Peasant blouse and simple dress

I have been busy with Christmas pressies - wrapping and sewing bags to contain them. So I haven't done much sewing of clothes. Wonder why since we didn't get that many pressies this year.

I finally had some time yesterday and I sewed two items. One blouse in the day and a simple dress in the night.

For the blouse, I followed this tutorial. Bought the fabric for the blouse from People's Park. Managed also to get some beads. The print on the fabric makes Kimmy look more mature. Somehow the neckline is a little high up. Hmmm...Do I need to curve it more before I do the casing for the elastic?


As for the dress, it looks similar to the first spaghetti strapped dress I made, probably cos it's from the same fabric and both have spaghetti straps. But this one uses casing for the bias tape which acts as the straps. And because the strap is adjustable, it is supposed to grow with the wearer. I also had to use bias tape for the arm hole. I'm trying out different patterns that allow me to try out new things along the way.



Speaking of Kimmy, she has become more water confident of late and would jump into the water from a seated position at the side of the pool. She also walks in the pool between the ledge and me. Although she sometimes loses her balance and finds her face partially in the water, she just sputters and then continues her merry way without making much of a fuss. We are so glad she is now very happy to be in the pool. It wasn't so long ago that she would fret about being at the pool and being changed into her swimwear. And then fret some more when we dip her in the water.

Today, she enjoyed herself at her first trip to Anchorvale Swimming Complex so much, despite the fact that the water was cold. We didn't even realise that her lips had turned purple. Oops. Tsk tsk. These parents need to be more careful.

Oh yes, she also signed "cat" today. :) She can now say "bye bye" when she waves. She can sign "shoes". Our little girl is growing up. It is fascinating to see her do something new every few days.

My first shirring project

I saw these nice dresses on this tutorial and I knew I had to try it out. But the whole shirring thing seemed so beyond me. So I tried it out on a small piece of cloth and it didn't seem that hard. And now with the new Brother, I thought it shouldn't be that bad since hopefully the thread won't be getting stuck and breaking unnecessarily.

Well, it wasn't that easy either cos the pulling of the elastic threads to tighten the area was kinda hard. Plus the fact that my bobbin ran out of thread in the middle and all that. Oh well. I shall have to try out more dresses to get it perfected. But for now, here is the end result of my first attempt.



I like how the skirt turned out. It's nice and full. Plus the colour is nice on Kimmy. :) Who cares that the threads don't look great and the spacing isn't all even and straight? At least it's wearable and she looks cute in it.

My new Brother

I've got a new Brother. No, not courtesy of my parents but of the bank account. The last week has been quiet and dull because I returned the sewing machine which was on loan to me. I had to buy a new one. I had so many projects awaiting. But which one and how much to indulge? Peen did most of the research and we made in total of two trips to Clementi before we finally decided.

Here is the little treasure that sits in what we now call the sewing room. It's the Brother NV-50! My first. My very own. No history. A clean slate. Smooth. Silent. What more could I ask for?



No need to fight with the needle when threading.



Here I am trying out shirring. It works!!!! Do I dare to start on my little shirring project? Brrrr.... A little scary how the nice fabric would turn out.



Here is my poor child trying to get some attention after my Brother came home with us.



Well, what better way to learn how to use my Brother than to start on my projects? I embarked on the simpler projects and tried out some new stuff...like sewing on a zipper, using different stitches and something which Kimmy really needs.

A huge pillow to prevent the child from falling out of her bed. She no longer sleeps in the cot but on a super single.



The huge pillow case with a zipper. The dog is just to give some perspective to size.



I've finally completed her first year album (since I had no machine to distract me) and decided to make a cover bag for it.

The third project is a long overdue white diaper cover that would go with most dresses.

Now that we've initiated the Brother, we now officially embark on our exciting journey.

Let the fun begin!

How much does Kim look like me?

This wasn't a planned posting but since I already have the photos, I thought I'd just put them up.

