hippity hoppity

i have been looking for easter baskets for my girls, and was having a hard time finding anything that i liked... then i thought, why don't i make them! duh! and it would be 'cheap cheap' (nice baby chick reference eh?) i finished these two days before Easter, and although they weren't what I had pictured in my head, I LOVE how they turned out. It is always funny how things work out that way!

just so you know, using felt as appliques is SO easy... also wonder under is my new BFF. that stuff is a-ma-za-zing!

click HERE for the free pattern provided by Dabbled

Sweater Vest and Matching Leg Warmers

Ready for a fun project that requires no sewing. My friend Jessica saw this idea on Good Things Utah. Anyway, here's what you do, go through your closet and find an old wool sweater that you don't wear any more...or go to Savers or DI or Good Will and find some wool sweaters. Go home and wash the sweaters in hot water in order to shrink them. Then simply cut off the sleeves. The sweater becomes a sweater vest and the sleeves become the leg warmers or leggings. So, here are the steps:

Step 1: Get a wool sweater.

100% wool is probably the best, but as you can see mine is 98% lambswool, 1% nylon, and 1% lycra spandex.


As you can see, the washing instructions clearly show that you should not wash a wool sweater in hot water. However, since we want it to shrink, go ahead and ignore that. Also, I threw mine in the dryer for a bit after I washed it and that seemed to be fine.


Step 2: Wash your wool sweater in hot water to shrink it and then allow it to dry.



Step 3: Cut off the sleeves at the seams


Step 4: Find a cute little girl to wear it like my neighbor Chadley.


She is about 4 1/2 years old and was the perfect size for my new sweater vest and leg warmers.


So this sweater went from a GAP woman's size S to 4T-5T...pretty awesome huh?

After cutting off the sleeves at the seam you will need to even them up so that they have a straight top. Also, according to Chadley, the wool leg warmers were a little itchy for her so I would recommend having your child wear tights or something like that under the leg warmers.

HO HO HO Tutorial

So my Christmas project this year is a fun HO HO HO Christmas decoration.



Here are some pictures of the process in case you want to make it for yourself...it's a lot of fun and pretty easy.

Step 1: Layout your holiday fabric folded in half (preferably right sides together). Make the letter patterns out of wax paper or other flexible material. Pin patterns onto fabric and cut out letters.



Step 2: Take off letter patterns and pin letters together again, right sides together.



Step 3: Sew letters together. For the "H", sew all of the way around the outside border, except leave an opening on one side of the short part in the middle of the "H". You can also sew all the way around the border of the "H" and then cut an opening in one side of the "H" after you have flipped it. Then just make sure that is in the back when it's done. For the "O" sew all of the way around the inner "O" and the outer "O". When doing this, start and stop at the top of the "O" on the inner and the outer "O leaving a very small space in between your starting and stopping backstitching. This is because you are going to cut all the way through the "O" at the top where you have left your VERY small opening so that the "O" becomes a tube.



Step 4: Flip both letters right side out so that they are ready to stuff with stuffing. Fill each letter with stuffing so that it is like a pillow.



Step 5: Hand stitch the holes closed and then hand stitch the tops of the "H" and the "O" to a ribbon. Do three "HO"s in a row so that it says "HO HO HO" like in my picture at the top of this post.


Here is another fabric combination I did for the HO, HO, HO's:


Also, here are some measurement notes:

-1 yard each of three different prints of fabrics will make 4 HO, HO, HO's.
-1 1/2 yards each of three different prints of fabrics will make 7 HO, HO, HO's.
-1 bag of stuffing should fill about 4 HO, HO, HO's.