slick your hair and wear your buckle shoes

and



allllll



that



JAZZZZZZ



okay, i’m going to attempt to get through this without any jazz hands references. no promises.

my second entry for project run and play’s SEWING THROUGH THE DECADES challenge from last week was a 20s flapper inspired look.

i started with this:


a (thrifted) size 3x all-in-one shirt/cardigan combo. it’s black shot through with silver threads and provided PLENTY of fabric for my skinny mini girl. ;)

i trimmed it all up, cut a deep v-neck and hemmed it. easy.

then i filled in the neck with white cotton in an overlapping pattern and cut serpentine ruffles from the excess black fabric.



the beads i dug out of my “beads & stuff drawer” (don’t you have one?) the fringe and layers on the bottoms of the dresses of the jazz age were to draw attention to the movement of their dancing. and i’m pretty sure it works!



the beaded lacey shawl also came from my “beads & stuff drawer”. the pearl necklace was from miss ava’s great grandmother—not real, but vintage none the less!

okay, can we talk about the cloche for a minute?



i’ve dabbled in hat-making before…and i don’t claim to be a milliner.
but seriously—new FAVORITE PROJECT EVAH.
and because i’m The Most Impatient Crafter Ever—i loved that it was SO easy! i watched some tutorials (here and here), gathered my supplies and went for it.

the supplies are minimal: you need a $3.99 wig form from sally’s beauty supply (covered in plastic wrap for non-stick factor). you make a 50/50 mixture of elmer’s glue and water and saturate your felt. i did a trial run with one of those 29 cent pieces of felt, and then used some yardage of wool felt i had for the final product.



you just  s   t   r   e   t   c   h  your felt over the form, pulling and pulling and pinning and pinning and pulling until it takes on the shape of the head. then i started forming the brim, trimming it up and YES it’s creepy but i stabbed my form through the head with a skewer to hold the brim in place while it dried.



once it’s all where you want it let it dry overnight and boom! hat!
i made a band out of some more felt and added the buttons and feather piece (all stuff i had—let’s hear it for cheap projects! can i get a what what!?!?)
















i may turn into a mad hatter. seriously.
once we got all the pieces together i couldn’t believe how much i loved the look.



and for real--current favorite picture of ms. ava:



i even attempted some finger waves…which looked super cool but you couldn’t really see them under the hat.
you CAN see the spit curls on the side—an absolute MUST for any good jazzy girl. ava was not overly thrilled with them…considering that of all the things i used to hold them in place (gel, hairspray, wax)…it was the actual spit that worked the best.



huh. whoda thunk it?
and that’s it. add the appropriate tuneage:



and start taking pictures!



and that’s a wrap! JAZZZZZ HANDS!!!!
(okay, couldn’t do it)

linking up here:

cherry dress tutorial…or, i walk the line

 

by far, this dress gave me the most trouble.

i sketched out and subsequently rejected more designs than i can count--either for looking too costumey, being too literal, being simply too ugly…

i had picked the fabrics on the fly—five kids at the fabric store, and already late for an appointment. i was nursing five in a back corner of the store and asking myself: “what do i think of when i think of cherries?”

 
(those top 3, and the solid green in the middle)

a palette of reds, darker and lighter…and a rich green. and i added some of the cherry print fabric to my pile because, well, why not?

and then i put this dress off until the very end—after the “watermelon”, after the “lemonade”, after the “picnic blanket.” playing with different ideas. and when i finally settled on one, it was still a vaguely formed idea…

basically, i just started cutting into my fabrics and hoped for the best.
(i do that more often than i care to admit)

i started by cutting my two red fabrics into strips—but angled slightly wider on one end—like a triangle with it’s head cut off.



and then cut my cherry print fabric into thinner strips, which i ironed in half…



then i sewed all my pieces together in groups—one light red, one dark red, cherry strip in the center—and pressed them.



once they were all complete, i sewed all my sections together making one giant circle.



i decided to make it a bubble dress at that point (did you read that part where i said i just started cutting and hoped for the best? yeah. not lyin’.)

i made a lining for the whole dress—just slightly shorter and smaller around. then i sewed the bottoms of both the lining and dress right sides together first—gathering the dress to fit the smaller lining.
next i ran a quick stitch around the top of the dress and lining to attach the two, and used more of the cherry print as a bias tape to cover and enclose the top.

