Church Spring Formal 2024

May 12, 2024May 13, 20242 Comments

I did manage to finish Rachel’s dress in time—11:30 that morning, to be exact—and Renaissance was able to finish adding bling to her dress—at 3:00pm that day, after a two hour gem-gluing session with Emily, herself and me—so all the dress dreams became a reality for the Church Spring Formal. I threw their hair into some updos, fretted over shoes and petticoats, and we were on our way! Their dates looked great, and I think everyone had a good time. We had dinner at my granny and aunt’s house because it was near the dance and we knew that Granny would love to see the dresses. It was a nice evening.

And now, I think I’m going to take a little break from my sewing machine…it’s been a wild two months of non-stop sewing! I’m so pleased with how they turned out and so glad that my girls liked them. Happy memories.

Prom 2024

April 28, 2024October 29, 20245 Comments

The big day has come and gone and Renaissance’s dress was finished the evening before and Rachel’s backup dress actually fit. Success! Oh, they looked beautiful. My baby girls went and got all grown up.

They had a great time at prom, and it was wonderful watching them be excited for and enjoying the evening. My heart is full.

I’ll post details on Renaissance’s dress in the next few days.

If Eeyore was a Unicorn

July 30, 2023July 30, 20231 Comment

After having to suffer through the excruciating torture that is waiting for one yard of yellow worsted-weight yarn to arrive in the mail, she’s finally done! Hey friends, please meet Nilla the Unicorn…except that I’m pretty sure her name is Eeyore, seeing that everyone in this house only calls her that after she spent a while looking like a purple donkey because of the aforementioned yellow yarn predicament.

Rachel with her yarn haul at the Madrona Fiber Arts Festival in February 2019. The Nilla Kit is at the bottom of the pile.

The kit to make Nilla/Eeyore was originally purchased way back in February 2019 when Rachel and I attended that Madrona Fiber Arts market together. She fell in love with Nilla/Eeyore so much that she was willing to learn to knit to create her, so I caved and bought the kit. Interest waned, as expected, and she never touched it. However, with my recent obsession with Little Cotton Rabbits patterns, I decided to give Nilla/Eeyore a go to see if I even wanted to invest the energy in knitting up cute little animals, and seeing that I already had Nilla/Eeyore’s pattern, I started there.

It was an easy knit and, while I started knitting this with the intention of gifting it to my niece, I think Rachel is claiming it as her own because she stole it and keeps walking around the house shaking it like a rattle or styling its hair when she’s not shaking it.

It does have some pretty epic hair! The kit came with a mini skein of turquoise blue yarn for its hair, but I decided to use the scraps leftover from a hat I’d knit previously for Rachel (the yarn on the top of her yarn haul pile in the Madrona picture above), and added in some other colorful scraps from the stash along with some gold embroidery thread strands for a little extra oomph.

Details:

Pattern: Nilla the Unicorn, by Rachel Borello Carroll (Ravelry link)

Yarn: I don’t know, but I’m guessing Cascade 220 as it was mentioned as the yarn of choice in the kit, but I didn’t have the colors listed in the instructions. The horn is KnitPicks’ Wool of the Andes Superwash in “Semolina,” and the hair is a mixture of White Birch Fiber Arts 80/20 SW Merino Nylon Self Striping in colorway “Electric Rainbow,” some worsted-weight scraps in orange, fuchsia and turquoise, and separated strands of gold DMC metallic embroidery floss.

Needles: US 6 DPNs (I swear that everything I’ve made in the last however many years have been on this one set of DPNs. Seriously.)

Modifications: None, except using different yarn than what was supplied in the kit.

All in all, a cute little project that has me thinking I might just want to fall down the rabbit hole that is Little Cotton Rabbits…we’ll see!

Ravelry Link to Project: maplesyrupmama’s Nilla the Unicorn

Finished: Rachel’s Halloween Skirt

February 4, 2022January 30, 2022Leave a comment

I didn’t keep it secret, and I let her have it once it was done, rather than waiting for her birthday. She wore it to church last week, minus the witch hat, which she really wanted to wear for the photos. Rachel really likes the “everyday Halloween aesthetic,” so I decided to make her happy and sew up a skirt that fits the description. When I first saw this floral print, I KNEW Rachel would love it.

