftover fabric that I used to cover my ironing board.  See how one fabric is the right side and one is the wrong side?  The right side is the ironing board.

Press your seams open.  On the bottom trim you have a bottom flap and a top flat, fold the top flap out of the way for now.  Twist the bottom flap until you get that nice 45 degree angle like above.  Then fold your top flap back over top and pin in place.   If you flip everything over you can see that you'll end up with a perfect line.

You're going to sew right down that nice line where my thumb is.  Once it's sewn turn it to the back, cut off your excess and then press your seam open.

I swear that was the only complicated part, from here on out it's smooth sailing.

Time to attach the pocket.  Fold your fabric in half like this.

Your pocket goes on about 6 inches from the bottom point.

Place it on, unfold your fabric and sew in place but don't forget that this is a pocket.  Don't sew across it.  Your also only going to sew up to the bottom of the triangle so you can fold the flap over.

Once it's sewn on, fold and press your flap and add a cute button.

Time to add your waist ties.  Place your fabric wrong side up and measure about 4 inches from side point (I only did 3 1/2 since my trim was narrower).  Place your waist ties on and pin in place.  The tie goes on at an angle, if you're looking at your diamond shape of fabric you'd want to line your ties up parallel (sorry, I forgot to take a picture, I made this lovely diagram for you though).

Do the same on both sides sewing into place.

Now it's time to put the back piece on.  I felt quite certain that I would end up sewing a waist tie into this seam so I gathered mine into the center of my fabric and pinned them in place just to keep them out of the way.

With right sides together line up your fabric.  There will be some overlap but you cut it off later.

Pin in place and sew around making sure to leave a section open so you can turn it later.  Before you turn these pieces trim off your excess polka dot fabric and clip your corners.  Turn and press really well and then top stitch all the way around.

Fold the top point down about 3 1/2 inches and stitch in place going over the same seam you used to top stitch.

See how both my folded over points are kind of angled?  I don't know how I managed to angle both of them but since they match I like them.

Now all that's left is the neck ties.

You could just sew both sides nice and secure and I did that on the first apron only to come home and find out the strap was way too big.  I could have just made it smaller but instead I measured the fit on Catie and left one side sewn on and the second side I unpicked.  I put two button holes on the strap a couple of inches apart so that as she gets taller the strap can grow with her.  Don't judge my buttonholes, not sure how they turned out so wonky.

I sewed a button to the inside of the apron to attach the strap too.

Once it's buttoned you can't even tell they're there and it fits really well.

You could also choose to put some buttons right where the neck straps get sewn on, that would look really cute.  I chose not too on either of my aprons because my fabric was so busy.

I hope that seemed easy because it really was.  I made mine during Catie's nap.  These aprons are adorable and even though I have no reason too I want to make more.

Pretty nice bruise on her forehead hey?  Perhaps she should take note of where the wall starts.

Passport Cover Giveaway Update

When I posted this giveaway I was honestly concerned that no one would want one, I've been so happy to see all the comments that during Catie's nap yesterday I made a second one.

So on Monday when I give this away I'll choose not just one winner but two.
Good luck!

Advent Calendar - Week #2

I just looked up Jill's site to find a link to remind you all of this sew along advent calendar that I'm making and noticed that my assignment this week was 8 ornaments, not 5 like I thought.  So now I'm 3 short.  I may or may not make three more, we'll see if this post gets updated.

Week two went okay, I felt really behind but managed to complete the assignment with time to spare (or so I thought).

Last week I embroidered all of my numbers and sewed them onto my backing piece.  This week I cut out my tree and sewed it on.

A quick side note... don't you hate how the second time you do a project you end up so much happier with it than you were the first time?  I want this advent calendar to be my second attempt because I'm already doing things I wish I could change.  I wish my tree could be taller but I'm limited by to the size of the rectangle I cut out.  It'll work but there are things I would change if I could.

So I cut out and sewed on my tree.

Then I made 5 ornaments

You'll notice that lots of them are white but that's because I was so busy with the car seat that I started a bit late, meaning I chose easy ornaments.  They happened to mostly be white, I will add some colour though.

Here's a close up of the individual ornaments.

He sure is a sad snow man hey?  Not sure how that happened.

Hopefully next week goes okay even though I plan on tackling the high chair re-cover.

Passport Cover Giveaway

**Update - I've been so happy to see the comments on this post and see that my fears of no one wanting this were unfounded so I went ahead and made a second cover today.  When I announce the winner of this I'll choose two and both will get a cute, stylish cover.**

When I put out my call for projects Carla answered with a high chair re-cover request.  I've been wanting to work on a high chair for a while now but I think you need to use some sort of plastic fabric that can be easily wiped clean.  I considered laminated fabric but it's really expensive, I've never seen it in Canada and I hear that it cracks over time.  One day in Fabricland I happened to wander over to the vinyl section thinking I'd just see what they had.  I was pleasantly surprised and found a really cute black and white damask pattern.  I've never worked with vinyl so I bought the smallest amount they'd let me and brought it home to sew a few lines.  My few lines test was successful and I'm now convinced that it will work like I want.  The vinyl on the roll is really wide which is great but means my small amount was really a thin,  long strip.  I didn't want to waste the strip and I figured if I sewed a project with it I'd be that much more comfortable working on the high chair.  The passport cover is what I came up with.