All of the past year, I've gotten comments on how Kimmy looks so much like Peen and then I'd get the occasional, "Oh, she looks like you, Van!" to which I would look surprised (skeptical actually). Of course, Peen has also mentioned it but I thot it was just his way of not making me feel bad that the kid that I had inside of me for all of nine months looks nothing like me.

Anyway, recently, my mother mentioned that she was going through my baby photos and realised how much Kimmy looks like me when I was at that age. So I decided to go dig up my photos and make a comparison.









Well, after all that, yea, I do see the resemblance. Now I'm happy. :)

Kimmy turns 1

My little girl is finally 1. And yet, it didn't seem too long ago when we first brought her home from the hospital. Building up to the birthday party, which was meant to be a very, and I stress, very small intimate gathering, I got all stressed up cos it was turning out to be much larger than I had hoped. And those who know me would know how I love to mingle.

Well, to take my mind off that and channel the energy into something useful, I finally got down to making the outfit for her birthday party. Am pleased that it was the entire outfit. :) I made some last minute shoes yesterday cos I stumbled upon this tutorial that had really cute shoes. But they were meant for 6mth old babes so it was VERY fitting for her. Will need to make them bigger in future.

Here is the entire outfit.



Here we are all dressed up for the party leaving our home. Kimmy looking rather pleased with herself.



Hanging out with grandpa before the party. Grandpa is so comfy. A quick snooze?

Here is grandma carrying Kimmy. She was quite fretful throughout the party. Think she was not used to the crowd.

Here is the cake that I took so long to select - bakery and then the design. It's Boof from Suzy's Zoo.

And a Suzy's Zoo balloon.

Kimmy hanging out with Ethan, her only friend at the party who is only 6 mths and already 0.4kg heavier than her!

Looking sweet and demure.

A decent family shot. But oh, Kimmy wasn't looking at the camera.

A birthday kiss from papa. She was definitely fascinated with the flame on the candle. Luckily, she didn't try to put her hands and fingers into the cake, although her one shoe managed to scrape the cream.

Here is Kimmy with her cousin Hannah who gave her THREE pressies! Peen says they just look like Peen and Jen in dresses! Haha.

Such concentration cutting the cake. Haha. I think she was just wondering what on earth was going on. She was also very puzzled at why the whole world were singing (her birthday song) and calling out to her (while taking photos). It was quite hilarious.

Doesn't she look like she's going to plant one on daddy? Awww...she truly melts his heart and has got him wrapped around her little tiny finger.

She's getting a taste of her first cake.

And clearly enjoying it.

Here she is on papa's shoulders again. Is she imitating him?

Weeeeuueeeet!

Kimmy, now all of 1 year old. She is now alot more vocal and has started to say "baby" other than "papa". She would point at kids and say "baby". We were of course thrilled at how clever she is. But then, she also started to point at Chyna (our dog) and say "baby". Even photos of apples and pears are all babies. Hmmm... She started to string different syllables together today.

She is crawling all over the house. And loving it. When we pick her up to change her diaper or bring her to another part of the house, she would start to scream. She loves going into the now sewing room to check out the floor, which inevitably has thread lying around. She would then pick up a few and gleefully show them to me, or quietly put them into her mouth.

She still loves Chyna to bits.

She has learnt to plant kisses on us. So when we ask her for one (depending on her mood), she would lean over and kiss us on our cheek and then smile gleefully. Aww... So sweet. I wonder if she understands that it's a sign of affection. Probably not? But we are so thrilled everytime she does it so maybe she's reacting to our excitement and glee.

She prefers to drink water from our glass and I would always find traces of her food in my glass cos she rinses her mouth with the water! Ewww.

She loves her books. Not reading them but being read to. Above all, she loves to open her books and flip the pages. It's like a sense of achievement to her cos she's managed to turn the pages. But it's so cute to watch her tiny hands try to pry open the books and the intense concentration on her face. Priceless.

