My creative space...

I had quite a skirty weekend!  A girlfriend asked me to make these four matchy match skirts for a friend of hers who has just given birth to her fourth baby girl!  Lucky thing!

 

I'm a big fan of dressing your small people in same same things on occasion!  I know many who are not!  I think while they are little you can get away with soooo much in the dressing department so do it while you can!!!

 

I must have learnt it from my mother....

In case you can't see very well, those are matching terry toweling t-shirt and short sets!  My mum changed it up a little to allow me a pink set, but still, we match!!!

 

 

 

 

I grabbed a few plain white t's for her to match them all up, for a nice clean crisp look (which should last approximately 3.5 seconds once you get a white t-shit on a small person!).

 

(here's a how to if you would like to make a pretty panel dolly skirt too!)

 

For more creative spaces, head on over to Kidspot.  There's always some lovely inspiration to be found!

My creative space...

Progress with my Mario crochet rug is coming along... slowly! 

I wish, I wish, I wish I had made my grannies smaller! 

But I am not undoing that bastard now. 

Mario will not defeat me!

School holidays have hit us around here so I took the boys to this giant indoor skate shed (Best $12 I ever spent!!!).  They scootered and I crocheted... for 2 hours.  Thankfully they are too young to be embarrassed by their mother's crochet skills at the skate park and, after all, I am crocheting an apparent life size Mario!!!

That's his face starting to develop right there... a beady, brown eye staring at me and urging me to get a move along!

And just look at this fabulous fabric I found at Spotlight the other day!  It also came on a green background too and I may have got some of that as well.  Cute reversible skirts are coming off the sewing machine as we speak!

On that note, does anyone have any good advice on where I can get some clothing labels made up.  They would be very basic, just with LionessLady written on them, that I could attach to things I've made.  Of course I have googled, and Etsyied but you get such a huge amount of options I simply don't know where to start! 

Other creative spaces are over at the Village Voice on Kidspot.

My weekend Creative Space!

I had a little skirt making session this afternoon and just couldn't wait till Thursday to share it for Creative Spaces!

Even better, it's a skirt I pinned onto Pinterest and then actually followed through with making!

It's called the Banner Day Skirt and I think it's probably meant for summer but I have made mine with some denim I had and some left over charm squares from my attempt at quilt making!  It's supposed to look like bunting on the bottom of the skirt which I think will be just perfect to brighten up dreary winter days.

 

 

 

 

Source: modabakeshop.com via Sonia on Pinterest

Whilst it took me most of the afternoon to complete, I am really pleased with how it looks and will definately make another one!  Since I gave Matilda's wardrobe a wee cleanout, I am fairly certain I can fit a few more coathangers in there now!

My creative space...

Yay!  My wool arrived!  Love coming home from a (winning!!!) game of netball to find lovely packages on my doorstep.  I shall be starting the Mario blanket straight away!

I whipped this reversible number up for one of lovely nieces.  She's 11 and quite the bike-riding triathlete so I thought this lovely Michael Miller fabric was very appropriate.  I went shopping for this down at Gail B's in Bayswater and I literally had to have my blinkers on when I went in so that I wouldn't buy the entire fabric range in the store!!!!

Can anyone help me with this annoying technical issue???  Every time I visit a webpage I get this annoying little pop up ad in the bottom corner of my screen and I can't seem to get rid of it.  I've run my virus software through, a cleaner program, looked at at all my pop-up settings and still it taunts me! 

Creative spaces is now at Village Voices on Kidspot.

My creative space...

More skirts this week!  I'm really cutting down my time making these reversible numbers and small people seem to love them.  I've had a sweet report of one little poppet whipping into the loo to change her skirt around several times during a kinder sesion!

I do need to find a reliable source of ric rac however!  I can't consistently seem to find lots of colours or of a good quality.  Spotlight is a good stop gap for quick supplies but... it is Spotlight!

I loved the owls on this one but I like to give them a plainer side too so spots make another appearance. 

(I am using the reversible skirt pattern from this book.)

The crochet cushion making is coming along too. 

 How satisfying is a pile of cut off yarny tails???!!!

The front...

It will look better once it's stretched over a cushion.

I'm crocheting a plain back for this one.

The pattern comes from Mollie Makes.

Love these clover soft touch hooks.  I'm building up a wee collection of these.  I'm waiting for my lovely friend Penni's new shop, The Stash Cupboard, to bring in some other sizes I am missing so I can complete my collection.

My creative space has moved over to Kidspot now....

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My creative space...

It's all about spots and skirts...

Spotty t-shirts for the boys to wear to a wee girly friends Spotty party.

Grab spotty fabric, cut out big circle spots, sew them on a plain t-shirt.
Spotty Party Ready.

Pale blue spots on one side....

Navy blue spots on the other.
Will it be overdoing the whole Spotty theme by pairing this with navy spotty leggings and a nay top with pale blue spotty
 yo-yos?

And what does one do when you stuff up the binding on the bottom of the skirt?!  The binding didn't catch both layers of the fabric so then I had to add that fancy zig zag stitch to fix it up.  I'm going to pretend it was on purpose if anyone asks.

This one's a special order for a friend...
Little Red Riding Hood fabric from Spotlight.

And the other side - Lisette fabric from Spotlight too.

And another reversible number...
Dolly Clothing fabric from Spotlight too.

And the navy blue from the Lisette range.

I'm thinking of making a few of these reversible numbers and maybe selling them at a little market later on this year.  So far I've only ever really made things for people I know and my own little poppets so the wee quirks (errors!) in each one have not really been an issue.  I might have to smarten up my sewing skills!

