Another day. Another pillow.

07 Wednesday Aug 2013

Posted by anotherbigbite in I'm a Crafty Mo' Fo', The "Joy" of Parenting

Tags

decorating, diy, kids room, kids rooms, pillow, pillowcase, pillowcases, sewing, upcycle

Or two.

I’ve been busy getting a duvet cover made for Finny’s Big Boy Room… I have been looking high and low for exactly the right fabric. Only problem? I have expensive taste. Which sucks. For me. And sorta for Jonathan Adler, since I’m not planning on buying anything from him anytime soon, no matter how deep my appreciation runs for white, mid-century-inspired ceramics and cheeky needlepoint pillows.

A duvet cover is also such a big project, for no other reason than the sheer linear feet of sewing, and it is not rewarding. Making a dress or stuffed animal gives you a bit of pride; the feeling like: It was just a flat strech of fabric, and now? (haughty sniff) I MADE THIS. A duvet cover is nothing but a giant fabric bag – which should be simple, but always ends up a bit off. I’ve got my share of sewing projects that I am purty darn proud of, but sewing miles and miles of straight lines is mind numbing. Monotonous. Lackluster. Unexciting. Mundane. Insipid. Exciting enough that one has time to think of numerous synonyms to “BOR-RING.”

Before. Meh.

I bought a pair of flat sheets to make Finn’s duvet cover. I picked up a pair of plain, white pillowcases while I was at it. During all this dull cutting and sewing and sewing and sewing, I thought; Screw this. I’m taking a break and doing something small.

It started with this tutorial for pillowcases. I followed her instructions but used slightly different measurements since I was adapting a pair of existing pillowcases. I had a pair of cases and I have a pair of children; it seemed only natural that each of them ended up with one. I busted out the scrap stash and got to work.

I love the pattern on Finn’s. I want a shirt made out of that fabric. Which would make me look a bit like a mime/lumberjack. I’m okay with that, though.

Alice’s is a little -ahem- loud, but since I used some of the leftovers from her quilt I made when she was still baking, it coordinates closely enough.

Every time I make something for the kids, I envision their beautiful, happy smiles on their little cherub-cheeked faces when I show it to them. This is not reality. “Finn, what do you think of your new pillowcase?” I hold it up and smile brightly. He glances over with glazed eyes and a dead stare that says Oh yes, Mother. ANOTHER e’ffing pillow. I’m ever so thrilled. “Okay. I have two pillows already, Mom.” Which is better than what I imagine he is thinking.

Does this child realize that one can NEVER HAVE TOO MANY PILLOWS? No. No, he does not.

See? Told ya he was beside himself with joy.

And so it is back to the grindstone with this damn duvet cover. Not that it is anything spectacular. But I’ve gotten this far into it – and plunked down eight bucks in supplies for it, so I ‘spose I’ll try to see it to the end.

Wish me luck. Karma. Victory. Triumph. Kismet?

My brain’s got all day here, folks.

They See Me Strollin’. They Hatin’.

02 Friday Aug 2013

Posted by anotherbigbite in I'm a Crafty Mo' Fo', The "Joy" of Parenting

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

alice, before and after, crafts, diy, doll stroller, dolls, goodwill, kids, parenting, recycle, sewing, upcycle, upcycling

Oh, Alice and her babies.

She’s been enamored with baby dolls since she’s been able to sit up. Finn suggested we get her a stroller for her first birthday, which turned out to be a stroke of genius. We ordered a plastic Fisher Price walker-type one from Amazon, and she was on a roll. Once she realized that she had more than just the one baby, all hell broke loose because the other babies were too big.

That one has been banished to the basement for its tantrum-causing tendencies. Don’t worry; it has the giant cardboard bricks, slot-cars and Hot Wheel track down there to keep it company.

Last week, after my I-should-get-rid-of-my-crappy-Old-Navy-clothes epiphany, I whittled down my closet by almost half and lugged two giant blue Ikea bags full of clothes to Goodwill. I made the mistake of popping in. And left $3.00 poorer with this icky bad boy in my trunk.

I scrubbed the hell out of it with Clorox wipes. Instead of being a regular person and plunking the cover in the wash, I made a new cover. Just trying to make the world a little cuter, one beat-up doll stroller at a time.