The first year has gone by so quickly. It has been a very good first year. I definitely look forward to the next year when she is more mobile and starts experimenting different adult foods and starts being more communicative.

Kimberley - I truly thank God for you. Each and every day spent with you is a precious gift. I pray I never take a single day for granted.

Froggie hood

I saw a hooded towel at a shop the other day and thought to myself that I should be able to sew something similar. So I bought two green towels from my current favourite haunt - Giant.

Then I stumbled upon this blog and was inspired to attempt a froggie hood instead of a simple one. How coincidental that the towels I bought were green.

The first hood I made was way too small so I turned it into a bean bag instead. Of course it was my fault that I didn't refer to the blog for instructions but depended on memory.



The second hood that I made was much neater but Peen says it makes Kim look like a bear instead of a frog.



At least the one without Kim in it looks like a frog. :)

Is tan beautiful?

I remember before we had Kim, we discussed this and said that we didn't necessarily need to have a fair baby or to keep her fair. But since we've had her and she turned out to be a nice fair baby, we've grown to appreciate and prefer "fairness". Talk about taking back what we said.

We've been bringing Kim swimming quite a fair bit lately. We especially bought a wetsuit, not just any tiny spaghetti strap swimming costume but one with sleeves to cover up as much as possible. But we couldn't bear the thought of putting her in the shocking pink ones that most departmental stores carry so we ended up with the short sleeve one from O'neil.

Well, in our very hot weather, even the wetsuit with sunblock was not enough to keep our baby fair. We have resorted to putting her in huggalugs, which are sock-like thingums that are open both ends and they can be used for both legs and arms. Even then she became tanned! To make it worse, the colour coordination was completely off so I decided I HAD TO do something about it.

We bought a huge pair of lycra pants from Giant so that I could make something out of it. Well, bearing in mind that Giant is so much nearer than Spotlight and parking is free....that is a convenient alternative.

I thought of making two pairs of huggalug thingums. Then I considered sewing them to the wetsuit but I couldn't bear to just in case I had a mess of the nice wetsuit. Then I decided to put into use the pants pattern that I had and see if I could make a pair of pants instead. That would also be better so that it wouldn't roll down her sausage thighs.

Here is the pattern I used.

So that's what I've been busy with today.

This is a complete set but separate.

This is what it would look like together.

Here is Kim going swimming.

Large grandmother's pants into something nice? (part 2)

Ok, remember I was trying to figure out how to make this dress more flared at the bottom so Kim doesn't have it all bunched up around her hips? You can see from the photo that she can hardly lift her leg. It was just too tight.

Well, I gave it alot of thought and I finally decided that I had to use the other side of the pants instead of amending this one because I had snipped off the width allowance (of the already made dress) around the chest so that it would be more snug and since I would be making (I don't even know what to call it) an upside down V down the back of the dress, it meant that I would need more fabric for joining of the seams.

I didn't have enough of the orginal fabric so I used this one to make the inner layer.

I can't even begin to explain what I did and how I did it. I basically cut a rectangular piece that was almost the length of the dress - almost cos I didn't need it to go all the way to the shirred area. And I folded the two lengths inwards so that I got an isoceles triangle. That would make the inner fabric but I wanted it to have a fold when opening out so I had to do a zig zag fold and then stitch the pieces together. For the top part, I simply sewed the shirred parts together, straight at first along the shirred part and then curved towards the edge like a curved L just to close the area. Ok, I don't know if that made any sense. I just was too impatient to get the dress done to take pics.

I had to make the straps from the second fabric and I added some lace to it. Finally, it is completed.

So here is what Kim will be wearing on her birthday.

Front of dress


Back of dress


Matching bottom of course

Here is Kim wearing the dress. Difficult model she is. Very hard to get her to pose and take a nice pic in decent lighting.

Hurrah. End of this project. Just in time for her birthday next week.