For more crafty inspiration pop over here for a visit.

Change your mind reversible skirts!

I have new favourite birthday skirts!  They are still simple and have taken less than an hour each!  I totes love them!  The dollies!  The ric rac!  The reversibility (we all know little ladies like to change their minds)!

The pattern is from 1, 2, 3 Sew and the author has a lovely blog called The Long Thread which I totally think you should go and visit since she is ever so generous and shares lots of crafty links and tutes and whatnot!

You can see Ellen's change your mind skirt from the book right here.  She has used beautiful Liberty fabric which my budget can't quite reach yet.  The fabric below was purchased from Spotlight yesterday (except for the black babushka dollies which was gifted to me).  The red and blue is from their Lisette range and the vintage dressing up ladies was just a lucky find in their quilting cottons.  Cute yes?!

These two are heading to Hobart to my lovely neices who have birthdays days apart from each other.  I am going to team them with a couple of plain tops each from Target and maybe some nice tights - outfit complete!  Present complete!

My creative space... Part two!

Gosh I love making these little skirts for presents!  Quick, easy, not too expensive... and completely sticking with my attempt at handmade gifts this year!

I like to team them with a plain t-shirt picked up at Target or Big W which I can then leave plain or pretty it up!  In this case with a babushka dolly that I have ironed and sewn on!  What a surprise!

For this skirt I followed this tutorial to add the apple panel onto the bottom.  I then finished it off like I do with the Pretty Panel Doll skirts - sew the side seams together, iron them out, create a hem, create a waistband.

Our creative spaces is a weekly blog post where you can head to add your own creative link and check out everyone elses.

My creative space...

I am addicted to skirt and dress making at the moment, not that my small girl needs any more clothes!  Once the small people go to bed, I am at the sewing machine churning out these little numbers...

Oliver and S Lazy Days Skirt

This is a free pattern and is super easy and quick to make up.  As this is a gift for a little girls first birthday this weekend, I like to turn it into an outfit by matching the skirt with a tshirt.

Not the best picture, but I just buy plain white tshirts from Target, Big W or Best and Less.  They are only a few dollars and can be prettied up to match your skirt with some yoyo's in the same fabric or these sweet iron on images.  These cute babushkas are from my local Spotlight (as is the pretty, green floral fabric - a bargain at only $5.99 a metre!)

I've also had this divine fabric in my cupboard, reluctant to cut into it because I didn't want to stuff it up on something that would look silly and I only bought a metre of it and I have never seen in again (Spotlight purchase)!

Whilst hanging around on Pinterest the other night, I came across this link and knew the material would be perfect for it!

 I even had enough fabric to make two dresses - one for Matilda and one for her little friend.

I did make some minor modifications to the pattern.  I have not used the elastic in the rolled down chest or back area, and I also deepened the arm holes (just by laying down a sleeveless dress of Matilda's on the pattern and following that line - image below) as I was worried about how roomy it might be.  I clearly didn't use bias binding on the arm holes either (but only cause I didn't have any in the colour I wanted).  I simply folded the arm hole edge over and zigzagged stitched it.  Because of this, I have threaded the ribbon through the gap where the elastic would have gone and tied it on one shoulder only.

The pattern is really user friendly and easy to modify too.  The first one I made was good, but I wanted more length in the one Matilda will wear so I just added an extra couple of inches.  I also tried the dress on a visiting friend's seven year old and it fit her perfectly as a top! 

I am totes going to try and have a handmade year this year present wise!  We shall see how that goes for me!



Pretty Panel Skirt: A Tutorial

Remember when I guest posted over at Emma's simple handmade gifts for girls series?

I showed you how I made simple skirts for little girls.  I have made so many of them now, I can literally whip them up in half an hour or so.

Yesterday I decided to get a bit tricky and fancy this skirt up a bit more!  I am such a thrill seeker!  I am calling it

The Pretty Panel Skirt!

So, what I think you should do, is pop over to Emma's and read about making a simple skirt just so you have the basics down, then come on back here and I'll show you how I added the pretty panel in....

Righto,

Grab your materials.  Here I am using a spotty blue fabric as the main part of the skirt, some pretty floral as the panel and then just to be super fancy I am (of course!) adding a babushka dolly to the panel to pretty it up even more.

 Measurement wise, I made my panel the same length as the skirt and about 7 inches wide.  Really you can make it as wide as you like.  I made it wide enough to add the sweet dolly on.

Lay out your main fabric right side up and then line up the edge of your panel fabric right side down to one of the edges of your main fabric.  Sew down that edge.  In the picture below, I have sewn down the right hand side.

Turn this over now and line up the other edge of your pretty panel with the other edge of your main skirt fabric and sew down that line (again, in the image below this is down the righthand side.

Press your seams open so they are nice and flat and turn it out the right way and you should end up with this...

Now you can just go back to the simple skirt tutorial and create your hem as normal and maybe your waistband too.  If you would like to pretty your panel up even more as I have done with the dolly, leave your waistband for now.

To add my dolly I ironed her onto some visoflex (do I have that spelled right???) then cut around her gently and then ironed her onto the fabric panel.

To make her even more secure I then zigzagged around her edges.

Once you have done that you can go ahead and make your waistband following the same instructions you would use in the simple skirt tutorial.

All done?

Does yours look like this?

Pretty, yes?  And definately fancy!

I hope this all made sense.  Please feel free to ask questions (although I am not sure I will know the answers!)