Details:

Pattern: I’m surprised at how many people have been asking on Instagram what the pattern is, and I’m so sorry to report that this is a massive mishmash of patterns. The pieces are cut from the “Three-Quarter Circle Skirt” pattern found in Gertie’s Ultimate Dress Book, and I modified the pocket pieces to be much larger. I’ve made this skirt before, and I think I lengthened it? I was working from my traced pattern, so I can’t remember exactly, but I’m pretty sure it’s lengthened by a few inches because Rachel is all legs. The waistband is a straight strip of fabric, and I do not know how large I cut it because that piece of paper has gone missing. And then I sewed it all up according to the directions found in Simplicity #1369.

Ta…da…😬

Fabric: “Cast a Spell” floral print in the “Spooky & Sweeter” collection that Art Gallery Fabrics put out last year. I bought 4 yards of it and have a good quarter yard left, plus random big scraps.

Thread: Whatever that black thread is on my thread rack. Probably cotton/poly or straight poly.

Notions: Dark Grey invisible zipper from that poorly-chosen purchase of “invisible zippers in an assortment of colors” from Amazon, shortened to the correct length.

Miscellaneous: I bought some new hemming feet for my sewing machine so I could perhaps get through hemming this quickly. I used the foot with the 6 on it, whatever that means. I think it was a rolled hem, about 1/4-inch. I have some larger hemming ones that I’m excited to try in the future, but I figured it would be hard to go any larger on the hem of a circle skirt, so I kept it small this time.

Oh, to be a teenage girl with a mom who will sew you cute little things to further your aesthetic. Ha ha. Enjoy it, Rachie Bug.

Sew little time…

November 22, 2021Leave a comment

Em & Renaissance with Nathaniel after his band concert! (Rachel was at her own rehearsal and had to miss it.)

Last week was a doozy! Nathaniel had his first band concert and Rachel was in four showings of our school district’s drama production, complete with rehearsals from 4:00-7:30 pm on the days leading up to the shows, and then she had to be at the theatre from 5:30-10:00 pm Thursday and Friday for their first two shows, and from 12:30-10:00 pm on Saturday because they did a matinee and evening show. I drove back and forth from the school 3-5 times each day! But she had a blast and it was a great show, and hey, that’s parenting.

Which meant not a lot of crafty times, but I did finish the Fresh Cut Pines quilt, label and all. I don’t have pictures of it yet because it’s been really rainy and a disc in my upper back went out Saturday morning, which incapacitated me for the entire weekend. Sigh. I have plans to take the quilt’s beauty shots over Thanksgiving Break while I have helpers available during the day.

I pulled out the Yuletide Botanica orange peel quilt this morning to start working on it, and after having a bit of a lazy crafter hesitation, decided to go forward with attaching a border because it will look better with a border, even though I didn’t want to take the time to do it. (And yes, I’m glad I did…it really does look better with the border…) I also basted this bad boy and now have the aching back to prove it. I’m hoping to get going on the quilting tomorrow, as long as everything goes as it should during the day.

I am so ready for the Thanksgiving holiday. Hopefully I don’t have to go anywhere Friday and Saturday so I can just plough through all my wonderful Christmas prep activities! I just want to be at home, sewing all the Christmas things!

The 2021 Halloween Costume Chronicles: Rachel

October 28, 2021October 18, 2021Leave a comment

Me: “What do you want to be for Halloween, Rachel?”

Rachel: “I don’t know.”

Me: “I honestly didn’t think I’d get that answer from you, of all people.”

Rachel: “Probably some sort of witch.”

Me: “OK, well, Ren’s going to be a 1950s witch; what kind of witch do you want to be?”

Rachel: “Maybe something along the lines of an Instagram influencer witch aesthetic?”

Me: [raises eyebrow] “Okaaaaay…and what does that look like?”

Rachel: [brow furrows] “It’s hard to explain.”

Me: “Well, let’s search a witch hashtag on Instagram and you tell me which ones look like what you’re thinking of.”

[We look at witch hashtags. Rachel says nothing.]

Me: “Any of these what you’re thinking?”

Rachel: “No. There’s too many crystals and too much eyeliner.”

Me: “Well, that’s kind of what the Instagram witch aesthetic is.”

Rachel: “…”

Me: “How about we look on Amazon for costume ideas?”

Rachel: [shrugs shoulders] “OK.”

[We pull up Amazon and start to scroll through costumes]

Rachel: “Ooooh, Katniss Everdeen!”

Me: [adds to cart]

Unicorn Star Party Quilt

February 15, 2019February 15, 20191 Comment

My first big finish to come out of the new craft room is this Star Party quilt for my Rachel-girl for her eleventh birthday. I started it last year, and it only needed its binding, but binding is hard to do when you’re being yanked back and forth between “Yay, he got a job and we need to get packing!” and “Well, shoot, the job offer fell through at the last possible second…should I unpack the craft room?” Ugh. 2018 was rough, folks.

But I digress. We are where we need to be now, and the craft room is unpacked, and I’m never moving again (she said as she chuckled anxiously), and so we can get back to our regularly-scheduled crafting program ’round these parts. Boo-yah!

Excuse the dark/blue lighting–it’s winter…

When I saw the “Happy Little Unicorns” fabric collection pop up on the “Coming Soon” page over at Fat Quarter Shop, I immediately subscribed to be notified when it became available because I KNEW it was perfect for my unicorn/glitter/rainbows-loving girl. I had a completely different pattern picked out to use it with, but found myself browsing the Robert Kaufman website last year to look at the free quilt patterns that they released for their Kona Color of the Year announcement, and lo and behold, they have patterns listed for almost everything they release, INCLUDING a quilt pattern for the Happy Little Unicorns fat quarter bundle, appropriately named “Star Party.”

It’s nine big blocks, which was fantastic and fast; and the only modification I made to it was to substitute some polka dot lavender fabric in for some of the solid lavender (I think it was Corsage) around the middle block because I…probably cut something wrong? I don’t remember, actually. (Never did I insinuate that I was perfect. NEVER.) I used Robert Kaufman flannel in lilac for the quilt backing.

The quilting was done by Utah Valley Quilting, and Kerri found a unicorn motif and we used lavender thread on the front and RAINBOW VARIEGATED on the back. I mean, could it be anymore perfect than that?

But then we finally got a job offer that actually stuck, and moving sucks and unpacking sucks even more, which brings us to this year, and me frantically attaching the binding earlier this week so that I could give it to her for her birthday.

I really thought she’d figured it out that I was working on finishing the quilt for her birthday, but she hadn’t, so she was pleasantly surprised when she opened it. Win!

The Details:

Fabric: “Happy Little Unicorns” fat quarter bundle by Sea Urchin Studio for Robert Kaufman.
2.25 yards of white solid for background
0.5 yards of Kona Cotton “Surf” for binding
3.5 yards Robert Kaufman flannel “Lilac” for backing

Pattern: Star Party

Quilting: I can’t find it on the Utah Valley Quilting site, but it definitely was in one of the design books at the shop. It’s been so long since I had it done that I can’t remember what the design was called, sorry. But I’m sure Kerri could help you figure it out if you wanted to use it.

I might actually end up using this pattern again because I really liked making it. And I rarely use a pattern twice, so that’s a big compliment. Love the big blocks, and super loved the adorable fabric collection.

But, most of all, I loved making my girl happy!

Autumn Update

November 11, 2018November 11, 20182 Comments

Hello friends!

Because I’m quite sure you wouldn’t get all giddy over a post that chronicled which boxes I unpacked and where I put the stuff that was in them, I figured it was better to not update you until I had something creative to show you.

I’ve had no inclination to sew, knit, whatever, AT ALL, and I’ve been OK with it because the more I look back on the past twelve months, the more I realize that we went through A LOT of stressful stuff, and it takes energy to deal with all that stress, which came from my creative reserves. Happy moment, though: This last week I had a brilliant little moment where I wanted to make something. That feeling has been absent for months, so I’m grateful that things are calming down enough that my interest in crafting is starting to come back.

