Shhhhh....don't tell

So, in just over a month, my baby heads off to college. We've been busy getting things together for him to move into the dorm. I bought him some nice masculine grey towels. I've struggled though with wanting to monogram them. Not some girly swirly thing, but just something so that he will know which towels are his. I finally settled on a tone on tone design. After playing around with 3 letter and 2 letter block styles, I finally opted for just the single letter of his first name. 

First, I decided I would put a 1" W on the corner of his wash rags. I struggled with placement. The first one was a little low and the second wash rag was a little high, but finally I got it just right on the hand towels.  I had thought I would put a large W in the middle of the bath towel, but after doing the hand towels I decided to continue with the same idea. I used a 2" W in the same font since the field where I placed it was wider. 

The towels are now washed, put away and ready to go to school. But here's the thing..... I didn't tell my son I did this. Shhhhh.....don't rat me out. Do you think he will notice?  I think they almost look like a logo for the company that made the towels. Personally, I love the tone on tone colors. I may have to do some like this for the master bath. Maybe I'll try an embossed design. 

Happy 4th of July

This week is the 4th of July. Summer is flying by and I haven't blogged as much as I had hoped I would. I hope to have more time in the coming weeks. 

Thursday, I asked a friend if she wanted a 4th of July shirt for her little girl. I told her if she provided the shirt, I would make her something patriotic. She came over about an hour later with a white tee shirt and a denim dress with stars both that she got on clearance at Baby Gap. The dress just begged to be monogrammed. So that night I created the following for this weekend. 

I opted to go with something generic red white and blue as opposed to something specifically for the 4th so that she could wear it the rest of the summer. I love the whole owl motif that is everywhere. I need to work on appliquéing and monograming on knit. It puckered a little bit. Still I loved the way it turned out. 

Yesterday, my friend sent me a picture of her sweetie pie dressed up for the 4th festivities. Such a cutie!

Pillow Talk

In my last post I mentioned that my son just graduated high school. My niece also just graduated from high school.....on the same day..... at the same time..... from the same school..... with the same group of friends. It's nice when cousins can be more than just family, but also close friends. I sewed lots of things for graduation. I foresee the next few posts being about that.

One of the things I gave my niece was a pillow to go on her bed in the dorm. Her bedding is gray, yellow, and turquoise chevron. She isn't a 3 letter monogram, preppy kind of girl, so I just appliquéd a big B on the pillow. Afterward, I thought it was a little plain so I took it apart and added cording around the edge in the same fabric as the appliqué.  That cording really enhanced the pillow. 

My other niece (the graduate's older sister) is moving into an apartment dorm at college next fall. She will have her own room with a double bed. Where was that when I went to college??? Of course this meant my sister-in-law had to buy her new bedding. Her new bedding is navy. Now this niece IS the 3 letter monogram, preppy kind of girl, so I could let all my inner preppy-ness fly!! After I made her pillow, I really wanted to keep it. Too bad I don't have the same initials as she does. Nor do I have navy bedding in my house. With my love of the nautical quilt that I posted earlier, I think I'm going to have to re-do a bedroom in navy. Maybe when the kids move out for good. 

This picture really doesn't do this pillow justice. The navy quatrefoil with that navy cording was a perfect combination. 

Taste and See

I've been kind of busy for the last couple weeks. My youngest child just graduated from high school.  It was a crazy time with parties, events and both sets of grandparents staying with us, but I still had some time to create a few things on my new embroidery machine. I'm having such fun with it. Before the grandparents arrived, I had embroidered them some kitchen towels. They were impressed. 

My parents were here a few days longer than the in-laws and so my mom recruited me to make some more towels for a couple of her friends who have up coming birthdays. I enjoyed  showing off my mad new skills to the woman who taught me everything I know about sewing. I wish I had a picture of my mom, dad, and myself gathered around the embroidery machine watching it do it's thing.

We wound up making a set of towels with the second one having just their last name. I love the way they turned out. I think these will make great gifts for wedding showers.

They look super cute hanging on the front of my oven. I'm going to have to make a set for myself.

After making ones for my mom to give away she decided she needed one with her last name on them. These ones below are hers. She says they are only for display and she is NEVER using them. 

I'm not crabby

For a long time, I have wanted an embroidery machine. I just didn't want to spend the money for one. For my birthday this month, my hubby gave me a brother pe770. I've only had it for a week and there has been a strong learning curve, but it has been so fun using it. I wish I had this when the kids were younger. Now, I have an 18 year old boy and a 20 year old girl who hates all things monogrammed so I am going to have to find others to make cute things for. Thankfully, I have tons of friends who love appliquéd and monogrammed items. I'm sure that my next few posts will be filled with some of my projects so far.

For my very first appliqué project, I made a cute little outfit for my friends's 20 month old daughter to wear to the beach next week.  A plain toddler tee from Walmart , a 1/2 yard of $2 polka dot fabric, and a couple hours and I created the cutest shorts set for just under $5.

After I appliquéd the top, I didn't like where I placed it on the shirt. It was centered top to bottom but it seemed too low.  Lesson learned!  I guess it's like the rule of thirds in photography. I added the ribbon trim to fill in the blank space above the design and I think it made it super girly and cute. Also, after using sew what pro and the true text fonts from Word, I decided I was going to have to buy some fonts. I like the shape of the letters of her name, but not the way they stitched out. Another lesson learned!

I also need some new clothing patterns. I had toddler and baby patterns years ago for my own kids but they are all gone now. I made these shorts from a free pattern on the web.  They were a little short in the stride. I guess I need to be watching for a .99 cent pattern sale at hancocks.

It's Twins!

So a couple weeks after the last baby shower, I went to another baby shower for a girl in our church.  She has twins--a boy and a girl. After my last project turned out so precious, I knew I was going to do something similar for these sweet little ones.  Who knew that finding just the right material was going to be so stressful?  I wanted fabrics that coordinated but were still girly and boyish.  It took forever for me to find just what I was looking for.  I made a striped john john for the little boy and a polka dot dress in the same colors for the girl.  I put a pocket on the front of each in the coordinating fabric and made a diaper cover in the stripes.

Look at the sweet ruffle on the bottom

 Of course I did have to make the dress reversible.  Once again, the fabric had owls and matched the other pieces.  I thought the dark brown would be great in the fall, if it still fits.

what cute little striped panties!
So much better than seeing an ugly diaper

"Whoo"s having a Baby?

It seems like this spring I have been to so many baby and wedding showers.  As my kids get older, I guess I am moving back into that phase of life.  In March I went to a baby shower for a friend's new grandbaby.  Since I don't really know her son or daughter-in-law, I looked at their registry and tried to pick fabric that went with the things they liked n the store.  It didn't hurt that I adored the colors and the owls in this fabric.  It turns out, the mom-to-be LOVES owls too.  She was quite tickled over this.

The project started out as just fancy burp cloths.....

 but after discovering such cute fabric I decided to do a little a-line dress too.

While not visible in the pictures, I made a diaper cover out of the orange fabric because who wants to see an ugly diaper under a dress.  This inspired me to make the dress reversible.  The dress reverses to the orange polka dot and I cut out one of the owls from the other fabric and machine appliqued it on.