Farbenmix Encinitas

I ordered a bunch of Farbenmix patterns in a co- op last summer.  I finally got them in January and set to work sewing one up for Addi Bo's birthday gift.  I chose the Encinitas which can be a super frilly, ruffly, twirly dress.  It can also be made plain, but what's the fun in that!  And since the birthday girl is very girly I chose pink!

3 1/2 yards of fabric later and I had this!





Upfront ruffles



Top view



And a little tag that peeks out of the ruffles when the dress moves



The dress is a peasant bodice attached to a double layer skirt. The upper skirt has 3 long tear drop shapes with 3 shorter upside down u's all sewn together alternating long, short, long, short, long short. It's what gives the dress the scalloped effect. The under layer is just 6 long tear drop pieces that also create a scallop shaped hem. Now, I don't technically know if I did this correctly. I mean, the pattern was in German, and I don't speak German. And I had a few pieces leftover. But from what I gather looking at other examples is that the leftover pieces are to create pockets if you want them. But I went without because I didn't think the dress needed them!

Do you sudoku, and other stuff

I love making the Sudoku skirts from Ottobre 1/2009.  And I especially love making them during Stash Game since they give me lots of points!  But really, how many of these same skirts do my girls need?  I mean, we have like 4 floating around the house.  So I made a couple for the other little girls in my life. 

Let me tell you, I spent an hour hemming and ruffling the bottom ruffle to these skirts.  That doesn't even include attaching it or topstitching it.  Hemming and ruffling.  Aaack!  But those ruffles are so lovely!  The bottom ruffle on each skirt is like 28 feet long and then gathered to fit the skirt. Ridiculous! 
For an explanation of how I put them together take a look at past Sudoku's.  Each of these has 24 different scraps in them. 

Pattern:  Ottobre Design 1/2009







A look up at all those ruffles!





And the other stuff! A few long sleeve shirts.

Ottobre Design 4/09 #35 in size 134
I love the way this shirt is cut and the stripes face different directions! I barely eeked this shirt out of the fabric I had left though and the sleeves ended up being barely long enough so there was no way I could hem them. I solved that problem by hemming them with picot elastic. Perfect!







A tunic for KK. I ordered a yard of this fabric from Girl Charlee awhile back and liked it so much that I re-ordered 2 more yards of it when I placed another order! :)

Pattern: Ottobre Design 1/2009 #28 size 134
(Have I mentioned lately how my girls are 3 years apart in age and wear the same size? I'm sure you are thinking, great they can share clothes and I don't have to buy as many. Yeah right, they fight over everything. Each girl must have their own!)

(Have I mentioned lately that Ottobre 1/2009 is my favorite issue? I have made most everything in that issue!)



The pockets are a little hard to see..



Finally, a Mamu Sabrina for Nin. I also ordered this butterfly cotton lycra from Girl Charlee. Very nice fabric and the girls love the butterflies! Maybe I should just have my paycheck direct deposited to Girl Charlee's bacnk account? She has such great stuff though! Do you know how hard it is to stay away during SG?

The thing I love about the Sabrina pattern is that it is open to personalization. Hood or no hood, long sleeve, short sleeve, cap sleeves, puff sleeves, pocket, tunic or dress length.

This just happens to be a dress with a pocket, no hood and long sleeves! I promise it's not wonky in real life. Just on the hanger...

China Doll

I made little Addi B a china doll outfit.  It turned out very very cute.  This outfit took many hours on my new embroidery machine but it was so worth it!  I hope she likes it!

The skirt is a double layer with 2 designs on the side panels and china doll ribbon down the seams.  The top layer is hemmed in red bias tape.  The bottom layer is red twill with a ruffle hem.

Pattern:
skirt- Farbenmix Insa size 122 which may be a touch big.
embroidery- Stickbaer

shirt- Farbenmix Antonia of course!
embroidery- Stickbaer

Birthday presents for Addi

I spent last weekend sewing up birthday presents for Addi. I let each girl pick an outfit from my stack of Ottobre magazines. Both just happened to pick these super fussy, detailed outfits and I immediately regretted my decision to let them choose.