It wasn’t rocket science; I used a seam ripper to tear it apart and then traced the pieces onto leftover fabric scraps. Oh, yeah, canvas dropcloth to the rescue yet again! I’m gonna milk that baby as long as I can. Best twenty bucks I’ve ever spent. Since the original stroller fabric was finished in bias tape (which tests my sewing skills and frustrates me to no end) and I was fresh out (shucky-darn, motherfucka), I opted to double up the canvas with some cute Amy Butler fabric I had lying around waiting for a project. That meant adding a bit of seam allowance.

Then traced my canvas on to the cute fabric…

I made sure to add elastic loops, static loops and velcro wherever the original had it. The original had a pair of D-rings and webbing for the belt to hold the doll in. Alice would have long outgrown this darn thing before she was able to manipulate those, so I improvised a velcro/fabric belt instead.

Now she’s happier than a brand-new momma with a Bugaboo… (Probably because she gets more sleep). And I’m happier because this one folds up and hides in the cabinets in the living room when she’s done.

Ohmygod! She was so little in December! And not even walking on her own.

“Back up, lady. That last Petite Vanilla Scone has my name written all over it.”

No stroller, but I couldn’t resist.

This should stay relevant until she realizes they make DOUBLE strollers for dolls… I’ll plead with her to reconsider putting it on her Christmas list. (“Please, Alice, honey. Your father and I thought we had to have a double stroller for the two of you kids… And that thing is a bitch to get around. And takes up too much real estate in the garage… Even though it is AMAZING.”) But she’ll be just like her mom – and won’t listen to her mother’s sage advice.

Woo! Foxy Pillow!

25 Thursday Jul 2013

Posted by anotherbigbite in I'm a Crafty Mo' Fo'

≈ 7 Comments

Tags

before and after, decorating, diy, fox, home, pillow, recycle, sewing, sweater, upcycle, upcycling

Here I come, baby. I’m comin’ to lean on ya.

As I write this, I am beginning to notice a pattern. Buying clothes for myself at Old Navy is not wise. I have countless pairs of jeans and shirts in my closet that don’t fit, are a weird color, are falling apart or some combination of any of those three. The one thing they all have in common? Old Navy.

But, hey, they were also all very reasonably priced. So there’s that.

Here’s the thing; I bought that crap because I thought it was cute at one time or another. This sweater is textbook Old Navy… Cute idea, slightly the wrong color, poor quality, ill-fitting… And only sixteen dollars! Why yes, ma’am, I’ll take it!

I like the fox, I do, but no one over the age of fourteen (I’m being generous here) should be sporting woodland creatures in the name of fashion. Since I’m not the greatest at math, I clearly overlooked the fact that I am in my thirties and have no business traipsing around in a sweater emblazoned with Tod from The Fox and the Hound.

Still, it is kinda cute. So I made a pillow out of it. Lined with (what else but) a drop cloth.

I was mad impressed with myself when I finally zipped up the invisible zipper that I put in – after ripping it out only twice. By the time I got around to getting started on the insert for the pillow, I had an epiphany.

Lightning had struck my brain.

Hey, I’ve got 826 down pillows scattered around the house. Surely I can spare one of them for The Fantastic Mr. Fox. They are all too big; I’ll just rip one open and make it smaller!! Easy, peasy!

Do you have any idea how many fucking feathers are in a 20″ down pillow insert? This many; it fills a bin that is big enough for me to lay down in.

So there I am, in the middle of the night, choking on the remains of some unfortunate specimen of water fowl, wishing I would have worn a mask, covered from head to toe in static-infused downy goodness, and it strikes me that some poor soul has to do this every damn day, forty hours a week, fifty-two weeks a year. And I’m doing it for a HOBBY. Clearly, I’m a dumbass.

Not that we didn’t already know that about me. I mean, hey, I’m a grown woman buying clothes from Old Navy without trying them on.

Now I’ve got a pillow – a fox, made out of sheep’s hair (wool), stuffed with a goose. It is the turducken of soft furnishings… A sheeoxaquack? I dunno.

Now, if you don’t mind me, I’m off to my closet to get a pile going for Goodwill.

DIY Crochet Cutoffs

28 Friday Jun 2013

Posted by anotherbigbite in I'm a Crafty Mo' Fo'

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

crochet, cutoffs, denim, diy, doily, recycle, refashion, sewing, upcycle

After counseling Nathan that , no, it is not cool to wear jean shorts again – yet, what do I do? I grab my old jeans and make a pair of cutoffs for the first time since the eighth grade.

These jeans, they were one of those pairs of jeans; the ones I wore to death and then still wore, regardless of the fact that they were too loose, past the point of acceptable “worn-in-ness” and would fit perfectly right from the dryer but fall off my ass before I arrived at Target to pick up more diapers.

