Retro Headband

My daughters got invited to a Birthday party for a friend over the summer. We went shopping for her present from the girls but I just had to make her something a little more personal and from the heart. It took me a while to figure out what it was that I wanted to do. Either something crocheted or something sewn. Around that same time, I got a newsletter from Create Kids Couture with a cute little free pattern in it…. a Retro Headband! I knew that it would be the perfect little thing for her!

After getting some color preferences from her Mom, I decided to make it double sided so that it would be a little more versatile. I also wanted to make two bows to go with it so that there would even more ways to wear it!

This pattern was the first one that I have ever done in this style. I am used to doing the Tissue Paper patterns that I was taught on. To be honest I was a little worried about it since you have to print it out with your printer. But as long as  you make sure that you print the file at 100% and not fitted to the page you are fine. That’s the way that I always print anyways so I didn’t really have anything to worry about.

Once I had all the pieces cut the assembly was really easy. CKC writes out their patterns perfectly and in great detail.

Needless to say it was a big hit and she looked adorable in her new headband! I can’t wait to make more and it totally got me hooked on Create Kids Couture patterns! I have a few things waiting in the works as we speak. So, be sure to come back and check for more items sewn using their patterns!

Here are a few pictures of my finished piece!

 

 

 

Make sure you check out their website as well as their facebook! They have some great patterns for all sizes and genders!

Website: http://www.createkidscouture.com/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/createkidscouture

 

Mock Smock Dress Tutorial

My daughter Peanut just loves My Little Ponies right now so she was SUPER excited to see that they had MLP Mock Smock fabric at Joann’s . She loved the last dress that I made for her out of this type of material (so much that she wanted to wear it three days in a row). So, what better reason then to do a tutorial post about it up on the blog right! 🙂 This will be my first tutorial that I have ever put on there for a sewing project. These types of dresses are pretty easy to make so lets dive in!

First thing first… buying the fabric. With this kind of fabric you get a lot of stretch due to the built in elastic at the top of the fabric. What I like to do is measure my daughter around the chest then buy it at that length. When sewing the fabric together you will loose half an inch because of the seam. If you want it to be more snug then you could take  1/2 an inch off of the person’s chest measurement. But remember you don’t want to make it too snug so I wouldn’t go more then 1/2 an inch.

Once you have your fabric in front of you, you want to seam it together. Fold the fabric in half (right-side in) and match the edges up. Now you just have to pin the two sides together so that the fabric doesn’t shift when you are sewing it. How many pins you use or if you put them in vertically or horizontally is strictly your preference. I choose to put my vertical when doing something like a seam, but when I do something like the straps I put them horizontal. I find it easier for me to pull them out that way in a smaller area.

Once you have your seam all pinned up you just sew a simple 1/4 inch seam from top to bottom of the fabric. Now you will have a dress for a special little girl!

But if that little girl is anything like my little girl, she will need some straps added to her dress! Peanut runs around and climbs on everything so a strapless dress just wont do at all. I went out and got some matching 7/8 in ribbon to use for the straps, of course Peanut picked pink. hehehe I wasn’t surprised by that at all! Her current favorite colors are Pink and Green. You can choose a different kind of ribbon if you want to. That choice is totally up to you.

Now that you have your ribbon You have to see how long to cut it. What I do is have your little one put it on and directly measure it that way. I had peanut put the dress on inside out and then I took the ribbon and pinned it where I wanted it in the front and put it over her shoulder to the back of the dress. This will show you how long to make both sides. I like to have a good 1-1 1/2 inch over lap with my ribbon straps. Because like I said my girls are rough and tumble even though they love the girlie stuff too. Now that the ribbon is cut you don’t want it to fray over time. So, take a lighter and just run it along the cut edge of the ribbon. This will singe the edges making it so that it doesn’t fray. Once you have them singed and pinned to the wrong side of the fabric you are ready to sew them on.

As you can see I sew my straps on with a nice box and X pattern. I find that this is super strong and really holds up. I could have used a darker pink color for the stitching but I wanted to make sure that you could all see the final sewing design that I use.

This is what you get! One happy little girl! It’s only 66 degrees here in beautiful Southern California but she insists on wearing it! I think this was a job well done.

Please share with me your Mock Smock dress after you make it!