Well, if you don’t, all you need to know is, while I love the look of ruffles, I am officially scared and scarred of making anymore on my own.

But what if I didn’t have to worry about making the ruffles? What if they already came attached to the very lightweight, stretchy, and gorgeous fabric? What if I could, with just a few simple stitches, create flowy ruffly nursing tanks and adorable ruffle-covered baby bloomers?

POOF!

Behold the fabulousness that is Ruffle Fabric…

Source: imakestuff4fun.blogspot.com via Jill on Pinterest

Granted, a belted nursing top sort of defeats the purpose of the easy access nature of a nursing top, but I’m told by Callie at City Craft (which happens to have just got loads of Ruffle Fabric in the store), that the fabric makes a great unbelted tank, too. This tutorial from I Make Stuff is so easy I HAVE to try it.

And with my leftover fabric, I could make Leyna a pair or two of these from Make It and Love it…

Source: makeit-loveit.com via Jill on Pinterest

My sewing machine has been stuffed in a corner of our room since before the floor renovation, and I really haven’t had the urge to do much with it lately. Now, though, I’m so inspired to try out a couple ruffle fabric projects! There are so many more. You can check out more ideas here.

Have any of you worked with this? I don’t have a serger and I’ve never mastered the zig-zag stitch on the edge of fabric to finish it off, so this should definitely be a challenge. Any tips for me?

Feel free to link up your pins of the week or posts about pins of the week in the comments. And if you’re not on Pinterest yet and need an invite, leave your email below and I’ll work on getting one to you as soon as I can.

View from the doorway

Curtains made using this tutorial
Diaper Wreath made by these two crafty friends
Blanket over the chair made with this tutorial

Unfortunately, the lens I have for my Canon T2i doesn’t let me take very wide shots, so I had to shoot those with my Sony Cybershot. I hate the discrepency in quality between the wide shots and the detail shots, but it’s what I have to work with.

Tie backs and curtain rod from Ikea
Corner shelves from Target
Pillow covers made using this tutorial

Hate this pic, but it's the only one I have that shows that whole side of the room.

Wall vinyl world map from Etsy Seller Ghetto Vinyl
Chair by Wendy Bellissimo for Babies R’ Us (bought nearly 3 years ago and since discontinued)
Crib is Tampa by Baby Cache

Bed skirt made with this tutorial
Crib sheets made with this tutorial
Crib rail guard made with this (my) tutorial

I owe a huge thanks to the lovely ladies at City Craft in Dallas for helping me pick the fabrics. They were such a wonderful inspiration and so helpful!

Hot air balloon mobile, a gift from my mom, from Restoration Hardware Baby and Child

A wide, point and shoot shot of the other side

Dresser from Ikea
Hutch from Ikea
Bow holder made with this (my) tutorial
Baskets from Target
Changing pad from Target
Trash can is cloth diaper pail (also from Target)
Brown bookshelf purchased at consignment (and yes, I know I’ll eventually have to strap it to the wall or move it when she starts pulling up)

The hutch is decorated with souvenirs from my childhood (like the teddy bear made from my VERY loved baby blanket and my copy of The Secret Garden), along with some things I’ve collected since then (like the Japanese mother and child a BFF sent me when she lived in Okinawa). I also used to collect elephants and have chosen a few to dot throughout the room. I picked up the vintage Winnie the Pooh back in high school, we’ve had the globe forever (it was Scott’s to begin with, I think), and that puzzle box was a gift from my dad when I was in Jr. High. The hippo wooden teether is from Little Alouette. I picked up the giraffe and the nesting suitcases from Gilt.com.

A few friends chipped in and sent me some lovely little additions, as well, like this jolly Buddha statue from Mandy’s shop, Opal.

And Melissa, from Little Yah and Yahees Place, made this coordinating baby blanket based on the fabrics I’ve used.

So there you have it! All prepped and ready. Just missing a BABY now.

If you’d like to see the progression of my nursery planning, check out the following posts:

A Nursery Decor S.O.S.

Let The Sewing Games Begin!

It’s Peanut Butter Jelly Time!

Blood, Sweat and Tears

How I Spent My Kid-Free Staycation

Well, now that took up a good 2 hours of my evening… and didn’t give me a single f-ing contraction. Soooooo I guess blogging doesn’t induce labor. Hmph.

Kendall is 2 years, 7ish months and I’m nearly 41 weeks pregnant

I’ve been itching to tell you all about it, though, so let me just start by saying it was one of the most wonderful weeks ever! I mean, as much as we enjoyed our vacation to Sonoma earlier this year, I think we got more satisfaction out of this one, and we didn’t even leave our zipcode most days. Our outings mainly consisted of those to Lowes since we decided on a whim to redo the kid’s bathroom, complete with ripping up and replacing tile.

Side note- the Pica is still going strong. The little bits of mortar that my husband was chipping up from the bathroom floor looked as appetizing as Cheddar and Sour Cream Lays Potato Chips, the grout he laid down looked as delicious as buttercream frosting. I kid you not. Yes, I spoke with my midwife about it. No, she *wasn’t* alarmed. This is… common??

My mother is an angel and the world’s best grandmother, or “Nae Nae” as Kendall insists on calling her. She had him for a solid 7 days, and we got SO MUCH DONE. We really must make this a yearly tradition. It’s not like I didn’t miss the kid, because I surely did, but the anxiety I felt after dropping him off rapidly faded and was replaced with the awesome sense of accomplishment as we crossed things off our mile-long to do list.

Sure, our week wasn’t as full of resting and relaxation and formal date nights as I’d hoped, but we still managed to connect and have fun together. I’m fairly certain we never even got into a heated argument a single time we were at Lowes (though there were still several disagreements). When you are away for vacation, I think it’s expected that your relationship will perk up a little bit, the arguments will subside, but it was so nice to experience that same feeling while living our “normal” life at home.  And since Kendall’s returned, I find we’re both working harder to be a little more patient with him and with each other.

So a rousing recommendation from me for more kid-free staycations!! You should really give it a try if you haven’t been so lucky to yet.

Now, time to brag.

As you may recall, I spent much of my week in my own personal sewing hell. Not only did I have my temperamental sewing machine and her bitch-ass bobbin to deal with, but I also had a new frenemy, the Olfa Rotary Cutter, who damn near sliced off the top of my finger. (For real, people, do not underestimate the deadliness of this crafty tool. I’m sleeping with it under my pillow the nights Scott is gone so I can get deadly crafty on intruders if need be.)

While Scott slaved away on the bathroom remodel, shouting obscenities at his equally deadly mortar scraper thingy (hmmm.. I’m beginning to wonder how much our relationship really benefited from having inanimate objects to scream at for the week), I sweat and swore and knocked out baby girl’s crib skirt, baby blanket, and curtains lined with blackout fabric.

I still have a few sewing projects to tackle, like the crib rail guard and a couple pillow covers, and we still have some furniture and accessories to add to the room, but here’s what I’ve got so far.

The baby blanket is definitely a labor of love, but not so much skill. Crooked stitches and wonky ruffles turned “pleats” abound. Never, ever try to hand ruffle 9 yards of fabric. Never.

Not quite satisfied with the curtains. I think I’m going to move the rod up a bit and put them on those clippy hook thingies. The blackout fabric was a huge PITA, but it makes all the difference. That room feels 10 degrees cooler.

This is the next big project I’ve got to tackle. We’re adding a hutch to the right of the changing pad where we can display her “worldly souvenirs,” like the Matroyshkas I just won on Ebay! Then I have some crafty things up my sleeve for decoration above it. The dresser is from Ikea (surprisingly sturdy, I’ll add) and the trash can is for cloth diaper laundry.

Not too shabby for a week’s worth of work in the third trimester, eh? We also managed to organize the garage a bit and finally figured out what to do with 3 of our 5 strollers (and I swear, every SINGLE one of them gets used- or will be- and has a purpose). Scott screwed in some $9 bike hooks to the studs and whala!  So much better than the real estate they were taking up in our front room, temporarily turned stroller garage.

I wish I could say we accomplished everything on the list that gives me anxiety daily, but at least we made a considerable dent. To top the week off, we got to go to a bar where we watched, in it’s ENTIRETY, the Mizzou Homecoming game vs. OU, and we got to see the most epic smackdown, not missing a single play. We ate greasy, spicy appetizers and Scott drank like he was in college again, which I found to be pretty amusing and was secretly jealous. Best. Date night. Ever. GO TIGERS!!

Mizzou Homecoming 10 years ago

And cuss words… there were many, many f-bombs.

The Olfa Rotary Cutter (which should come with some sort of required safety class, much like a hunting rifle) has taken the “fuc*ing whore” title from the sewing machine after it nearly completely sliced off the top of my left pointer finger. That’s where the blood comes in. And the tears. I cried like a little girl once I saw the blood gushing from the tip of my finger (away from the fancy fabric, thank goodness). I got hot and flushed and felt pukey. Scott had to come to the rescue and I nearly passed out. You’d think I’d never experienced or lived through anything more painful or bloody, like… I don’t know… med-free labor and delivery.

Once my finger was properly bandaged (with a super cool Transformers Bandaid), I got back to work. I was DETERMINED to be productive yesterday because, well, Monday didn’t really work out that way. I wanted to finish just a simple baby blanket. How hard could that be?

IMPOSSIBLE, it turns out.

Remember that ruffler foot attachment I was coveting for my machine?  I couldn’t find one anywhere that is compatible with my super cheap, bottom of the line Brother LS-590. Oh, sure. I could have ordered one online and waited all week for it to come in, but I’m impatient and figured, “how hard  could it be to hand ruffle?”

I was not anticipating the miles of fabric (okay, more like 9 yards) I would have to pull and scrunch to create ruffles for this baby blanket. I present to you my own personal ruffling hell.

After 45 minutes of that futile effort, I tossed it to the side, searched online for a ruffler foot, again, to no avail, and then went to Lowes with Scott.

For some reason, we thought it would be a super easy, FUN task to take on re-tiling and re-painting the kid’s bathroom. As I type this, my husband is banging away at the super glue mortar and there is a toilet in the bathtub. I can not impress upon him enough how KEY it is that that toilet is back to fully functioning and out of the tub by the time Kendall gets home this weekend.

Since I wasn’t going to be much help in the bathroom reno, I got back to work on the baby blanket last night. I decided to take a Facebook fan/liker’s advice and just pleat the trim instead of ruffling. I was quite proud of myself for doing it all by hand and figured it would look pretty cute.

Around 11 last night, I’d attached the trim, sewn the blanket and was ready to add the finishing touches. I’ll admit, it’s definitely a…. homemade baby blanket. It looks nothing like I imagined, and the trim is sort of wonky. Whatever. I do not care at this point. I just want to be done.

I still have to go add those finishing touches (top stitching, mainly) because somehow I managed to eff up the tension on my machine last night, and instead of breaking out the manual to fix it, I threw a little temper tantrum, stomped out of the room and watched the Teen Mom reunion special. (OMG, Amber, Amber, Amber… I have no words.)

On the child-free front, I’m happy to report I’m loving every minute. I’ve talked to Kendall a few times and he sounds like he’s having an absolute blast. My mom is keeping up with him just fine and keeping him occupied with awesome activities like playing in the mud and with ranch tractor parts. Kendall is so thrilled to get “dirty” every time he visits her. I’m a totally lame-o mom who does not encourage active play in mounds of dirt, so I guess that explains his simple joy over finally being allowed to do so.

Okay… off to finish that blanket. I’ll come back and post a picture when I’m finished.

Kendall is 2.5 and I’m 31 weeks pregnant today

I decided I was going to go the DIY route for this baby after dropping a ton of cash on Kendall’s crib bedding only to never really use much of it (crib bumper came out after he started rolling over, the blanket never got much use). I couldn’t find exactly what I was looking for, and figured it couldn’t be too hard to sew up a crib skirt. Then I found a tutorial for making crib sheets, and they actually don’t seem too hard either. And then I figured a curtain panel or two wouldn’t be that challenging, and while I’m at it, why not some matching pillows for the rocking chair and the window seat?

I told Scott we’d “save so much money” this way, but uh… that was before I fell in love with cute designer, boutique fabrics. So yeah, I’m making all this stuff with expensive fabric, which sort of negates the cost effectiveness of it all (and NO pressure on my end… none at all). But it will be super cute, right? I mean, maybe. If I can mange to not kill my sewing machine for inevitably fucking up for something that I know is my fault, but that I can’t diagnose in the moment because I’m too filled with RAGE over the stupid tension getting screwed up and the bobbin constantly coming unwound… or something to that effect. And this is all banking on my seam ripper not attacking me and lopping off a thumb because I will be using that seam ripper a lot.

I made sure to buy a couple extra yards of each fabric to account for damages. Speaking of fabrics, here they are:

Left to right- The first is the Amy Butler fabric I originally fell in love with, from the Love Collection. The sample I came home with was quilted because it’s all they had, but the fabric I ordered and will use won’t be quilted. The other two are by Jennifer Paganelli, from the Poodle Collection in a color called Mustard, but it really looks a lot more like peanut butter to me. The first two on the left will be used the most, with the one on the right used sparingly in the details.

My plan is to make the bedskirt out of the Amy Butler fabric. The bed sheets will be made out of the diamond Poodle fabric, and so will the curtain panels, which will be a great contrast against this grape jelly purple accent wall. We still have much painting to do, including adding the peanut butter color to the top of the rest of the walls and white trim, but you get the general idea. I know it looks pretty dark in this picture, but I swear it’s not as cave-like as it seems.

I’ll make some fun throw pillows out of all three fabrics to go in the window seat/sill thingy. I made sure to find a tutorial that requires no zippers or buttons. Would love to add a ruffled edge to some, but… I’ll get into my fear of ruffles in a minute.

Of course, I’ll also whip up a crib rail guard, using whatever scraps I have after the big projects are done.

And then there are these awesome, collapsable fabric bins that look like maybe I can tackle them… or just one… maybe none. We’ll see. There may be too many measurement involved for my frazzled pregnant brain.

Oh, and she’ll HAVE to have a blanket, at least one. Kendall’s not about to give up any of the billions other people made for him. He still demands to sleep with each one of them at night in his sea of stuffed animals and various other soft, once SIDS hazards that now cover his face most of the night.

I love this one. Seems simple enough, except for the ruffle edge. THAT seems hard as hell. Ruffles scare me. Anything that requires “basting” scares me. Okay, okay, anything that requires more than a simple straight stitch scares me, which leads me to…

What did  just sign myself up for?! I have to follow through. I’ve spent entirely too much money on too much fabric, but I can already envision the battles, the f-bombs, the crooked seams, the seam ripper thrown across the room (a dangerous habit, I know). I will need an extra dose of patience, a box of Bandaids and a bottle of Tylenol.

Or, you know, maybe it won’t be that bad. Maybe the fact that I can’t drink while doing these projects might actually help me. Yes, let’s just blame all my previous sewing inadequacies on the glasses of Shiraz that always accompanied me to the sewing machine.

Kendall is 2 1/3 and I’m 27 weeks pregnant and off to tackle some crib sheets.

So as birthday season approached this year (there was a stretch of 4 months where I swear we had at least 2 birthdays to attend each month), I had to get a little creative about what to give for birthday gifts, and after seeing so many pictures of adorable little girls wearing stylish pillowcase dresses, I set my mind on figuring out how to make them. They sell on sites like Etsy for $25+, but you can make one with less than a yard of fabric and a couple yards of grosgrain ribbon.

Now, pillowcase dress tutorials are not hard to find online. There are hundreds, or… I don’t know… maybe thousands? I looked high and low for the easiest one I could find. I ended up mainly following one from AndersonsPlace.net.  A few months ago a friend asked for a link to the tutorial, and when I went to send it to her I noticed the link was dead. It hasn’t come back up since, and AndersonsPlace appears to be blank.  Luckily, I printed out the tutorial long ago and it’s still readable.

So I’m going to just type out the tutorial below based pretty closely on what I printed off from AndersonsPlace.net If anyone from this website reads this, please contact me! I’m not trying to rip you off, and would LOVE to give credit. It was such an easy, helpful tutorial that I think it needs to be accessible again. The photos that I’m using are mine.

I always start with a yard of fabric and have never actually used a real pillowcase for one, but you can do it either way.

If you are using a pillowcase, cut it off, leaving the hemmed end, based on these measurements:

6 months -14 1/4″
12 months – 16 1/4″
18 months – 17 1/4″
2T 18 1/4″
3T 19 1/4″
4T 20 1/4″

If you are staring with a yard of fabric, cut it to the length specified above, and a width of 28″ for 6 months, up to 33″ for 4T (adding one inch in width for each size up). This, however, can really be based on your own judgement, depending on how wide you want/need the dress to be on the girl.

While you are cutting fabric, go ahead and cut one piece 1 1/2″ wide and 30″ long and set aside for later.

Fold up half an inch along the bottom of the large piece of fabric (will be the bottom of the dress), press with iron, and fold again. Stitch along the top fold to hem.

Fold the fabric vertically (lengthwise), right sides together, pin and stitch 1/2 inch from un-joined edge to create a tube of fabric.

Use pinking shears to trim excess fabric from the seam.

Lay the tube, seam side up, with the seam in the middle and press to one side with an iron.

Fold the tube in half vertically to cut the armholes. From the top (un-hemmed) edge, measure 1.5″ in and 3″down for sizes up to 2T. For 3 and 4T measure 2″ in and 4″ down.

Using your marked measurements, cut a J shaped armhole through all 4 layers of fabric. Don’t stress about perfection.

Okay, this next step, for me, is the most difficult, but once you figure it out, it gets much easier. (That’s why I included a ton of pictures.)

Unfold the dress (guess we can stop calling it a tube now) and line the 1.5″ x 30″ piece along one armhole, right side of the strip to wrong side of the dress (dress is still inside out at this point). Fold down the top of the strip about 3/8″ and meet the top of the fold with the top of the dress. Stitch the strip all the way around the armhole. I tried pinning this, but it’s really much easier if you just freehand it. Maybe pin the top to help you get started.

When you get close to the end of the armhole, cut off the extra fabric, leaving enough to fold down 3/8″. You will use the remaining fabric on the other armhole.

Fold down the 3/8″ and finish off the armhole.

Repeat on the other side, then turn the dress right side out.

Next fold the strip in half so the raw edge is touching the raw edge of the armhole.

Then fold again over to the other side of the armhole, creating a binding. Pin as you go along the entire armhole (I use about 4 pins and just keep most of it in place with my fingers while sewing).

Stitch along the binding and then do the same for the other side.

Turn the dress inside out again.

Fold the top of the front and back 1/4″ and then again 5/8″ and press with an iron to form a casing with no raw edges. Stitch along the bottom fold, similar to what you did for the bottom hem.

Thread 1 yard of ribbon (or less for the smaller sizes) through each casing. I like to pin a safety pin to one side and use that to guide it through the casing, then trim the ends of the ribbon when I’m done.

Gather the ribbon and tie bows on the shoulders and you’re done! You can also secure the ribbon by stitching it in the middle to the inside of the casing (wrong side of the dress) by hand.

Now, even though these dresses don’t make appropriate winter wear by themselves, they do look adorable over long sleeve shirts and jeans or leggings! So you can make and give these all year, even for the holidays

Hope this was clear! Please let me know if you have any questions.

The pictures in the tutorial below are for the first crib rail guard I made for my son. I made another last year for my daughter, along with everything else I made for her nursery:

Now, onto the tutorial…

Not only do I make people, but I also make things that keep those people from turning their gorgeous convertible crib that I once envisioned gracing children’s rooms and guest rooms for decades to come (HAHAHAHHAHAHAHAAHA!!  My ignorance and naivety…oooh!  It’s so funny!) into chomped up little bits suitable for sturdy beaver dams.

After discovering several dozen notches scratched into the top of Kendall’s crib a while back, I began looking for things to not only prevent him from ingesting polyurethane and other lovely chemicals, but also to preserve what is left of the once beautiful crib.  I found the stick on plastic and rubber guards, but those, I felt, would make the crib look worse and leave behind a sticky residue.  Then I saw a few cloth teething guards listed on sites like Etsy.  I was contemplating shelling out the $30 for one of my own and realized that they looked incredibly easy to make.  After a lot of digging around on Google, I never really turned up a tutorial that showed me exactly what I wanted to make, so I winged it.  That says a lot considering I just got a sewing machine for Christmas and have only ever made a couple nursing covers, thanks to this blog.

So, without further rambling, I present to you my haphazard tutorial on how to whip up one of these puppies.  However, let me state for the record that I am no sewing expert!!  My stitches aren’t straight and I wasted a ton of fabric because I got the measurements wrong the first time around, but here’s the final product.

It’s actually three separate pieces, so I’m only going to spell out how to do one.  I’m sure you all can figure the rest out from there, based on your own crib measurements.

Materials: (this is enough to make all three pieces)
3 yards of fabric (I chose three contrasting fabrics)
1 yard of single face quilted fabric

1. Measure the length of the side of the crib you are making the cover for from inside corner to inside corner.  Add 2 inches to this measurement for your length.  I decided to make mine 9 inches wide, but I have a pretty fat crib rail.  If you’d like to customize your own width, just take your tape measure and wrap it around the crib rail until it tightly touches underneath, then add 2 inches to this measurement.  So, for example, I cut my fabric to 53″ x 11″ for the front guard.

Now, I did have to do some additional math since I decided to make that front guard out of three pieces of fabric instead of just one.  If you’d like to do something similar, just make sure that you account for the seams when you cut the fabric and add an extra half inch where each piece will meet.  ( I really hope all this is making sense.  Damn.   I knew I should have written this before the glass and a half of wine.)

2.  Cut your quilted fabric to the exact width you want your final measurement to be.  Since you only have a yard of this, you are going to have to sew together two pieces for the long guard.  Again, make sure  you account for seams when you cut the two pieces.  My final quilted piece ended up being exactly 51″ x 9″.

3. Lay your decorative fabric strip face down, fold up the sides half an inch and press with an iron, starting with the long sides first, followed by short sides.

4. Center the quilted fabric, right side up on top of the decorative fabric.  Then fold the decorative fabric half an inch over the quilted fabric, press and pin.

5. Make your ties.  For the long guard, I made bows that tied the guard together at 5 spots (either end around the corner posts and three down the middle).  Each bow needs two long strips of fabric, one on each side of the guard matched up.  I cut the corner ties (4) 3″ x 20″ and the middle ones (6) 3″ x 10″.  Then I folded each in half lengthwise, pressed them, stitched down the long side and one short side, and turned right side out. (This was, by far, the biggest PITA.  Grosgrain ribbon would probably work well and be easier, but it’s much more expensive than a yard of fabric.)

6. Place your ties for the bows.  Since all cribs are different, I’m not going to bother with telling you exactly where I placed my ties for the bows.  I just took the raw guard and placed it over the crib, then marked with some pins where I wanted each bow to tie so that it would be centered between the crib rails.

7. Lay your raw gaurd piece back face down and place each tie where you marked, making sure it’s up all the way underneath the edge of the folded seam over the quilted fabric.

8. Straight stitch around the entire guard at the edge of the folded seam closest to the exposed quited fabric.  Then fold the ties back and stitch again all the way around, this time closest to the outer edge.  I also reinforced each tie by back-stitching over each one.

9. Place over your crib rail, double knot it and tie it up.  Note- these ties are long, but I made them that way so that I could double knot them and, on the corners, double wrap them around the posts.  If the length makes you leery, you could certainly shorten them.

10. Repeat the same steps with adjusted measurements for the other two gaurds.  Here’s another look.

Hope that makes sense!  Again, I’m by no means saying this is the best way to do this, just what I figured out on my own.  If you are a sewing goddess, feel free to chime in with tweaks and tips!  I do think it turned out pretty cute.  Kendall likes to chew on it.

Kendall is 9 months and 1 week old

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