Pajamas 2.0

Pattern: New Look 6641

My parents were in town for the weekend, so I had some time to finish DS's pajamas. I used the same pattern as DD's pajamas. I've decided that this pattern, though unisex, is shaped rather girlish. Possibly DS could've used a smaller shirt (the skinny kid!), but I just think the shape of the top and the bottom of the pants are a little girlie. It really doesn't matter since these are just pajamas, but it's something worth commenting on.

I used a green & tan camouflage jersey knit from Fashion Fabrics Club with which, frankly, I'm disappointed. This fabric is VERY thin and I'm not very confident that it's going to hold up, particularly in the waistband of the pants. It's my fault for choosing a "jersey knit" instead of something else. Live and learn, right?!

Since these jammies were for DS, I obviously didn't do the lettuce edges and puffy sleeve details. I'm REALLY happy with how well the neck band turned out (although I think the neck opening on this pattern is too wide in general)--no pleats or tucks or anything this time! I even got the sleeves eased in without any puckers! Yay! Everything went together well using both the serger and the sewing machine.

These pajamas were great for practicing sewing with knit fabric as well as practicing with the serger. I've learned quite a bit and hope that my sewing skills continue to grow as I sew!

Pajamas!

The fabric for the kids' pajamas arrived on Saturday as well as a 10 pound box of "mystery" fabric from Fashion Fabrics Club. My sewing process normally goes like this: I find a pattern I like, then I have to search and search to find appropriate fabric. I decided to try the box of mystery fabric to see what happens if I reverse the process. I got a few hopeful yardages, but there are some that I can't imagine using. You never know though!


The magenta knit I ordered for Gracen's pants was supposed to be an interlock knit, but based on the Understanding Knits class I took in June, I think it's actually a french terry. No matter. It's nice fabric--heavier than the fabric for the top--but so nice that I want some pants made out of it, too! OK, probably not magenta pants...


The green camouflage fabric for Garrett's pajamas has some gold in it. I like it, but I wasn't sure if he would. He says he doesn't mind the gold, so I guess we're good to go.


Armed with fabric, I tackled sewing Gracen's pants on Sunday. The fabric was easy to cut out. The directions were easy to follow. I had no problems using the serger and was wondering why anyone would make knit pajama pants WITHOUT a serger! To sew the waistband, I used a small zig-zag stitch--lets it stretch without popping stitches. I ended up cutting off about 2 inches from each leg. I *should've* measured DD before I cut the pattern out, but I didn't and I thought I would sew the extra up into the hem allowance. That was just too much fabric though, so I cut off the excess. Instead of doing a one-inch seam, I decided to just fold the allowance over twice, then did a LARGE zig-zag stitch over the bulk of it. I think it gives it a fun little touch. Feast your eyes...



These pants were *super-easy* to do. I think DD probably could've used a size smaller, but she is SO HARD to fit right now! She's very much between sizes and it appears that she's going to have her daddy's long torso and short(er) legs. Of course, mommy isn't tall, but at least all my parts are in proportion! ;oP I figure that she'll continue to grow into these and if needed, we can let the hem of the legs out as she gets taller. This mission has officially been accomplished!


I'll be starting Garrett's pajamas this afternoon. I won't be able to complete them today as I need more elastic for the waistband, but we'll see what I can get done.

New Dining Set!

A while back, we had a guy who works for a logging company call us to ask if we'd be interested in selling some trees on some land that we own. They were going to be next to our land and they thought it looked like there were some trees there that they could use. We decided to let them have our trees because we figured they would come on our land and get them anyway. (Many loggers are unscrupulous like that.) We figured that we might as well get paid for what they take! We don't use that section anyway because it's all timber. For those of you concerned about the environment, they took only certain trees that were the right size. They did not cut down the entire forest or anything!

So, to make a long story longer, because of the loggers, we now have a little extra money. We have been needing new dining room chairs for YEARS now. I've seriously been worried that someone is going to get hurt when one of those chairs falls apart underneath them! I decided to go ahead and get a new dining room set--table and chairs.

We went to the Amish or Mennonite-owned (don't know which!) Country Heritage Furniture in Jamesport. The set will be custom-made in oak and what they call Seely stain--basically a light oak color, but not as "golden" as what we've got now. We're getting a 42"x50" table, two leaves, and 6 chairs. We'll be able to comfortably sit 6 people at the table without the leaves and at least 8 people with the leaves. I'm so excited! The bad part is that we won't get the set until the second week of November. I guess I can't complain too much since I'm confident that I'm getting good quality furniture custom-made for me. Check out the pics of the floor model below.