the shorter and smaller lining pulls the dress fabric under and bubbles it out, easy peasy.
now the strap…

i debated a long time on this. would a leaf make it too costume-y? i kept seeing it walking down The Runway…nina yelling “what IS this? it’s aesthetically NOT pleasing.” whilst michael kors rolls his eyes and sighs…frustrated by my literal interpretations.

yeesh.

in the end, i just decided to go for it.

i put the dress right on ms. ava, and pinned a large section of freezer paper where i wanted the strap to be. then drew my shape on the paper, like so:




which i cut out and used as a pattern piece…



i cut two out of the green fabric, and sewed them right sides together, leaving the skinny end of the strap open. i turned it right side out and stitched some “veins” on with green thread.



i made one “normal” strap for the other side, and then attached everything. (the “leaf” i tacked on by hand, sewing only through the bottom layer so no stitches showed on the front of it)

a simple button closure in the back…



and the last minute addition of a high waist tie to give it a little more shape (it was a bit poofier than i normally do (QUICK! name that movie for 10 points!))

and you know what?


quite honestly…



for flying by the seat of my pants…



and walking that dangerous line between “costume” and “wearable but cute”…



i gotta say—in the end…



this dress came out



pretty cherry. 




linking here...

 

she sleeps deeply

deeply enough that, not only did her 2 year old little sister do this to her:

but we took this picture and removed all the stickers…

and she NEVER.WOKE.UP.

i made a dress…and it was all yellow

with full apologies to coldplay, i couldn’t help it.

the entire time i sewed my “sunshine” challenge dress for SYTYC i sang.

i made a dresssss…i made a dress for you

and all the things you do

and it was all

yellow.

but i must be honest: this is not at all the dress i set out to make.

it’s really not even close. i had a sketch, a plan. i bought fabric and stitched away, creating…well, basically something i pretty much hated.

so i let it stew and simmer for a couple days.

and finally, when it was down to the wire, i took a pair of scissors and hacked off 2/3 of the dress. then i worked with the fabric pieces i had left to create this.

the “little miss sunshine” aspect of it was also a last minute decision. and i’m really glad i went with it (also thanks to some encouragement from girlfriend girl). i was fully convinced i would not be the only one to make that connection…

and, in a final burst of honesty: i found it extremely ironic that this last minute thrown together dress scored my highest votes yet.

but i’m glad you liked it. because i made it for youuuuuuuu…

(that’s supposed to be a singing voice…not a creepy one. which is kind of how it looks)

you know what?

bathing a big 6 1/2 year old with a big heavy plaster cast on one leg...a LOT harder than doing an infant or 3 year old. or even a 4 year old.

a LOT.


(sorry i've been so MIA lately...not much energy left for sewing/crafting/photography right now.)

and now i'm annoying even myself...

so i had a whole big blog post written for today.
and then i thought about it a little more.

i can kind of sum it up for you: "whinewhinewhinewhinewhineywhine".

so i scrapped it.

i'll give you the cliff notes version instead:
meet tiny tim.

she's my middle child. #3. a goofball with an easy laugh, a happy spirit and an easy-going attitude.

sometimes we call her ava. a lot of the time we call her tiny tim. and this is why:
she was born with a clubfoot.
(yes, we enjoy dark humor like that)

i have very few photos of  her casts & braces...and only one of her uncorrected foot. it's not something you think you'll ever want to remember...but it turns out--you do.

it was unexpected, meaning our one and only prenatal ultrasound with her didn't catch it.
we used a non-surgical treatment method to correct her foot and it worked just fine.(that was casts # 1-9)

she wore this brace 23 hours a day for a long time...then 21 hours a day...then 18...then nights and naps. then nighttime only until she was 5. she still has a brace she wears during the day, and a different one for nighttime.

until she was 3--then it started to relapse. at that point we flew her halfway across the country for treatment with a new doctor--one who specialized in older children with relapses. (casts #10-12)

about a year later it relapsed again. fortunately by then we had found a local doctor (45 min drive vs. 3 hr. plane ride) who was/is awesome. that was casts #13-18.

last friday was another "foot checkup".
guess what?

presenting cast #19, or as i like to call it~

{Clubfoot Correction}

~2011 Edition~

this is ONE.STUBBORN.FOOT.

but it's cool, you know?
i told her we'll just lay in bed together and boss everyone else around. gimpy one and gimpy two.

because this cast is for clubfoot correction it's bent at the knee and at the ankle to hold her foot in the right position. looks comfy, eh?

we may even head to walmart and race on the electric carts.

we like to keep things interesting in the googiehaus.