201811117370910250702226081 I did grit my teeth and make my youngest daughter a Little Red Riding Hood costume for Halloween because I did have time for it, and her little brother decided to be a wolf so he could match her, and I think they were adorable! Her costume was an exercise in frustration–I could not locate the pattern in her size ANYWHERE. And my best friend rode in for the rescue and bought the pattern* at her local JoAnn Store, not realizing that it came in adult OR child size, and sent me the adult size. (Oh gosh, we laughed…) So the costume ended up being the Adult Small skirt, minus five inches around the waist; a plain white t-shirt with aspects of the original costume appliqued onto the shirt; and I tracked down a different pattern** for the cape/hood. She was so pleased with it all, and totally didn’t care that it was a crazy hodge-podge costume. A woman stopped me at the school Halloween party to liberally compliment me on the costume, so I’m pretty pleased with the experiment. (And totally want to make more things edged with eyelet lace! Such a sweet look!)

20181103_145518-01 And right now I am eyeballs-deep in making linen napkins for my Thanksgiving table because I’ve always wanted linen napkins and I have no crafty deadlines on my plate at the moment. It’s been so. much. fun. researching hemstitching and heirloom sewing, and oh my goodness, do I love me some beautiful heirloom sewing. So much drooling.

BUT…I massively underestimated how long these napkins were going to take, mostly because I didn’t think ironing the hem allowances was going to take twenty minutes PER NAPKIN. Four more napkins to press before I actually get to meet needle to fabric! Ugh!

But look at this gorgeous view from my new craft room’s window…it’s so nice to have something besides a window well to look at!

The napkins are going to be lovely, with mitered corners and hemstitching. I’m seriously in love with them. That bit of brown fabric and thread in my craft-room-view photo is the start of one of them. It’s a gorgeous chocolate brown. So pleased!

And then it’s on to Christmas crafting, which I was really hoping to not do this year, but something went wonky with my bank transfers to my Christmas savings account when we moved, and there is much less in that account than there should be, so I’ma gonna have to get creative with supplies already on-hand. Boo/yay

I’ll probably start writing a bit more, now that things have started to settle. It was such a mistake to think I’d be able to paint everything upon moving in–I’ve come to the decision that I’m going to tackle the house room-by-room, because it’s driving me batty to not have a single “finished” room in this house. I’ve been working on my youngest daughter’s room, and it’s looking pretty cute. I’m excited to share that when we finally reach the finish line! (You can have a housewarming party five years after you move in, right?) 😉

But I am hosting Thanksgiving this year, and there could be as many as twenty people attending, so it’s all about the napkins and the cleaning and the cooking for the next two weeks. (And my dining room table that was supposed to be delivered in August? And then October? They changed the delivery date AGAIN…to December. Fan-freakin’-tastic. We’re eating Thanksgiving dinner on folding tables this year. So classy.)

I hope the onslaught of the holiday season is treating you all well! I look forward to seeing your posts and photos of what you’re working on in these next weeks!

*Red Riding Hood Costume: McCall Pattern #M6187
**Substitute Cape/Hood: Simplicity Pattern #8729

Jolly Braid Tote Bag

October 13, 2017October 22, 202510 Comments

UPDATE, October 2025: The updated pattern has been released and is now available to download from Fat Quarter Shop’s website here. It is no longer a free pattern.

UPDATE, March 2024: I have been informed that the pattern is currently being updated and will be re-released sometime in the future. When that re-release happens, I will make sure to inform you, dear readers. 🙂 If you would like a personal heads-up from me when the re-release comes out, please leave a comment on *this* post, and I’ll go through and message every comment when the re-release happens.

UPDATE, August 2023: The link to the free pattern does not work at the moment. I have emailed Fat Quarter Shop and am awaiting their reply on how to fix it for you! Thank you for pointing it out!

I’ve been posting teasers on Instagram all week about a project I’ve been making for Fat Quarter Shop, and it’s finally time to show you the finished product!