I resigned to the fact that they were about to pitched in the trash – since they were too big to even paint in – when I saw (yet another) idea on Pinterest (which I did not pin – agh) that made me tap my fingertips together maniacally, narrow my eyes and go “hummmmm….”

My grandmother had sent me a boatload of doilies that had been in the family forever (handmade by my great-great grandmother, no less) to do this to, but so far its a project I still have not gotten around to accomplishing. What’s a girl to do with forty painstakingly hand-made heirloom doilies? I know. Cut them up and make a pair of shorts out of them. Naturally.

I tried cutting my jeans twice, and twice they ended up with whackadoodly hems – too low on the sides and too high in the crotch. While that might be socially acceptable in some circles, I was not pleased. What really helped was folding them like I was going to iron a crease in them (inseams and outside seams all lined up) and cutting them. Short story even longer: my shorts are just a tad too short for my taste. No matter.

After cutting the doily in half, I hacked out a triangle from the outside of my shorts, and then used the little piece I cut out as a pattern on the opposite side so they would both match.

I pinned the half doilies in place…

And double stitched along the triangle, and then did one more pass just to be sure.

Since the jeans were originally skinny jeans from a few years ago, meaning they weren’t tight tight tight like skinnies are these days, I made a little snip in the inseam (about a half-inch), just to give me a little more room in them. After a spin in the washer and dryer, they frayed up just perfectly.

This is my “Finn? Why are you putting Legos up your nose?” face.

Do I look a little more country and a little less rock ‘n roll than normal? Sure. Let’s be frank, though. Really, looking like a badass was never one of my strong suits, so I guess I can let it ride.

And NO, Nathan – jean shorts are still uncool for guys. Now put down that pair of Target Wranglers and let’s getcha a nice pair of khakis.

Ugly Mom Tee to a Little Lady Tank

07 Friday Jun 2013

Posted by anotherbigbite in I'm a Crafty Mo' Fo', The "Joy" of Parenting

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

kid's clothes, old shirt, recycle, refashion, sewing, tank top, tee, tshirt, upcycle

Do you ever have one of those projects that, by all accounts, will be quick and easy, and ends up being a total nightmare? Me, too. This is one of them.

This project started out as a super soft yet unnervingly illfitting cheapie tshirt from Old Navy. It was regular old tshirt; why would I need to try it on? I grabbed my size, headed for the register with two wriggly children in my wake and silently cursed Old Navy everytime I rifled past it in my closet. It was too boxy in the body, too tiny in the sleeves… ugh. A nightmare.

Couple that wonky tshirt with WAY too many hours on Pinterest, and you end up with an overinflated confidence in your sewing ability. That geourgus chickadee from Cotton & Curls? Pfft. I can take her. Or so you think.

The next thing you know, you are wondering why in the hell Alice really needed another tank top, and why didn’t you just do what normal people do and donate that effing shirt?

It started simply enough; tracing one of her tops for a pattern, and putting in little quasi-box pleats at the top. Box pleats? I love box pleats.

Then came the pain-in-the-ass part. All that tiny, tiny finishing work… The kind that if you don’t take your time, the whole thing looks like a craptacular Home Ec project.

And just when it was all done, I nodded with satisfaction and waited for her to wake up. And that, my dear friends, is always where it seems to go wrong. It looks cute on the hanger, but fits like a garbage bag. And so I ended taking it up, taking it in, and running elastic through the top of the back to scrunch it up just a smidge.

And Alice, of course, thought it was alright, but really needed to be paired with a statement shoe… I am totally seriuos when I say that she demands what shoes she wears. At least these match.

I’m going to have one of those kids who ends up at Target with a tutu, leather coat and galoshes. Single girls will look at me and wonder why I ever let her leave the house that way (as I often did when I was a single girl – ashamedly). Other mothers will give me a warm, understanding smile; yes, some kids just are like this… I am not much of a “pink” girl; but this child – lordy – she loves pink. LOVES PINK.

So it is only my responsibility as a mom to make sure that she has lots of other colors in her wardrobe to balance it out.

Another Big Bite

Tag Archives: sewing

Another day. Another pillow.

They See Me Strollin’. They Hatin’.

Woo! Foxy Pillow!

DIY Crochet Cutoffs

Ugly Mom Tee to a Little Lady Tank

Nifty Bite? Share it:

Like this:

Nifty Bite? Share it:

Like this:

Nifty Bite? Share it:

Like this:

Nifty Bite? Share it:

Like this:

Nifty Bite? Share it:

Like this: