Ice cream dress

I am continuing on my Oliver + S kick - this is the Ice Cream dress made for Lucy. It's just a little big for her because I made it in a size 2T, but I always think that after the effort I put in to make the children's clothes, I'd like them to be able to wear the clothes for a bit longer! She was supremely pleased with the pockets. This colour combination makes me happy! It's not so clear in the photo, but there are little ladybugs on the pink fabric. I am thinking of making the blouse version of this, one for each of the girls.

Oliver + S

Just a few months ago, my goal when sewing was to come up with something that the kids could wear, that wasn't too difficult to sew. I didn't want to struggle with anything to fiddly. I think it's an indication of how much I've been learning in my sewing course that I am now more focused on producing clothes that look more professional and that are a bit more of a challenge in the actual sewing process. These outfits take a bit more time, but they also look better.

Josh has his own pairs of Oliver + S's Sketchbook shorts now. They have proper pockets, a faux fly and a pleated front, and aren't all that difficult actually. After working through the steps on Noah's pair, I could sew two pairs up for Joshua quickly. I made a pair in the same green elephant print as Noah's and one in this blue and orange camo print. He chose to wear this one! I guess not everyone is a fan of elephants on green! I made an 8T size so that they'll last him longer.


Emma got an outfit from Oliver + S's Swingset tunic and skirt pattern. This was a tricky one but I found a tutorial (with pictures) that explained the tricky bit, so I could work it out. I made my first buttonhole on the tunic, so I was plenty pleased about that.


I am now obsessed and am determined to sew through as many Oliver + S patterns as I can. I can't do all because some of the patterns are for jackets which the kids don't need here in Singapore. I also will have to omit outfits that I think the kids won't wear, no use working on an outfit which fails to pass Emma's twirl test!

kcwc day 6 and 7

This is my final outfit for KCWC 2011.

I based this dress for Emma on this spring dress. My modifications were doing away with the front tie because I didn't feel up to tackling the buttonholes; and adding a bottom contrasting hem because erm, it turned out a little too short when Emma tried it on. I do like how it turned out though. The print of Japanese cherry blossoms, while pretty, is very busy, so I thought that the solid lavender hem was a nice grounding touch.

I think I need to lengthen the elastic around the waist because right now, it fits a little snug, but I am putting that off for a bit. Daunted by having to lengthen three elastic lengths! I am not sure why it is, but I seem to make elastic bands that are either too loose or too tight, can't get them just right!

I am taking a self-declared holiday from kids clothes now. I am either going to do something totally different, like bake, or do some selfish sewing for myself.

kcwc day 5

Emma is quintessentially girly.

As in she loves pink, princesses, twirly skirts, new shoes, ballet and glitter. If she could, she would be in dresses all day, everyday.

She vehemently rejects t-shirts and shorts every single time I suggest them.

Then I discovered that what I needed for her to change her mind was peer pressure! She came back home from school one day actually asking for me to make her shorts because one of her friends in school thought it'd be a good idea for them to coordinate their outfits! *shockers*

Digression: While I am happy that she deigns to wear shorts and pants now, I worry about how easily swayed she is!

So this is her shorts, which aren't shorts because she decided that she wanted them to be mid-calf length. I let her pick out the fabric from what I had in my stash.


Edited to add: The girl has changed her mind! She says she likes the pants but won't wear them, because "shorts are not comfortable". Haiyah.

kcwc day 2

Completed 2 pair of undies late last night!

I haven't managed to iron out all the puckers, but I am counting them as done.

kcwc day 1

Yes, I have OCD tendencies.

Because sometimes, once I get an idea in my head, I just can't let go of it until I actually do it. It's like an itch that needs to be scratched. And this is how I ended sewing the children's underwear.

Yup, underwear. Now, I can see how this would seem a tad ridiculous. After all, children undies aren't that expensive. And sewing their underwear means I have to take on sewing knits, which I thought I'd never do just because it is harder than sewing woven cottons. But like I said, it became an itch that wouldn't go away.

