DoodleBug Makes Her First Skirt

Wow, OK before I start let me say, I am getting behind here since I bought my serger. My blog is not the only thing that has gotten behind since the serger came home, laundry, sweeping, mowing...OK, I must stop or I will be on a huge guilt trip and I really don't want to go there. Pleasure trips are more my cup of tea.

Well, Doodles finally got a chance to make a skirt for Fluffy and try out her machine. She is counting down the days of her last couple of weeks at school. She has big plans to spend a lot of time with Mamaw doing a bit of sewing this summer. I think that sounds like a fun way to me to spend some of those hot summer days, inside sewing with my best friend.

Well, here are a few photos of her process with her little sewing machine.


She first took a few measurments of Fluffy.


She cut a strip of fabric allowing a bit for gathering around the top of the skirt.


We were very careful with her using the iron. I wanted to teach her how much better her sewing would look if she got into learning to press her fabric and even showed her to fold under her hem and casing and pressed before we went to the machine. She needs a small iron of her own. I do wished I could find her Papaw's travel iron. That one would be perfect for her.

She did really well for her first sewing project. She has been drawing and painting since she was very small and I think because of that fact, she has very good fine motor skills for her age.











She did well making her seams and it was a simple little plan of sewing a casing and a hem then closing the back seam, adding ribbon through the top casing and wah la! Fluffy has a new skirt. She wants to make a purse next. This should be fun.

A Few New Creations

A little dress that I made this evening out of some thrift knits and a little yardage. It is a size 6X


On the way to school one morning last week, Doodle Bug and I designed this dress.

She wanted it for a bathing suit cover up and I tried very hard to duplicate what she was seeing in her head. I made her this little racer back dress and it was more time consuming than I had thought but fun. She hasn't seen it yet and I do think I am going to turn it into a mulit media dress before it is all said and done. I think I want to fabric paint a few little shells on the beach. I also thought adding a few surf splashes to the waves might be fun and for sure, the sky needs a few clouds. I will post another photo of it after the fabric painting is done.

Below are a couple of little dresses made from thrift knits that I picked up at a yard sell over the weekend. I did have the Good and Plenty candy T. Using another smaller dress and a section of a bright pink T, I created the little 3T/4T with the flowers. I used the tail of the dress and a sliced section and added to the Good and Plenty T to create this little fun play dress. It is size 7. I think Doodle Bug will like this one.


Now I need to get busy and spend a little time working on patterns and sizing. I have a few ideas I would like to try out for someone a little smaller than Doodles. I think I will have her to help me design it too. I am really excited to see she seems to be into helping design some of the dresses and she had really been wanting to try out Mamaw's sewing machine. We decided for her kindergarten graduation gift to get her a Hello Kitty Janome sewing machine.


She will be thrilled to have her own machine. I have tons of little easy sewing projects for her to get her started. I recieved an email today that said it had shipped so, it will be hard to put it away until graduation day. I don't know if I will be able to wait.

Now I need to get busy sorting some knits and getting ready to do some screen printing. We will have fun with this next screen printing day. We will be screen printing aliens. I found a piece of very cute and colorful knit and we are printing our one eyed alien design on the tops. It should be cute. I know it will be fun.

Blessings & Hugs All!

A Busy But Fun Week!

On Monday Doddlebug had a wonderful treat, she was out of school and her great granny was here for a visit. After being patient with us old gals at the fabric store, we took her to the park. She played for a little while. She is still getting over a respiratory infection and didn’t have as much energy as usual but she still had fun. I think her great granny had fun too. They love spending time together. After we left the park, we went for lunch and ice cream. It was a good day. We were all pretty tired in the evening.


Yesterday, I had a chance to sew a bit and to get to use my new little Singer serger more. I love that little machine. With my mom being up for a visit for Easter, we started a little project for her and made her a lady bug table cloth. She loved sewing with the serger and I think she may get her one before too long.

My time spent sewing yesterday was fun and productive. I made a couple of t-shirt dresses and a pair of shorts for my little gal. She seen them today and loved them. I told her when she had time to try them all on and let me take photos of her in them; she could take them home and start wearing them. Hopefully, we will get to do that soon.

After a little tweaking and measuring Doodlebug several times, I came up with a couple of good basic patterns to work with. I drew them out on poster board because I plan on making many of these over time. My first pattern was drawn out on the backside of Christmas wrapping paper and ripped after making my first dress. I love the idea of using old knit shirts for reworking them into other useable items. I am going to be making shopping bags from t-shirts next. Now I do look at people’s t-shirts and think…”hum, I bet I could…”

My daughter just dropped off a bag of t-shirts a bit ago and I can’t wait to go through them and see what is there. She has all of her friends passing on t-shirts to me now too. Yeah! I appreciate each one too.

Below are a few of my first few dresses. I think I will just keep rolling on these and see what happens. They are great fun to make. I will be posting some of the other creations that I come up with using t-shirts. I do have a few ideas and can't wait to try them out.

Screen Printing Fun

Yesterday we spent a several hours screen printing on old t-shirt knit. It will be turned into upcycled dresses and shorts for the kids. I thought I would be on my own with the project but as it turned out, the gals thought it looked like fun and they really got into it. I think I may invite them over again when I have more to do.



Screen printing is great fun. I think next time we do a bit of printing, I will print watermellon slices and strawberries. With summer coming, I have summer fruits on my mind. I can't wait to get some time now to turn our screen prints into a few outfits. It is such fun. I am trying to come up with a few new patterns and I going to make shopping bags out of t-shirts as well. I have a great idea for that one.

The yard is calling and needs much attention too so, I will be doing some outdoor work in the next few days too but I think right now I would much rather be sewing.