This week, we’re participating in the Kids’ Clothes Week Challenge led by Meg of elsiemarley.com. We’ll be back to our regular posting schedule next week.
Jo’s Update: Same Diapers, Different Day
I wasn’t sure how much I would get done today, since both Scooter and Skeeter came down with colds today. Skeeter isn’t quite a year old yet, and this is her first cold.
She is not a fan of being sick. So in anticipation of a crazy night, I followed last night’s routine – as soon as the kids were asleep, 10 minutes of quiet time, 20 minutes of kitchen cleanup, and straight into sewing time. And it’s a good thing I did, because she woke up for her next dose of Tylenol about five minutes after I turned off the sewing machine. How does she know?
Tonight I finished five of the eight diapers, and I’m estimating that I have 20 minutes of work left to do on the other three. I serged all the diapers, turned them right side out, and got the velcro onto most of them. When I’m making multiples of any item of clothing, I try to make them assembly-line style, rather than finishing one piece and moving on to the next. I had to wrestle my serger for a few minutes while changing the thread, but otherwise it was a fairly stress-free night. Larger pictures of one finished diaper can be seen on our Flickr page.
Tomorrow, I’m hoping to finish the remaining three diapers, and cut and sew a diaper cover so I can fit it on Skeeter on Thursday.
Wendy’s Update: Better Late Than Never
Day Two went much more smoothly for me, not just from a sewing perspective but also from a life perspective, so I was truly able to enjoy the time I spent sewing small pants this evening and reducing my fabric stash.
(For the uninitiated, “fabric stash” is code for “the stacks and boxes of fabric that I must turn into something functional before I am allowed to bring more fabric into the house”.)
Ahem. Like many people who sew, I have occasionally indulged in picking up fabric “just in case” or with a specific project in mind but no real timeline to complete said project. The third pair of pants, which will be part of a full set of pajamas, is made from some of such fabric. While I am embarrassed to go on the record regarding how long I’ve had this material, I am perhaps more embarrassed to say that I can’t remember exactly when I bought it. My best guess is that it was seven or eight years ago, and the fabric was originally slated to become a pair of lounge pants for my husband (who already owns several pair of similarly themed pants). The print is great; I wish that the fabric were a bit sturdier, though, because I can already hear my child asking to wear his pajamas to school.
Using the same pattern, I’m working on two pair of green linen pants that are intended to be included in the school day rotation. We bought this fabric earlier in the year, along with some grey linen, while we were making a portfolio display box for an exhibition that included some of my husband’s illustration work. The grey linen outperformed the green for that purpose, to which I gave a possibly audible cheer, because I had designs on the yardage. I intended to use it for a tablecloth, but after almost six months without any movement in that direction, and with a real need for some long, lightweight pants for my son, the tablecloth that could have been became pants.
I was able to work more than an hour today, but that won’t be the case tomorrow as I have longstanding plans for an evening out. Still, I should be able to fit and finish the pants and begin cutting out everything else.