I decided to make Noah a couple of new pairs when I noticed that he had been wearing the same few pairs of Thomas the train undies. (I also have to add here that Noah was pretty easy to toilet train - I guess it helps to wait until they are really quite big. I only started with him just before his third birthday.) Since I had signed up for Elsie Marley's Kids Clothes Week Challenge, I decided that this would fit the bill. And since I'm making up some for Noah, might as well go ahead and sew up some for Josh and Emma too. Production line sewing makes more sense, right?

Except that I underestimated how long it would take to cut up the pattern pieces. I started at 11pm, thinking that I'd take probably just a little more than an hour (an hour of sewing a day was the requirement).

Umm, wrong. I am clearly not as good as wielding a pair of scissors and a rotary cutter as I though. And those leg band and waistband pieces got my head all muddled up. I only finished at 1.45am.

But here they are, ready to be sewn up. 3 pairs for Noah, 2 pairs each for Emma and Josh.

Children undies pattern from here

Day 1 done!

gathered skirt

I saw this tutorial on MADE and promptly put this on my list of to-dos. My kind of project: straight lines, no buttonholes or zips, looks cute and doesn't take forever to complete.


I decided to do the double layer skirt. I had some chambray left over from making the boys' shorts, so that became the bottom layer. And I used half a yard of a Riley Blake print for the top layer. I did make some tweaks to the tutorial. I didn't want to fold down two layers of cloth for the elastic casing because I thought all that cloth(four layers and the elastic!) bunched up would make it a little uncomfortable. And there are fewer things more frustrating than to make something for a fussy child who refuses to wear what I made! Instead, I made a tube casing for the elastic at the waist by sewing the two pieces of cloth right sides together, and then flipping it right side out and topstitching another line of stitching to create a casing for the elastic. I also made the top layer only two inches shorter than the bottom layer, even though the tutorial recommends a three inch difference, just because I wanted to use up more of the pretty print.


She looks happy enough to be wearing it, no? Noah is busy stuffing his face with ice cream in the background.

Now to make her a top to go with the skirt. I still have a mermaid iron-on match that she picked out to use, maybe on the pocket of a new top?

daiso buy

The older kids spent the afternoon at grandma's house, so I made a quick dash down to Spotlight. I couldn't resist dropping in at Daiso just to see what they had - not that I've ever managed to make it out of Daiso without buying anything!!

Anyway, I found this piece purple checked cloth for $2 and couldn't pass it up. There was enough to make a simple dress for Lucy. I based it loosely on the ruffle sleeve top tutorial here, but somehow the ruffle on my sleeves ended up much shorter. Oh well, it was still cute anyway. I added a line of ric rac around the bottom, so that it wouldn't look so plain. Otherwise, it was a loose, comfy dress, cheap and quick to make.

I thought Lucy looked really cute in it, especially since she let me put her hair up in two ponytails. She lasted all through church with her hair done up, but the moment we got into the car to leave, she pulled the ties out of her hair!

ruffles are not my friends

Eva dress pattern from Manimina on Etsy

Lessons learnt from making these dresses:

1. When making matching dresses for the girls, don't go all the way matchy-matchy. I sewed these two dresses at the same time, and ended mightily confused when I sewed the bottom green strip from Lucy's dress onto Emma's. The dress looked extremely unbalanced, with the narrow green bottom band, and I was so annoyed that the pattern seller had gotten her measurements mixed up. Until I figured out that I had mixed up the pieces from the two dresses. Oops. Major unpicking and some silent swearing.

2. Making ruffles for a gathered skirt is ok, but doing four tiers of ruffles in one sewing session is too much. I took a while to recover from all that ruffling.

3. Emma loved the twirl factor of her dress, which reminded me of why I did all that ruffling in the first place.

emma is five

Emma's birthday always marks the beginning of birthday season in our family. We have three birthdays in three consecutive months. She wanted a princess cake. Actually she'd been asking for one since last year, and I was initially quite hopeful that she'd forgotten. But no such luck. It gave me some impetus to overcome my fear of working with fondant though. So the princess' skirt didn't fall straight down, but that's what skirts are like, right?

Birthday celebration at school

Emma's birthday fell on Chinese New Year eve this year, so it seems particularly appropriate to include this picture of her at the Chinese Gardens. She loves this skirt for the twirl factor. I used the circle skirt tutorial from MADE.

Does she look like she's having a Marilyn Monroe moment?