sewing insanity

I am a bit insane.  It was Thursday afternoon and it dawned on me that on Saturday my kids were going to go to an Easter Egg Hunt and they did not have matching outfits!  Oh the horror!!!

So since we had plans for Friday night, I had to quickly get busy that evening.  Of course I still needed to finish work, go home, eat dinner, and take care of all the household needs too.  But in my insanity I had an adrenaline rush and I was able to knock out two skirts and a pair of pants minus the hems and insertion of elastic.  I went to bed at 11pm that night satisfied that I could finish the rest Saturday morning.  Since this was a last minute project, I had to use what was available in my fabric stash.  I had some lightweight corduroy that my mother had given me a few years back that was perfect.  There were actually three coordinating fabrics:  One bright green with large colorful lady bugs, one with stripes that matched the lady bug colors, and a light blue solid.

I made the girls’ skirts using a very basic skirt pattern from Ottobre Fall 2007 magazine.  But for the baby I added bloomers (in the blue solid).  I just sewed them in at the waist band and used the two fabrics to create a casing for the elastic.  Then, I lengthened the skirt a bit for Abi, the older one.  I used my go-to pattern for Eli’s pants.  It is actually from the book Sewing for Toddlers that my mother gave me when I started sewing kid’s clothes.  She had used it when sewing for us girls and I love that I am using it for my kids.  He got the crazy stripes and since his favorite color is orange, I added orange pockets to the front and back.  They are not shy pants, but my not-shy-boy loves them.

I did not have time to make tops … I frankly think three bottoms in one evening and an early morning was fairly productive.  So they wore what we owned and looked adorable at the egg hunt.  As they were all dressed up, my husband started to sing “Lady Bug‘s Picnic”.  You know, from Sesame Street.  (To help you remember:  http://muppet.wikia.com/wiki/Ladybugs'_Picnic   )  And that song was in my head the rest of the day; which is not a bad thing, it is a cute song.  But as the day ended I knew that I was not going to stop at coordinating bottoms.  Now that there is a song, and I have lots more of the fabric, I would HAVE to make tops.  So over the weekend I made a red polo for Isa using the ladybug fabric for the collar and placket.

Then … I saw that Project Run and Play (http://projectrunandplay.blogspot.com/ ) had announced the first week’s theme.  It was a PATTERN REMIX....of........DANA'S CIRCLE SKIRT TUTORIAL.  What a great idea!  I can participate in the sew-along and continue adding to my LadyBug’s Picnic line. (YES, It is now a line) I made bloomers out of the ladybug fabric and the circle out of the blue solid.  I then sewed the blue skirt onto the bloomers at the bottom of the casing line.  That way the elastic band would be in the bright ladybug fabric and it would provide high contrast and a very functional waistband.  I was going to use my embroidery machine and embroider some ladybugs onto the skirt and add some appliqué ladybugs from the scraps.  But my husband (he really is the artist in the family) said that would be too much.  I trusted his judgment and only appliquéd one lady bug on the skirt.  A red one.  Just to tie in the red t-shirt.

So there they were. Circle skirt remix and red polo on hangers.  And I say, “Hey, J.  Here is the ladybug skirt from Saturday and it matches the shirt too.”  He replies, “You need to make another shirt then.  You can’t have two bottoms and only one shirt.”

YESSSS!!!!