First Communion Dress

It's just around the corner, First Holy Communion. It's not done yet, but here's what I've been working on this past weekend. I've had this dress pattern for several years, and it looks divine on paper. However, I'm going to have to make some alterations to make this not look like a bolt of fabric on my tall slender girl. I would even say I think it looks lovely on the hanger...but on my daughter, it just looks like some one's wedding dress swallowed her up. I don't like it!

I did consider just buying a dress, there are lots of pretty ones online. But I was afraid they wouldn't fit her well. Well, now look what I went and did! I made a dress that doesn't fit her well at all. Now is this ironic or what!

My absolute nemesis in sewing is zippers. I suck at them! If you look close to the front of the dress you can see where I damaged the fabric when I accidentally sewed over the top of the dress while sewing in the zipper. Please don't ask me to make you a garment that requires a zipper, you'll be sorry!

Lucky for me, my daughter is not picky she seems to think it's nice. I can take it in some in the back, and add a sash or something. Maybe I'll add some beading if I have time or can think of something that would compliment the dress.

Oh, I almost forgot, I did change the pattern somewhat, in that I added some cap sleeves to the dress. The dress code guidance for first communion was "no bare shoulders."

Hair Flowers

When I was a little (roller) skater there were very talented parents who made these gorgeous hair accessories for their skating daughters. And there were crafty moms who also sold their hair accessories at contests too. We all liked to look at all the pretty flowers and hair ribbons. Now, I'm not saying mine are equal to those I remember, but I did try to emulate the flowers from my  memory.

Well, now that these are done, I'm finished with the girls' skating costumes.

Dress on Ice

The dress had it's test run today. It passed. The head coach (well, the most senior coach in the rink) liked it too. So we're green light, go for coach approval. Yes, I do worry that they won't like my dresses.

NY NY dress

The back of the dress

At the last contest, the little sister sat quietly in the stands just watching. There were so few skaters in the beginning levels that I thought it was kind of silly I hadn't bothered to enter her into the contest too. She too would likely win a medal for just having shown up...and that might help her get over her feelings of being left out.

So our coach is working with her a little each week and she's going to skate to NY NY at the next contest.

I had this fabric on hand and since everyone in NY wears black...all the time, it was clear the dress should be black. Then I decided to look at dresses worn by Audrey Hepburn for inspiration, because I wanted a "classic" look. I saw a few "Breakfast at Tiffany" styled dresses I liked, but decided that this dress had to have sleeves, and I didn't want to fuss with a zipper. So I came up with a simple off the shoulder scooped neck and back get up. The fabric shines on it's own, so I just embellished the shear and neck line with beads.

Last night I finished her dress and beaded it up. I just have to come up with hair accessories for both girls and this season's dresses (maybe we can eek out two seasons again ;) will be done.

New Contest Dress

This is the dress! I've been working on this "classical" polka concept for a while. The music is Tritch Tratch (chit chat) polka by Johann Strauss...and I just love how everything is coming together! My daughter and her coach worked on the first part of the program today...and I'm just tickled pink! I just don't think I could get tired of ever listening to this piece and watching her skate to it. I'm happy with how the dress has turned out thus far.

This afternoon, I'm working on the beads.

And then, I have another dress to make up for her sister when I'm finished...and will have to start this all over again.

Practice Dress

I made this practice dress about a week ago. It was mostly so I could see how the new pattern I bought worked for my daughter's body type. Of course, it needed to be tweaked, but it's easier to buy a pattern and then tweak it, then to try and draft my own pattern. So I needed to start with a practice dress.

Maybe one day I'll be good enough at design and sewing to draft my own patterns from scratch. I'm self taught, so I learn something new with each project.

I don't like it...

Nope, I don't like how this turned out at all. It doesn't appeal to me in the least and I loath how the lines don't connect and how the patterns don't exactly flatter my recipient.

My DH said, "don't worry, you can always make me another sweater."

Ugh...November, December, January, and into February...hours and hours, and hours...and I don't like how it turned out. Oh well...after I finish tucking all the tails, I'm done with this thing.

At least my model is cute! And he did say that he would wear whatever I made for him. What a sweet guy!

The sleeves

The sleeves of that sweater are done...finally! Last night I ripped back the neck and picked up the new neck line stitches. I hope to have this sucker finished by this weekend.

skate dress time

 I really was milking it when I got two seasons out of the last dress I made for my daughter. Alas, she's too big for that dress now (nearly popping the seams), and it's time to craft another one. Thus, the planning has begun! I'm kind of nervous. I hope I can pull this one off.  

