Owl Diaper bag preview for K

"K"- you were such a patient client- I can't thank you enough!!! I just love how your choices turned out! I'm so glad that you ran with this gorgeous pattern and the pink. Looking at it makes me want to have another baby girl!! I painted the little owl feathers on your owl and he can be removed whenever you like. Your bag is loaded with pockets for all of your baby luggage- I hope it's useful and unique!! Thank you again!!
;) holly

Easter bag!! The Bunny bag tutorial

I designed these bags last Easter to use for collecting Easter eggs. I used iron on transfer paper to transfer my kid's drawings onto the fabric but they crumbled off pretty quickly. This year I just let them have at it with Sharpies straight onto the fabric and it worked great. They love making these bags and were begging to make them as soon as I brought Easter decorations out this year. The bag is long so it's roomy enough to hold lots of eggs!
Here are the three done by my little ones- can you tell that my 2 year old loves blue?


Wow- this is a terrible picture but you get the gist! It's the pattern (PDF pattern to follow this post). Just cut out the pattern, trace onto your fabric and then cut out of the fabric. Cut 2 bodies. 2 ears and 1 face from your fabric. Then cut 2 bodies and 2 ears from whatever fabric you will use as the bag lining.



This is where I let my kids color on the fabric. They didn't do the back side so I gave them one set and the face.



I interfaced the top with fusible Decor bond, you don't have to interface or you can use a softer interfacing- your choice! I chose to not interface my lining.



First, I zigzag stitch (applique) the face near the top of the body.


Here is how it looks with the face stitched on.



Then I straight stitch the ears onto the body. Right sides facing together, edged lined up.



I press the seams open of course!



This is how it looks with the ears stitched on. Now you do the same thing with the second set of body and ears. Then do the same thing for the lining fabric pieces.



If you want to use store bought twill, thick ribbon or something else for the handle, feel free. I will quickly show how I make my handles though if you want to make them from scratch. I took this picture of two handles because I was making several bunny bags but you only need one for each bag. Cut a strip of fabric 12 inches x 4 inches.

Fold the strip in half and press. Open it back up and then use the pressed seam that you made as a guide. Now take each edge and fold it in until it hits the middle pressed seam that you made. Then press it again! See the picture below.







Then fold the strap together again and press one last time. Crisp, clean edges from an iron are crucial so don't skip pressing!



Now straight stitch down each side to finish the strap.



You want to sew the strap onto the bunny ears. Line up the edges of the strap with the top, middle of each ear. I stitch back and forth a few times to get a very strong connection.



Here are the straps stitched on.




Now you can see the strap pulled up and the clean front side.



OK- lay the strap back down. Take both front and back of the bunny, put their right sides facing together and then stitch all of the way around starting on one ear about 1/4 inch before the strap. Sew all of the way around, down the ear, the body and all of the way up to the other side, up to the ear, a 1/4 inch past that strap. Don't sew between the ears ;).


Clip those curves!

Here you will repeat the same thing for the lining pieces (omitting the strap though) but LEAVE AN OPENING AT THE BOTTOM, about 5 inches long.



This is the tricky part if you don't sew bags already.

You have the bunny bag (with a strap sewn on) facing the correct way.

You take your bag lining and turn it inside out.

Put the bunny bag inside your lining and situate it so they match up. The strap needs to be folded into the bag, like it's stuffed inside.

Now you stitch the part in between the ears (the part that you DIDN'T stitch before).

Pull the bunny bag through the opening that you left in the lining. Pull the strap up. You will have two bunnies with their ears sewn together.

Then tuck the lining into the bunny bag.

NOW you have a bag with a proper lining ;).

I looooooove top stitching. First I press all of the edges and make sure they are completely nice and neat because the bag has lots of curves and can look wonky if not. I use the eraser side of a pencil to push the all out.

Top stitch around the entire bag....looks so pretty!

That's it!! Super, duper cute and at the same time giving your child a special way to show off their drawing. Hope you enjoy!!


xo-
holly

Handmade infant Easter dress for Baby Holly!!

Having a niece (even though she lives far away) is a super wonderful blessing!! I couldn't let her first Easter go by without making her something......I know the day will come soon enough when she dreads Aunt Holly's homemade gifts ;) so I'll make the most of my time now.

The shape of the dress is simple and will grow with her for quite a while since the shoulder straps tie. The labor of love was all of the stuff that I appliqued on. I can't wait to get my hands on her when we go on our girl's weekend soon!!

Sling purse for "K"

Just posting a quick preview for my mom's friend "K" ;). I hope you guys enjoy your time together!!!
xoxo-
holly

Hand embroidered spring dress

When I scheduled photos with Courtney Vickers (see the right of my blog for examples of her work!) I started making Laci a dress right away. I've been so involved with adding my hand embroidered pieces to my handbags that I was anxious to see how it looked on a dress. I stitched it onto the bust portion of the dress......now I'm working on embroidering a much larger section for her next dress because I enjoy it so much. If you are interested in embroidery check out fabric designer goddess Anna Maria Horner's blog (http://annamariahorner.blogspot.com/) and search through her posts for her incredibly gorgeous work!!!

Scalloped Easter dress

Laci and I had several conversations on how her Easter dress would look this year ;). We compromised on this one- I picked the shape of the top and the scalloped edge (super fun to sew by the way!) and she got "twirly and very long". She also chose her fabrics which is something I just love to see her decide on. I have another Easter dress for her that I'm almost done with....don't know why she would ever need two but I got too engrossed in the idea so I made it anyways ;). Hope you all enjoy your Easter!! I have a bunny bag tutorial that I'll post this weekend that combines your sewing with your child's cute drawing.
xo,
holly

Mario Kart birthday party!

My oldest is 7!! Every time I look at him I melt....he is such a sweet young man. He loves racing, hot wheels, NASCAR, Mario Kart, ANYTHING that has to do with racing. So each year we basically repeat the same theme and I was grasping for new ideas this year ;). Thank heavens Mario Kart has super adorable "weapons" so I ran with the idea to incorporate them.



I found a great template of the Wii remote on a party blog to use as an invite. We folded them up and slipped his invitation inside. He really liked passing these out ;).


I was so excited to find a cookie cutter that makes a track! I had a cloud and star cutter already and used a tiny paintbrush in gel food coloring to paint on the details.
It took a few layers but I was finally able to paint this Mario on a plastic jar that we used for our M&M guessing game.
I have a lot of plaster cast (it's similar to paper mache) and used it to create these little squids "inking" the table. I cut card stock for the tentacles and painted over it all to cover the seams.
Martha Stewart's sugar cookie recipe is always the best!! I use gel food coloring only to get these wonderful colors.
King Boo lanterns- so easy! I drew King Boo with a sharpie on dollar store lanterns (I did his face on both sides because they never stopped turning) and then cut his crown out of gold scrapbook paper. The cake was time consuming but simple. I made drawings of the weapons and then cut them to use as templates. I then cut the fondant using the templates with an x-acto knife. Again, I painted on the smile and eyes with black gel food coloring and a very tiny paint brush.

Making this party was so much fun because of how excited Ryan was about it all. His ideas merged with mine and it turned out really cute! I adore his little friends and he seemed to have the time of his life...which is all I could hope for!
xo-
holly