Pajama-thon

It's finally here! Tomorrow will be Christmas and I am totally thrilled to say that all of my Christmas sewing has been completed, photographed and wrapped! PHEW! I was a little later this year than usual but in typical Shellie style, I finished up with plenty of time to spare.

After completing Lisa's quilt (Moving Right along...), my next big commitment was a slew of pajama's which my niece --hehe --Kiersten ordered as gifts. Two pair of fleece pj bottoms with t-shirt tops for her and her ski-mate, Michelle; and three pairs of pjs for the children of other good friends.

Kieli trusted my judgement on fabric and design but gave me some totally excellent guidelines to consider...

For the ski-bums: Something in fleece that coincided with their love of the slopes. She didn't want a matching top -- a t-shirt would be fine.

It took two trips to two different fabric stores before I found the perfect girly - but not TOO girly - snowflake print fleece. These pants are SOOO soft!

I used a cotton twill tape drawstring in each pair but also put in elastic as I thought it made the waist band look nicer. You can't see it here in this pic but trust me, they look nicer. :)

At first I thought I would embroider the t-shirts but then freaked out! I'm still too new at the whole embroidery thing and doing so on a knit scared me even more!

I found these totally cool crystal applique snowflakes that I think Kieli will like very much! They were very easy to put on and, according to the packaging, are machine washable. Cute, right?!

For three-year-old Tommy, I was told that he loved cars, trucks --anything "boy." And that he looked great in blues.

I'm always amazed at how hard it is to find something you think would be totally obvious -- fleece with snowflakes or a ski theme? blue boy fabric with cars on it? Am I the only one who thinks these things should be easy to find??! All of the "car/truck" fabric I found was either totally UGLY or not the right color or not right for the age. UGH!

After much deliberation, I settled on the jungle theme -- cute little giraffes, elephants and alligators on a blue background.

And a fabulous little giraffe button! For the children's pjs I was completely comfortable in making up cute little name tags which I put inside each piece. I think it's a nice little homemade touch. :)


Seven-year-old Emily is tall and blond. She likes orange and pink and has recently fallen in love with horses. I found this and knew it was the one.

I used the two daisy buttons because all of the horse buttons I found were way too realistic for this cartoon like design. You cannot see them in this pic, but the same flower can be found scattered among the cowgirls and lassos.

And then there is three-year-old Astrid who look fantastic in bright colors. "Florals and stripes!" Kieli suggested.

I love this frog/prince fabric! It is too adorable for words. And the matching striped pants are just perfect! As with Tommy's pjs, I used the stripe also as the neck facing fabric which I think ties the set together.

And then I saw this frog button...

Kieli is coming to my house on Thursday for Christmas dinner and I'm just dying to show her everything! I'm even hesitating to tell her about this post since I think the pjs are so much better to see in person. I'll think about it some more over breakfast.

Before I'm done though there were more pajama's to be made! I have two older aunts that deserved something a little special this year as well.

My dad's sister Katherine has yet to receive anything meaningful from me just yet -- hand sewn that is! I have a quilt in mind (shhh!) but in the mean time...

Aren't these pjs's sweet? I wish I was a better photographer so you can see the fabric. It's a soft pink with tiny silver pin stripes. The sleeves are gathered at the wrist and look very soft. I hope she likes them!

And who could forget Auntie Phyllis!

Auntie Phyl is my Godmother and has gotten more handmade sewing gifts than I can recall. This year she received a flannel bathrobe.

I sent the robe up to Worcester yesterday with my dad -- I thought she might use it when she goes to visit my Aunt in woods of North Central Massachusetts (haha!) so she got her gift a few days early.

She loved it of course! I found the buttons in an old cookie tin I have which belonged to my late Aunt Rose (as in Ava Rose). I needed ten pink shank buttons and when I went searching, this is what I found...

Do you believe in fate?

I love the package of these buttons -- "unusual value." It made me laugh!

But then I called my mother who said my aunt called her crying and then she started crying and then I started crying and...

A lot of emotion over one little robe.

And now I can rest! But those of you who know me know I cannot sit for long! Tomorrow we're having 22 people over for dinner and instead of worrying about where everyone will sit, my first thought is "where can I sew?" since I will have to set my dining room table tonight!

Happy Holidays to you all!

Connor's Crayon Caddy

I am almost done with absolutely every bit of Christmas sewing I set out to do! Hooray! I know I've said it before but now we're getting really close to being DONE!


One of my recent accomplishments was completing this way cute crayon caddy for my nephew, Connor.




