More Sewing

I've had some fun doing more sewing for my littlest munchkin!  Here's what else I've accomplished so far:

Lots of easy T-shirts!!  The middle one could go for PJs but they are play clothes.  I love that you don't even have to hem knit!  The other two I had the shorts for but he needed a good matching T-shirt.  I used the pattern from Sewing For Boys.

I Love Baby Gifts!

I have had so much fun sewing for my new little niece.  I made the bag from Bunny Hill's pattern using some fabric I already had by Riley Blake and finding others at Joanne's to go with it.  I made the bapron from CINO's pattern.  I added some fabric to the front of the clothe diapers to fancy up some burp cloths and then made a changing pad (no- it's not a sleeping bag!) from my own design.  I used that water proof stuff in the Baby Boutique section and it seems like it will hold up really good.  Next time I won't use such thick batting because it's a little too bulky but it'll sure do the job!    

Teacher Gifts: Flower Pots

My boys asked me if we could do the same teacher appreciation gifts this year as last year.  Since they had so much fun making them last year and their teachers really seemed to like it we went ahead and did the same thing.  I got some clay flower pots and they painted them with paint pens.  Then we put some cactus plants in them and stuck these notes on a wooden stick in the dirt.  They turned out cute, are inexpensive and my boys loved making them.  Plus it is something that THEY made and I think they teachers like that.  Here's the flowers I drew with: "If teachers were flowers, I'd pick you!" printed on them. 

Family Tradition: End of the Year Award Ceremony

We had our end-of-the-school-year celebration and awards ceremony on Monday night for Family Home Evening.  This is a new tradition we're starting.  My husband and I picked out 6 things about each of our son that they have accomplished or done in the past year.  Some of them were funny and some were more serious.  Then I had fun finding little things to go with each of them.  Our boys loved it!!  They were so excited to find out what their awards were.  Some of our awards were:  Torpedo Award (fast swimmer on swim team and I got some torpedo toys to play with in the pool), Hardworking Speller (smarties), Bookworm Award (gummy worms), Best Giggle (Laffy Taffy), Musician Award (play recorder), Best Pet Owner Award (swedish fish- we have a fish), etc.  The Dollar Store comes in really handy for these kinds of things!

Then we enjoyed these graduation cupcakes. (I snagged the plain cupcakes from Walmart for 40% off and added a Reeses, cut up Hersheys and Twizzler)en we enjoyed these graduation cupcakes. (I snagged the plain cupcakes from Walmart for 40% off and added a Reeses, cut up Hersheys and Twizzler).

New Summer Outfit

I am finding that the hand-me-downs for my third son are pretty sparse at this age.  (He's two.)  I think my older boys were hard on their clothes at this age.  But that's okay- it gives me an excuse to get sewing!!  I was inspired by a lot of the posts from a few weeks ago when it was sew for your kids week or something like that.  I got out some of my scraps and knit fabric stash and started putting some outfits together.  I have a T-shirt here or pair of shorts there for him without a matching counterpart so I was able to put those together.  I had fun planning and cutting out the outfits and now it's time to get to work!  (Before he outgrows  what I cut out!)  

Here's my first product.  

The pattern came from this book by Rob Merrett 

that I purchased over a year ago and this is the first thing I've made from it but I think it turned out really cute!  I actually cut out size 3 because even though L* is 2, he's pretty tall for his age.  And it fits perfectly.  If I made it again I would just use elastic in the waist instead of a drawstring.  There were a lot of details and buttons on this so it took awhile to make, plus the instructions were a little hard for me to follow in some parts, but I might make another one because I like how it turned out!

Lifesaver- How to get crayon out from a load of laundry

I know I am very lucky that in the 9+ years of raising boys I have never had a crayon sneak through my wash.  But today broke my lucky streak and it wasn't pretty!  I am really bad about checking pockets for things and evidently a yellow crayon was hidden away somewhere in my piles of sheets and miscellaneous lights.  When I was folding them I thought it was paint splotches (my kids have been working on teacher's gifts) but when I saw the empty crayon wrapper it hit me these were melted crayon spots all over my laundry!!  (Which is probably a good thing that it wasn't paint!)  So I googled it (what did we do before internet?  Probably bugged Mom more often!) and found this great and simple solution at Diary of a Doctor's Wife.  A true lifesaver!  We probably would have just lived with yellow spotted sheets and T-shirts but now we don't have to!  This worked perfectly.  I did have to repeat all steps twice.

Fun ABC Magnets

Awhile ago I saw these adorable magnets over at servingpinklemonade.  I pinned the idea and have had it in my project to-do drawer for many months.  I thought it would be a great thing to whip out while I'm making dinner and my preschooler is begging for attention, not to mention a great learning tool!  So I finally finished them and all of my boys have liked playing with them.  Probably my preschooler least of all, but I'm hoping that will change once I sit down and play with him.  But we'll see...  Part of parenting is figuring out what works with each child since they are all so different!

Anyhow, I had fun coloring them with my colored pencils while watching my favorite TV shows, "Elementary" and "Castle".  But you can also print out a colored version or let your kids have fun coloring them!  Then I modge podged some cut up magnets- you know the kind you get tons of advertisements on in the mail, etc.  And then I laminated them. I think they turned out really cute!