shoemaker extraordinaire

Not quite, but I finally did it! I took the plunge and fabricated a pair of fabric boots for the five-year-old! I kept fondly remembering the cheery red boots that the three-year-old outgrew and decided to try my hand at making some.

Almost a year ago, I tried dismantling some shoes to learn a bit more about their construction, but never followed the project through to completion. This weekend I finally got tired of my daughter's sad collection of half-shredded shoes, and ripped one of them apart. Apparently I thought spending the entire day trying to make a boot would be a more efficient use of my time than going to the store to buy some.

I used the existing sole of one of her thrashed pair of shoes, ripped out the shoe uppers, then used them as a pattern for the new boots.

 

 

After some failures, rethinking my design, and a bit of hair pulling, success was finally mine!

 

 

 

 Perhaps most valuable, I made it past my own fear that I couldn't do it. I'll definitely be doing this again.

Easter for the little man

The last of the Easter outfits (the girls' are here and here). He just took his first steps on Sunday. A tie and vest, complete with a screenprinted boutonniere - absurdly grown up for a baby that is growing up absurdly fast.

poppies for Easter

image source

My daughter is a compulsive flower picker.

That said, let me now paint a tricky scenario for you: we live on the bottom floor of our landlord's home. Our landlord, a constant presence in our lives, resides on the second floor. Roses of every shape, size, and color fill the small backyard that we share - the first real backyard we've had access to as a family. These rose bushes are constantly laden with the most enticing blooms imaginable. As an added bonus, the backyard is also home to two lemon trees, their branches weighed down with plump yellow goodness at arm's reach - short little kid arms, that is.

What could possibly be wrong with this lovely scene? My three-year-old is unable to spend a minute in the backyard without plucking roses, petals, and lemons. In the interest of amiable relations with our landlord, I have become the scroogiest mom around. Every time I spot my daughter cradling a handful of flower petals I give her a stern look and say, "I hope you didn't pick those!" The pinnacle of scrooginess is when I must reprimand her for her gift of flowers that she has picked just for me.

My flower picking paranoia has apparently rubbed off on the five-year-old. Both my daughters are quite enamored with the California state flower. In fact, they always refer to it as such instead of the poppy.  "Mom, she's picking California state flowers!" has been her watchcry lately with the abundance of rich orange poppies that spring has brought.

I thought poppies would be an appreciated addition to the Easter dress I made for her this year. The dress was made out of the same silk dupioni that made up part of the five-year-old's dress. The three swooping pintucks in the dress echoed the three delicate poppies that I painted onto it.

I was a bit worried it might not be apparent what kind of flower they were supposed to be. But I almost felt redeemed again as a mother when she donned it excitedly on Easter morning, exclaiming, "Look! The California state flower is on my dress!"

pink frills and princesses

We don't really do Disney princesses in our family. Have you heard of the book Cinderella Ate My Daughter by Peggy Orenstein? I haven't read it, but heard her interviewed a few times. She aptly put into words my uneasiness with allowing my daughter to give her heart to the Disney princess empire. My position is not popular with my daughter. Every so often I overhear her confiding to one of her little friends, "My mom hates Disney princesses." (Though, in my defense, I have never used the word "hate" when explaining my reasoning for not having said paraphernalia in our house.)

It's a bit disheartening to already be the uncool mom (about 8 years early), but I suppose I've brought it upon myself.

Needless to say, I was pretty excited when I saw this print in my local fabric shop.

Rapunzel, but not Disney and not pink. I was saving it for the perfect occasion and Easter seemed to be it. Last year I made them personalized Easter skirts. The girls were delighted with them, but I think my older daughter still secretly craved a frilly Easter dress. So I decided to dress this year's up a bit. I had various scraps of pink silk dupioni - leftovers that a friend had given me. I fell in love with the pale pink and bright green combination (hopefully I'm not the only one who thought it the perfect color scheme) and designed the rest of the kids' Easter outfits around the five-year-old's dress.

I made hers fairytale-esque, with a graceful shawl-like neckline and a petticoat-type ruffle under the dress.

 

And cowboy boots (logically!).

Hopefully my coolness factor has increased just a tiny bit.