KK picked a skirt and shirt from Ottobre 1/2007. #15 and #16. Both are in size 104, with added length to the shirt. They are very cute but the shirt alone has 17 rows of shirring at the waist! I don't mind shirring, it's easy, just takes awhile.



Look at all those rows!



The skirt has these cute pockets on the front and ruffles on the bum. The ruffles are certainly adorable and perfect for girly girls. The pockets on the front have these flaps but they didn't have anyway to stay closed. And as you may be aware I am kind of a crazy ironing person. I iron just about everything. And the thought of those pocket flaps sticking up after the first wash just about drove me crazy! And no offense Trish, I mean I love ya and all, but I knew you wouldn't iron them down and it would bother me. So I added snaps to the pockets to keep them from driving me insane. Hey, at least I admit I have a problem.



back





The skirt also called for a drawstring waist to tie at the side. Screw that, I put in a pretty pink zipper.



Now, Nin had the best of intentions picking out this pretty, fluffy, twirly dress. But it turned into an issue. So much so, that I had to let Nin pick a dress out of my selling stock to give to Addi. The dress was made in Addi's size, 104 and it was sooooo big, it fit my 9 year old. It was beyond ridiculous. Way too wide, too long and too big of neck. It is very pretty and has lots of great details, but the pattern in this size was poorly drafted. Perhaps, in the bigger sizes it would be more true to size. Who knows. But it currently hangs on my garment rack while I try to figure out what to do with it.

Pattern: Ottobre Design mag 3/2008 #25



Look at those cute little ties on the back!



Can you see how big this neck is?



3 1/4 in. could be taken out to fit my 9 year old.



Usually, Ottobre is right on point with their sizes, so I was a little disappointed with this one.

Intervention

I think I may need an intervention. My name is Kelly and I make way too many Antonia's. There I said it. If you readers promise not to call Intervention, I promise not to make any more Antonia's. How about that? But while you are here, let me show you how I spent the last week....

I got together with friends and their daughters the Saturday before Christmas and painted t-shirt fronts with the kids. The kids did a few and the adults did a few. And then they left me with a big ol' mess. The end. Okay, not really.

So we decided to make a few Christmas ones and then let the kids pick a second design. Since 4 out of the 5 kids picked a reindeer, I set them up with just 4 colors to chose from. You know sometimes with kids, less is more. I should have given them 2. When you see the shirts, you will know why. But it was fun and the kids had a really great time and when they saw their completed shirts they were stoked!

So I got to mix and match the rest of the shirt parts (which is the fun part for me!). So here is what we got, in size order.











I had a hard time deciding on the fabric for these. I only had a few Christmasy fabrics to chose from. I found the solids and then found the red and blue stripes. And then in my remnant pile I found the green and white stripes, which incidently is a Target baby blanket. I was almost out of the green and white and it was my fave, but I managed to stretch it into 2 shirts.

So Wed. night I finished these so that the kiddos could have them for Christmas.

And then Sunday I picked out fabric for the other designs and sewed them all up in one marathon. These were my favorite to do because I could literally pick any fabric and trim and ribbon I wanted! I sat for 2 hours on the floor of my sewing room playing with fabric trying to get the right combos before cutting and sewing! I am only slightly insane.

In size order again.....

We have Baby Ally's, with a band at the bottom to be more like a tunic than a t-shirt. I checked with her mom first to make sure she had pink or brown leggings. Because dang it, this shirt needs them and I was prepared to make her some.

Look closely at her sleeves. They are cut off another t-shirt...



Kate's



And look at this trim on the sleeves! Ruffle FOE (fold over elastic). Matches perfect!



Then there is Addi B's.



And she gets 2 different trims. One in between the sleeve pieces and one at the sleeve end.



Next in Nin's.. She painted this one herself. Hello Kitty! I cut up one of her old shirts to use as the sleeves and she was a bit disappointed at first but then I convinced her that since the old shirt didn't fit they were better as sleeves. The lace trim was already on the bottom so I just left it! Look how cute it is!!





Last is KK's. I tried a new sleeve band on the bottom but somehow my math didn't work out and they are a little short. She doesn't mind though that they are more like 3/4 sleeves.



5 little shirts all lined up





How is that for insane? 10 shirts in 4 days?