I finished the body...

...then knit up about 1/2 a sleeve before deciding to have my recipient try it on. Wrong, wrong, wrong. The sleeve wasn't tapering down fast enough, and the neck! Oh the neck is too high. My last Aryan sweater the neck seemed too low, and thus I've over compensated.

I've ripped out the sleeve back to the starting point and will start again. When I finish the sleeves I'll be going back up to the neck and will try and unwind it down and then knit it back to a better dimension. That will be a bit experimental, as I've never unwound a garment from the beginning. However, I think I should be able to, why not? Better than ripping the entire thing out. Oh the hours, and hours I've spent on this thing already. I don't foresee this being done before Valentine's day at this rate.

Progress

I knew this sweater would take a long time...but it's a little frustrating that I'm still working on it. Hopefully, I will get it done for Christmas...I hope!

Here I am multi-tasking; knitting, administering a math lesson, and serving as a baby bed. The baby is quite cozy under the large, warm sweater-to-be.

On the needles...

A request from over 6 years ago

Pumpkin socks

fun little weekend knits

Project Pumpkin Pants

It started out as a skein of plain Aryan wool. I poured a dash of vinegar into the bathroom sink, then added orange flavored kool-aid (1 packet unsweetened) and enough water to cover the whole skein. It resulted in a very pale orange yarn. Then I repeated the process using 1 packet of black cherry flavored kool-aid, and this helped to darken the orange a bit more.  After it dried I had a nice variegated peachy orange color.    And now we have a new pair of longies for the baby.   The longies are knit in the round from the top down. The body of the pants were knit on circular needles, and then the legs were knit on double point needles.

Lime for the fall

 Just finished knitting this last night and got the dress sewn up this afternoon.

The sleeves should shrink up a bit after it's washed, but they are a bit longer then I'd intended. Oh well...

I'm not even going to bother with a headband...she won't wear them anyhow.

Two down, one to go

I didn't think I'd have enough fabric, but I've got a plan to eek out one more dress from this lot, so that my three girls will have matching dresses. It would have been nice if I'd finished this at the begining of Spring....but before fall will be fantastic too!

The goal now, is to finish the third dress someone's birthday at the end of this month. "just keep knitting, just keep knitting...knitting, knitting..."

Here's the second dress.

It's been a long time

...but I managed to finish a dress for my littlest girl. I've cast another dress top onto the knitting needles...and hope to have that one done in a month.

As I sat down to sew, I realized I hadn't really put my sewing corner into order. I usually require four large push pins to anchor the skirt to the bodice. I couldn't find the stuffed animal, a green Loch Ness Monster toy I got years ago on a trip to Scotland, which I now use as a pin cushion. But luckily, the former owner of this home left behind a sewing machine inside a table, along with all their sewing things. So I used her little pin cushion and her teeny tiny pins. They did the trick, but I was sure glad to find Nessie later, because larger pins work best.

At least someone is knitting

A month ago I had to...scoff with me for a minute...buy a couple dresses for my baby, because she had grown out of most of her clothes and I hadn't found time to make some for her. A few days ago I cast on a dress top. I plan to make it into a V-neck with cap sleeves to go with some peach floral fabric in my stash.

I used to be able to crank these out in a few days...a week tops! What's happened to me? You can see why it took me over ten minutes to complete a single row this afternoon (as I sat in the car awaiting the older kids to be done with their class). This child is very hands on and HAS to touch everything she sees!

These days go by so quickly, so I'm not sad at all that I haven't much time to knit.

Another New dress

Inspired by some of the things I tried with the baptismal dress, I made a new dress for my oldest daughter...who has nearly grown out of all the dresses I've made for her. She's pretty tall and slender, so I needed to try something different. This is a mock turtle neck top with 3/4 length sleeves. I added cuff ruffles, a seed stitch texture, and a eyelet pattern to allow me to insert the decorative ribbon on the bodice. You're looking at nearly three months of work here, over three skeins of yarn, a spool of ribbon, and two yards of fabric. But I'm much happier with how this "big girl" dress turned out than any other I've ever tried before. Hopefully, the dresses will just keep getting better and better. Already I have ideas of what I can do to improve next time.

Baby's Alpaca Sweater

I started this about 20 days ago...that's a long time for me...and long time in the life of a quickly growing baby. But it's still big enough for my little one.

The yarn came from an impulsive purchase at a local shop. It's 100% alpaca wool, and just looked so chocolate and pinkilicious! I had to make my princess something girly with this.