I had decided to put together a little gift bag packed with coloring books, paper, crayons, markers -- the works! A nice, no batteries required kinda Christmas gift. :) While blogging one day I came across a tutorial on the UK lass in the US blog on how to make this cute roll-up crayon caddy. Connor just had to have it!




Dawn gave some really great instruction and I was able to whip it up in about an hour. I'm lucky to have a great guide that attaches to my walking foot and didn't have to draw in all of the lines. I loved that she used a little pony tail holder as an elastic around the button. It's so much more pro looking than your average white elastic found at the fabric store. And I used this really cute Robert Kaufman fabric I had in my stash. I LOVE the chicken driver -- see him between the two oranges??

Filled with about 16 Disney Cars crayons (one of Connors favorite movies), the boy is ready to go!

Thanks, Dawn, for a totally cool gift idea!

More pics to come!

Moving right along...

I am very happy to announce that things here on Chestnut Street are going pretty quickly! The list of Christmas sewing projects is getting smaller and smaller each day. Projects for others -- especially those which were "orders" -- are just about completed and all that is left are a few items for my peeps. Luckily, none of which are grand surprises so I can sew all afternoon if I need to.

One of the most important of Christmas sewing projects this year was the lap quilt ordered by a co-worker of my sister-in-law, Mary. Lisa had seen the quilt I made for Sharyn and asked if I could make one for her husbands grandmother. She didn't care what pattern or what colors or anything! This may sound great to some of you -- artistic freedom and all -- but it was actually WAY stressful as I had never met Lisa or her husband's grandmother!

I found a pattern that I loved and had never tried in a Quilter magazine which I borrowed from (who else) Giuliana. And VOILA...

a close up of one of the blocks...

One of the things I truly loved about this quilt was that it had no borders. Instead, the pattern uses setting squares all around the edges. A nice change from the norm!

I delivered the quilt to Lisa yesterday and she LOVED it! I'm so relieved! I sat with Mary in the kitchen of her office where she proceeded to invite everyone in to view my work! She is slowly but surely catching up with John and my mother as my biggest fan. I love her for her undying support! Thanks, Mar.

Accidents will happen

OK - a little blogging accident!

In an attempt to edit some of my posts, I accidentally deleted two of them. :( Not a big deal I guess but one of them was the pic of Ed in his little hoodie.

If you'd like to see this pic, it's posted in my Flickr photo stream.

oops!

Coming up for air

PHEW! I can't believe it's been two weeks since my last post. Needless to say, things have been pretty busy in this house -- you wouldn't believe it if I told you. But we'll give it a try...

Last week I spent most of my time getting ready for the famed Snowflake Bazaar! If you were a fly on my wall, you would have seen me tagging my wares, printing out inventory lists, and sewing the bindings on table runners at Ed's basketball practice. And then there was also the batch of sweet potato cupcakes for my nephew Robert (who came home Saturday night after spending six months working in California) and my favorite brother-in-law-to-be Don (HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!) who at first was tricked into believing they were pumpkin muffins. Aren't all men really 7-year-old boys at heart??

One last meeting with Elyse to firm up our plans and we were ready! For those of you who haven't already seen Elyse's beautiful description of the weekend, the bazaar was so much fun!

Our table received a lot of attention and wonderful compliments from everyone! Thank you so much to everyone who came -- and especially those who bought! We sold a little bit of everything and even took a few special orders. How cool!

THANK YOU! THANK YOU! THANK YOU!

We attribute our great success not only to the fact that we're both very talented (or so my mother tells me) but to Stephan who secretly sat behind our tables and gave to us the same luck which he has brought to so many tattoo conventions across the country. Thank you, Stephan!

After the snow fell (aww! she didn't say that!) I returned to the dining room to find a GIGANTIC list of Christmas sewing waiting for me! It's funny how it seemed like I would have so much time but with the daily reminders from Ava as to how close Christmas actually is, I started to panic!

Luckily, I adhere to the house motto which my loving husband coined ...

Efficiency, Effectiveness, Adaptability.

Now to those of you who actually KNOW my husband... stop laughing. Poor baby is actually NONE of these things but that's OK - we love him anyway.

So I tackled the sewing list with gusto and so far -- in the five days following the bazaar, I have made three pairs of pajamas and a lap quilt; cut out a muslin of Ava's Christmas outfit, baked brownies for the Christmas Festival on Saturday, and caught a nasty cold! ACHEW!

Oh... and did I mention that my step-daughter is now living with us for a few months??

Sleep is for the weak!!