Below is our current dining room and dining set. The table and chairs are all pretty old. We will keep the table for future use. I may eventually paint or do *something* with the buffet on the right of the photo just to break up all the brown from about waist-high and down. Or maybe I'll make some cute little slipcovers for my new chairs to bring in more color. We'll see!

This is the set we are getting. Same chairs, table top, and table legs, but it will all be a different color as well as a smaller size. This set is stained a cherry color. It's beautiful, but the color doesn't go with the rest of our house.

Here is a close-up of the chairs. The flash of the camera makes the finish look lighter than it is. There are no or very few LIGHTS in Amish & Mennonite stores!

Finally, this is a close-up of the legs of the table. I LOVE these! We had to make the table a bit longer just to accommodate these legs.

Argh! I can't get things formatted correctly on here. So please excuse the fact that things are lining up.

New Look 6641 Pajamas

Pattern: New Look 6641--Pajamas

Last Thursday, I finally got started sewing the kids the pajamas that I've been saying I would make them all summer! Originally, I was going to make short-sleeved PJs with shorts, but I think it's a little too late for shorts, so I decided to go for pants.

This all started when a friend asked me to make her a bag using some fun fabric from SewBaby.com. Once the fabric arrived, I knew that the knit fabric wouldn't work at all for a bag, so I decided to use it for some pajamas for DD. (The friend did get her bag in a different fabric!) I determined that I wouldn't have enough fabric to make both a top and pants, so I decided to make the top and I ordered a solid knit for the pants.

On to the review:

This pattern is for kids' pajamas. It's a multi-size pattern--sizes 3-8. It features a nighty, short-sleeved & long-sleeved shirts, pants, and shorts. There are cuff and hem options--regular or lettuce edge--as well as puffy or flat sleeve options. This pattern is sized for stretch knits only for the shirts and a variety of fabrics for the bottoms.

After measuring the kids, I determined they both needed size 5. (I'm sure DD will need her pants shortened.) I traced the pattern so I can use the other sizes for future pajamas. So far, I have made view D--the puff-short-sleeved top with lettuce edges.

This top should've been super-easy and in many ways it was. Cutting it out with the rotary cutter was super-fast. It also has only 5 pieces, so it's not a complicated construction. However, since I'm pretty new to sewing with knit fabrics, this top also gave me some problems.

The instructions were thorough and made sense for the most part. One thing I did not like, however, was sewing the elastic in the sleeves directly to the fabric. It was VERY difficult to do! In the future, I will probably make a casing, then thread the elastic through the casing. I think it would be more comfortable that way as well.

Now, onto the sewing errors and problems I had. These are totally and completely MY fault, by the way, not an issue with the pattern:

I had issues sewing the neck band to the top. This was the first time that I have done this, so while it's not perfect, I did pretty well if I do say so myself! If you don't sew, here's what you have to do: You have to stretch the neck band AS YOU SEW it to the neck edge of the top! It's a weird process. I did this on the serger, so when I discovered a pleat in the back of the shirt underneath the neckband, I decided to just leave it since I had no seam allowance left to work with. It's not a big deal since this is just a pajama top for DD.

I also did the lettuce edging on the sleeves and hem. This process gave me some problems as well. For you non-sewers, you can make a lettuce (ruffly) edge on the edges of the sleeves and the bottom of the shirt by using the rolled hem feature on a serger. You stretch the fabric as it goes through the machine so it leaves a cute lettuce edge. This is a pretty simple thing to do, but you have to understand that I'm new to using the serger! It's such a finicky machine! If it's not threaded EXACTLY correctly (and it's difficult to tell without unthreading and starting all over), it will NOT sew correctly! So, it took me a while to get everything set up and threaded correctly. Then, while lettuce edging one of the sleeves, there was trouble. I don't know exactly what happened, but part of the edge didn't come out right, so I had to cut *another* sleeve and do it again. Later, I had BIG problems with being able to tell how much fabric the blade was cutting off while I was lettuce edging the bottom of the shirt. I finally cut off the messed up parts and did the lettuce edging without using the blade. MUCH BETTER! Luckily, the pattern had a huge hem allowance and the shirt ended up just the right length for DD.

While I'm not super-happy with this top, it turned out OK. It was good practice sewing with knits and with the serger. I am not sure that I'll make this top for DD again, but we'll see. I will make her PJ pants next when the fabric arrives. I ordered a camouflage knit to makes DS's PJs and he's very excited. I'll blog about those items as I get them done.

Let me know what you think!

The Busy Life of a SAHM!