"e" is for embroidery

And Emma. And Emilie. The 5-year-old had a double birthday party to go to this weekend, so I made a couple of "e" skirts with a pocket.

Pockets are a must for little girls' skirts, don't you think? Mine always fill theirs with flowers, rocks and leaves. My 5-year-old even surprised me by having my keys in her pocket on Sunday. I (who did not have a pocket) had forgotten them on our pew in church. She kept them safely tucked away for the next few hours and miraculously produced them just as I was formulating a plan B for how to get us home. Yes, I am a firm believer in pockets.

For Emma and Emilie, we started them out with a treasure for their pockets. A little memo pad (great idea, Allyson), the cover decorated with magazine clippings, then Mod Podged.

 

keeping eeyore warm

Lately the daily temperatures are hovering in the 70's, so it seems odd that this would be the time my five year-old's bedtime companion, Eeyore, is having trouble staying warm. But trouble he is having. My obvious solution was to grab one of the many (many many many) doll blankets lying around and wrap him on up.

"Oh no," she countered. "He needs a blanket of his own."

Being home about half of the week (odd kindergarten schedule and such) is sometimes hard on this girl -- no one to play with but the baby and a busy mom. Most of the time she is searching for a good dose of action. The blanket came as a double request: "Eeyore needs a blanket mom, and I need to do some hand sewing."

She picked orange fabric for the back and bright flowers for the front -- "Eeyore really likes flowers, you know" -- finishing off with blue thread for the E. We sewed the blanket together with the machine (lap-sit style, the girl running the show), and then sat down for the hand stitching.

Considering that the girl is only six, and has done just a few hand stitches before, I thought she did a remarkably good job. A good job with a little help from her (mommy)friend, and a hearty round of dark chocolate.

Eeyore certainly seems happy with the end product. And I'm assured he is nice and warm now.

another t-shirt resized

Either my daughter has an abnormally long torso, or most kids' t-shirts are simply not made long enough. Either way, her belly seems to be peeking out half the time. Resizing adult t-shirts is the best way I've found to supply her with "long enough" t-shirts. One of my favorites is the yoga shirt. On this most recent t-shirt downsize, I tried out some new ideas.

 Shirring at just the back of the neck.

 

A tie from contrasting fabric with the ends sewn on the top and underside of the shoulder seam. Tied together, it makes a cute little scrunched sleeve.

Also, today is the last day to enter the giveaway!

a little bit of green

Spring is starting to pop up in around here. Temperatures in the 50's, 60's, and 70's for weeks on end have induced the grass and trees to begin thinking green.

One of my girls has also started thinking green, both literally and figuratively. She came up from the laundry room the other night with a giddy glint in her eyes and started asking about the bag of rice.

"Does all of the rice have to be gone before someone could use that bag?" she asked.

"Nope," I replied. "The rice is in a plastic bag inside the canvas bag."

"Ahhhh," she said, and disappeared back down. The next time I saw her she had the now-rice-free bag in one hand, and a large piece of green fabric and some batting in the other.

"Any chance you could help me make a new backpack?"

Well, I'll be darned. A backpack. Out of a rice bag. For a seriously fashion-conscious girl. Who would have guessed?

We lined the bag with green fabric, and added an orange pocket with a stick-on-velcro closure. The zipper came pre-installed in the bag -- I just had to be careful not to mess it up. We put a double layer of batting inside the straps to keep them soft with all those books pulling down, and over-stitched them onto the backpack at least half-dozen times, just to be safe.

And would you believe that all of her school folders fit inside the thing? Just barely, but they fit. This bag was meant to be a backpack.

The first day she wore it I asked if anyone had noticed she had a rice bag on her back. "Oh, everyone loved it," she said, tossing her hair out of her face and heading off for a snack.

Everyone loved it. My faith in generation-x-box has been restored. At least a wee little bit.

riding (or not) pants

I suspect I'm mixing my riding styles here (English vs. Western?), but I've been so taken with her prancing about in her cowboy boots as of late (and she's been so short on pants, especially with all the ones in the to-be-patched pile) that I decided to make her a pair of riding pants. Flared out just below the hips, more fitted from the knees to the calves, and with built in patches (though, shamefacedly I admit, more for looks than utility). But awfully fetching, nonetheless.