Friends, meet the Jolly Braid Tote Bag, a super easy, very beginner-friendly bag made from Jolly Bar precuts. I’d actually never made a structured bag before this, and I have no idea why I waited so long to get on the wagon! SUPER easy, and totally satisfying to sew.

The pattern is available from Fat Quarter Shop. You’ll need a Jolly Bar package, yardage of two other fabrics, some Annie’s Soft & Stable, one-inch polypro strapping for the handles, and a roll of “Fat Jelly Braid” Triangles on a Roll paper (seriously, I want to buy every available size of Triangles on a Roll because I love it so much).

I chose to make my bag from American Jane’s newest collection, “Merry Go Round,” and I’m really pleased with how cheerful it turned out. When I first saw the dimensions of the pattern (12 x 11 x 5″), I thought it would make a great library book bag for my daughter, so I went with sunny prints to match her personality.

For my two prints, I went with Merry Go Round “Yellow Large Floral” (SKU# 21720-14) for my accent print, and “Red Mono Floral” (SKU# 21723-11) for my lining.

And, because I intended for the bag to hold heavy books, I added two inches to each end of the nylon strapping for the handles and tacked them down inside the construction of the bag so I wouldn’t run into ripped handles in the future. (I have ripped A LOT of handles out of A LOT of book bags…we nerdy girls always carry too many books in our bags!)

My little Miss Junebug wanted to help with the photoshoot so much, so I let her! There’s nothing like spending a beautiful autumn afternoon following your kid around the neighborhood as she proudly shows off her “new bag” to everyone she meets on the street! (Don’t you just love it when a finished project makes the recipient enthusiastically happy?!?!)

Thank you so much, Fat Quarter Shop, for allowing me to sew along on this super cute bag! It’s going to get a lot of use in our home!

Fat Quarter Shop also has a tutorial video to aid you in the construction of your own bag!

Disclaimer: In exchange for sewing up this project, Fat Quarter Shop provided me with the materials.

Link-ups:

Confessions of a Fabric Addict Friday Linky Party

Life’s Simple Pleasures

October 11, 2017October 11, 20171 Comment

I was driving the Brookelets home from school the other day and noticed that a tree on the side of the street had a lot of its leaves twirling towards the ground, which prompted me to exclaim, “Oh! Falling leaves! One of life’s simple pleasures.”

Miss Junebug scrunched her nose at me and asked, “What does that mean, ‘life’s simple pleasures’?” I explained that a simple pleasure was a rather ordinary occurrence that just made your heart happy, and generally didn’t cost any money, which made it all the more special because it reminds you that you don’t need to spend money to be happy. My girl nodded and went back to reading her book.

What I thought was a quick little explanation of some random phrase has apparently been percolating in her mind because we were driving to the library today, and saw a maple tree whose leaves had all turned a brilliant scarlet, but hadn’t fallen off the tree. Junebug saw it and said, “It’s too bad those leaves aren’t falling off the tree because then they could be a simple pleasure for Mom.” I explained that, even though the leaves were still on the tree, it was still a simple pleasure for me because I liked how it looked.

She looked at me through narrowed eyes, “Does that mean that simple pleasures can happen even if you spend money on them?”

“What? How did you make that leap?” I asked.

“Well,” she said, “you spend a lot of time just looking at your quilts and the things you knit, and it makes you really happy. But you spent money on them, so I thought it was a complicated pleasure.”

I laughed, “A complicated pleasure? No, spending money doesn’t take away the simple pleasure of admiring a job well done. I’m proud of myself for finishing a big project, and I’m pleased with the good job that I’ve done on that project, so it makes me happy to look at it a lot and just be pleased. It’s fun to make stuff.”

“Really?” she said, “Because it doesn’t seem like you have a lot of fun when you’re making stuff. You yell a lot, and you breathe angrily when you run out of thread. And sometimes you burn yourself on the iron or cut yourself with the circle blade…”

I studied her face for a moment, then turned away to stare at the traffic on the road while I thought about her statement. Then I nodded, glanced over at her and said, “You’re right…it’s complicated.”