I have a lot of stuff to blog about that I'll get to sometime this week. Right now, I am sitting here, having my snack of Weight Watchers Vanilla Fat Free Yogurt mixed with 1/2-cup of Kashi Go Lean Crunch (highly recommend it), and thinking about the day...

• Got up and helped get the kids off to school
• Started Matt's laundry
• Made & ate breakfast
• Helped Matt move a truck
• Worked out (The FIRM's Hi-Def Sculpt, if you're curious)
• Picked up Gracen from preschool
• Made phone calls
• Switched laundry loads
• Showered
• Got Gracen lunch
• Finished getting ready
• Laundry to dryer
• Made & ate lunch
• Did some stuff online for a while
• Put Gracen in the tub (she had green marker outlining her feet from yesterday's Children's Church project! So funny!)
• Folded towels & Matt's laundry
• Opened ton of mail
• Paid bills
• Started on township work (I'm the township clerk--fun)
• Got Gracen out of tub & dressed
• Trimmed Gracen's fingernails & toenails
• Painted Gracen's toes
• Garrett came home--trimmed his fingernails
• Got kids snack
• Finished township stuff
• Filed papers
• Cleaned litter box
• Got kids more snack & myself a snack

And now I'm blogging after sending my sister an e-mail! Of course, interspersed in all of that is talking to Gracen and helping her with little things. Sadly, my day's not over. Here's the rest of the day's doings:

• Go visit in-laws (Gracen needs to show off her red toenails!)
• Make & eat supper (think it will be Roast Beef Burritos tonight)
• Watch TV and cuddle kids for a bit
• Help kids brush teeth
• Get kids to bed with minimum of strife
• Sit in chair and veg for a bit before heading to bed, too.

Whew! Of course, today's industrious-ness makes up for yesterday's total lack of mobility & accomplishment. We went to church, had lunch at the in-laws', then came home and were complete couch potatoes the rest of the day! It's pretty rare that we do that anymore, but it sure was nice--even if I did feel a little guilty.

I guess the moral of this is that Stay-at-Home Moms do a LOT, too, and never let anyone tell you otherwise!

Alrighty, I'd better jet! A little preview for you on some things I'll be blogging about this week:

• Gracen's pajama top
• New dining room set

What's With These Growing Kids?

Oh, how they grow! School has started and it won't be long before the weather starts to cool down. I love fall even though harvest takes my hubby away from me. At any rate, my weekend has me pondering what's with these growing kids?

Cooler weather means jeans and long sleeves. I know, you're thinking "It's stinkin' hot here! I can't even think about long sleeves!" That may be true (although we've been enjoying some nice weather lately!), but fall will be here before we know it. To that end, on Saturday I helped the kids try on all their winter clothes to determine what fit and what didn't.

Let's just say that the consignment store will be getting a load pretty soon!

I'm amazed at how much bigger DD is as compared to DS at the same age. I have a big girlie on my hands. She can't even wear DS's old jeans around the house/farm because his skinny butt needs slims! Oh well, at least the kids didn't complain too much during the clothes-trying-on procedure.

Since the kids were in need of clothes, we decided to go clothes shopping Sunday after church. I have to give my munchkins kudos for being super-patient throughout the whole thing! We ended up in JC Penney's for...FOREVER! DH and DS were in one fitting room while DD and I were in another trying on a TON of clothes. We'd send our respective "models" into the next fitting room to get that parent's approval of that particular outfit. It was like musical chairs. Sort of. Anyway, I regret that we left a mess in the fitting rooms, but in our defense 1) there was no clothes rack on which to place vetoed clothing, and 2) we needed to get the heck out there because we'd been in there so long! I did give the clerks a heads-up, though. Don't you think that was sufficient?

I've determined that finding clothes for kids is just like finding clothes for myself--no two pair of jeans ever fit the same regardless of brand. So, we got DD some 5T things, but we found that size 5 girl's regular Arizona jeans fit her the best. Yep, my not-quite-4-year-old wears a 5! Wow! Even Garrett got a variety of sizes of clothing. Guess that's why God made fitting rooms. I'm just amazed at how fast these kids are growing!

We had a successful shopping trip with the kids getting clothes, I got a shirt and some shoes, and DH bought himself Final Fantasy something-or-other for the Nintendo DS as his belated birthday/early anniversary gift. We were all pretty pooped by the time we got home at almost 8 p.m.

I haven't labored too much on this Labor Day. I did end up redoing the Gallery section of my Bumblebee Bags site. Feel free to check it out and let me know what you think. It was getting too cluttered having everything on one page. Plus, the changes will make for faster downloading for those of us still using dial-up. I rock! ;oP

I hope you've had a fabulous holiday weekend and that you have a great week!