It has a cute ruffle down the front to add a little something and it has black edging.  I think it looks classy and a great place to store your generic passport.  The inside is plain black fabric.

Here's a view from the back

I've decided to give this beauty away (hopefully someone wants it and I don't have an un-commented on giveaway, wouldn't that be embarrassing.)

To enter just become a follower and leave me a comment letting me know you did.  If you're already a follower comment and tell me.  That's it, easy.  I'll pick a winner and ship this off, it would make a great stocking stuffer don't you think?

I also have another fun giveaway I want to post but I have to get my act together and actually make the item first so stay tuned.


As a side note, isn't it funny how projects come in waves?  Three weeks ago I was out of projects and now I can't seem to keep up with everything I want to do.

Taco Salad - SAMM

I realize you probably read that title and thought that there's no way you need a recipe for taco salad but just keep reading.

For the past month or so I've committed myself to making one new recipe a week.  My menu had become really stale and I was just repeating the same recipe's over and over, even if they're yummy ones excessive repeats just diminish they're deliciousness.  I find recipes online sometimes but mostly I've been pulling out cookbooks I haven't used in ages and flipped through them once again choosing recipes that perhaps I skipped over the first time.  This new recipe experiment has been mostly unsuccessful so far, just about every new recipe I've tried has been average or below average until today, I finally found one that will make it's way into permanent rotation.

This recipe comes from a little Pillsbury book I got who knows when, it's called Casseroles & Slow Cooker Meals.  I was looking for a Sunday meal and lately I've been enjoying the slow cooker, especially on Sunday it's nice to come home to a cooked dinner.  I saw the taco salad recipe and thought it would be perfect because I love taco salad and since I did all the prep in the morning it would feel even easier than it already was.  This recipe is awesome and may become our new go-to taco meat.

Here's a picture of the meat all cooked.  I know it doesn't look great because it's a pot of meat but trust when I say it's so good.  I hadn't ever put beans in my tacos before but I love the extra texture and substance they add.

Make-Your-Own Taco Salad
1 lb ground beef
1 pkg taco seasoning mix
1 can (16 oz) tomato puree (does this mean crushed tomatoes?  That's what I used)
1 medium onion, chopped
1 can (16 oz) pinto beans, drained and rinsed
1/8 tsp pepper

So you put it all in the slow cooker breaking up your meat before you add all your other ingredients and give it a good mix.  Cover and cook on high for 3 hours or on low for 6-8 hours.

Once it's done you plate with whatever you'd normally have on taco salad.  We had lettuce, tomatoes, cheese, salsa, sour cream, avocado and corn chips.


Linking to Share a Meal Monday

Car Seat Re-Cover 3

If you've been reading along you remember when I put out a call for projects as I'd run out of fun things to do.  KD responded with just what I was looking for, a car seat re-cover.  I've done two of these already that you can read about here and here and I enjoyed them both.  They're a challenge and they're difficult but the end result is well worth all the energy, don't you think?

KD handed me her car seat

along with these fabrics.

There are three sock monkey fabrics and the bundle of polka dots is handmade bias tape (that I was so grateful for, it was perfect for piping).  I'm sure KD would have been fine if I didn't use everything she gave me but they all looked so cute together so I fit them all in.

I'm not going to go into too much detail on this project because it's just like the last one and I detailed it pretty well over here.  Instead I'm just going to show you lots of pictures.

Hopefully KD will forgive me for mentioning that this was the dirtiest car seat I've ever seen and the cover looked practically new after a spin through the washing machine, I almost could have stopped there.  It was also a new challenge because it used piping.  At first I didn't think it would be a big deal but it made the whole thing a bit of a jigsaw puzzle, certain pieces couldn't be assembled until the piping was put on but the piping couldn't be put on until another piece was assembled... tricky but do-able.  In the photos the piping is tough to see but it looks so cute, here's a closer picture.

Here's a closer photo to show all the fabrics together.

I added the banana strap covers but they can be removed if she doesn't want them.

Catie is going to be very sad when this seat gets delivered because she loves it!  She sits and laughs and gets up and sits back down, over and over.  She would get very angry when I was doing fittings and wouldn't let her play.

For all the before and after lovers out there...

I'm going to toot my own horn for a minute here, I did a couple of really smart things on this project and I'm going to tell you about all of them because I'm so pleased with the results.

Starting at the top and working down, the banana piece was supposed to be two pieces sewn together since one of them has much more padding for the headrest.  It made a lot more sense for me to use one piece so the pattern carries on.   Looks cute and doesn't change the functionality.

The side of the carseat has a tiny label telling you how to use the lap seat belt, that got unpicked and re-attached to the new cover (sewing is all about the details).

I added small little straps (they're hidden underneath) to keep those armrest pieces from being pulled up.  They should stay on nice and snug now.

The bottom of the car seat has holes that lined up with holes in the fabric where I assume you could attach the two pieces together somehow.  I've seen this on every car seat cover I've done but I've never actually seen the fabric attached or any hardware to attache it.  I sewed a strap underneath the fabric that ties through those holes to keep the cover nice and snug so it can't be lifted.

Okay, horn tooting over.


So KD now has a custom and improved car seat cover that fits her personality and will hold her little guy comfortably, I hope she's as happy with the results as I am.

The drought of projects has also ended and my list is piling up so there should be a lot more fun posts to come, sorry for the dry spell.



I'll be linking this project up to these great parties.