a crochet guessing game

IF YOUR NAME IS KIM AND YOU’VE RECENTLY HAD A BABY…PROBABLY DON’T READ THIS. UNTIL YOU GET A PACKAGE FROM ME. THEN COME BACK AND READ. K? K. ;)

okay, now moving past that PSA…if your name isn’t kim/you haven’t had a baby in the last week or so, feel free to continue reading. 

so remember the little dress and hat set i crocheted for a friend here? when i made it kim emailed me and said “please please make that for me IF i have another baby and IF it’s a girl!” and of course i’m a wonderful person and i said yes. ok. truth is i love crocheting and i’ll take any excuse to make tiny baby things. ;)

guess what? she did have another baby! guess what else? it’s a boy! so, no little dress and hat. whomp whomp. but….shhhh. truth is i’m easily bored and i kinda hate making the same thing twice. so really, i’m kinda glad.

ooh! and guess a third thing. i’m a total procrastinator! so even though i finished the bulk of this quite a while ago and all it needed was buttons, i kept delaying…until this weekend when i hopped on instagram and there was bouncing baby boy making his debut. whoops. ::sheepish grin:: this also explains the stunningly terrible photography here. i wanted to get it shipped out ASAP, and the light was not in my favor. :(

so it was a race to sew on those eight buttons, trim the loose ends, and get this little package shipped off…

i mean, hello!? a tiny crocheted sweater that looks like a itty bitty double breasted peacoat?

peacoat pattern from HERE, yarn is bernat baby in a gray and white twist color.

a tiny hat with ears??? EARS!!??!?

hat pattern found HERE, same yarn as coat

a crocheted…uh. this?

so here’s guessing game #4: what is this? i decided to take the rest of the yarn and make what hopefully, hopefully will be a snuggly little cocoon for baby axel. i used a combination of the grey yarn that makes up the coat and hat and some plain white yarn. the entire thing is done with a double crochet, and it’s kind of shaped like a letter ‘T’.

i sewed four wooden buttons on one side…

so he can be wrapped in and buttoned up as snuggly—or loosely—as is comfy for him.

because it’s made with double crochet any opening can serve as the buttonhole, so it’s adjustable.

does that make sense? honestly in my head it 100% makes sense. but….i’m not sure how it will work, and (unfortunately) i happen to be fresh out of newborn babies to test it on. so i wrapped it up and mailed it off today, and hopefully the new little man and his momma will enjoy! congrats, kim!

sweat ‘n sew

the sweat:

i hit week 4 of couch-to-5K a month ago. A MONTH. for various reasons i’ve been unable to make the jump to week 5.
until today.

i did week 5, day 1 this morning (a run 5-walk 3-5-3-5 combo) and i felt great. really. it’s insane to me. i’ve never been able to run so much as a 1/2 mile. shoot, 1/4 mile was too far. no matter how good of shape i was in, i’m no runner. between the asthma and…well, the “ladies”…i don’t exactly have a runner’s physique.

and tomorrow i go a solid 8 minutes.

i’m also into week 2 of 30 days of green smoothies. it’s…okay. i’ve made my peace with not chewing. and i think i may actually be seeing some results. possibly.

the sew:

really this is like a Flashback post. Way back Wednesday? whatever. because this skirt + blazer were made for guinevere. as you can see…

it was made for an 8-year old guinevere, and somehow got missed for ms. ava, and so now it’s a touch too small to wear. but before it goes back up to the attic to await an 8-year-old gigi* i wanted to get some pics. for posterity.

*really gigi will probably be 12 before this fits her. but at least the letter will be right again.

they were so cute in their matching outfits. i blogged about a 4-year-old ava’s here. and what i don’t have pics of is the matching tie i made harrison. :(

all my three babies in matching burberry-ish plaid found at wallyworld for $1/YARD. it never gets old saying that. ONE DOLLAR.

i used a pattern for this, and i remember clearly how i struggled with that blazer. and how stinkin’ proud of myself i was when i conquered it and it was wearable.

these outfits were the first time i sewed where i felt like it was GOOD. you know? i felt like i was proud of these, and they didn’t look “homemade”. these dresses were a turning point in my sewing—where i really felt like this was something i could do. i was proud of how each girl’s dress was a nod to their age: the vintage peter pan collared dress for the 4 year old, the more sophisticated blazer and skirt for the 8 year old, tied together by matching fabrics and black velvet accents.

but clearly i still had things to learn…like matching plaids on a back seam. couldn’t be bothered back then, i guess.

ha. who am i kidding. i still can’t really be bothered. ;)

starting easy: circle skirts

these skirts.

these skirts should have been blogged a loooonnnnng time ago.  BUT, i’ve figured out a good way of justifying the fact that i made these for guinevere ummm…two years ago.

ready? here it is: THEY STILL FIT HER. two years later—and the girl has grown substantially, but because of the elastic waist and the length she is still wearing them. when i first made them they were closer to mid-calf length, now they’re still below-knee length.

add in the fact that both fabrics were bought at walmart for $1.50/yard, and well…i’d say we certainly got our money’s worth out of em.

i bought 2 yards of each fabric (that’s $3 per skirt, for those following along at home), and followed dana’s awesome circle skirt tutorial—which, EVEN THOUGH IT INVOLVES MATH, is really really REALLY easy to follow.

honestly—neither of these prints are my absolute favorite. but the gal needed some skirts at the time, they’re a super quick sew, and they’re comfy and easy to wear. and they were $3. did i mention that?

that probably explains why she’s still wearing them coughcough 2 years later.

because of her height i couldn’t get the full cut out of my material, and i solved this in a different way for each skirt.

on the brown and peach one, i used a piece to fill it.

now you see it…

i made my quarter-circle pattern piece, then folded and laid my fabric underneath and marked where i needed extra length. then i sewed additional pieces on where needed, refolded and cut the pattern out.

because the skirt is so full and the pattern is so busy you can barely tell where this was done (especially when that part is on the side which is how i MEANT for her to wear it. sheesh)

now you don’t. kinda.

on the silver one i took a piece of tissue weight black knit and added a border to the bottom. because the bottom hem of the skirt is curved and the border is not there’s a bit of wonkiness right where the two meet.

but again, the fullness of the skirt covers a multitude of sins.

i hemmed it with a lettuce edge hem, which you can find a tutorial for HERE.

it truly doesn’t get much easier or more comfortable than this. and let’s face it—no matter how big you are a twirly, spinny skirt never gets old. ;)