Nothing says fall like a trip to the pumpkin patch!

Yeck Farms

568 Baker Road,  Freedom, PA

 

It was a wonderful, warm and sunny day in our neck of the woods so I decided it was perfect for taking our little family to Yeck Farms. 

It is not too crowded, family friendly and clean. 

They have local honey, apples, apple cider, a kid friendly corn maze and pumpkins of course.

 

They also have some animals and a hay ride with a lot of recognizable children's characters like Scooby-Doo and Buzz and Woody from Toy Story. 

I hope everyone else is taking advantage of these lovely days of fall!

New and Improved Potty Trainers

 I know I've talked about my little man a bit. 

Today I want to talk about:

POTTY TRAINING!

Well, he is not ready to be honest, but I AM!

 I am so ready to be out of this diaper changing stage! I just made him some new and improved training pants made from Gerber's store bought ones so we are prepared. I know that I saw this on another blog but I'll be darned if I can't remember where. I'm 99% sure it was for a little girl though. As you know boys and girls need different...coverage. 

First the Supplies:

One gerber trainer

One FQ PUL

One FQ Flannel or other absorbent material
The Basics-Thread, scissors, sewing machine/serger

Check out the template for the flannel / PUL layers

HERE

I hope my link works! It's my first time haha

**When you print this out just make sure to match it up with your trainer to make sure it printed the right size. This was made to fit a 3T Trainer for a BOY, if you have a girl just fold down the side of the pattern marked "front" 1 1/2 inches.

Step One:

Fold over the flannel wide enough for the printed template and cut out.  I use three layers but I'll leave that up to you!

 

Yea that's right, living on the edge. No pins when I'm cutting my pattern peices.





 Repeat with one layer of PUL.


So now you should have this.

Step Two:

Pin all your layers together.
 Serge or zig zag the edges of all your layers together. 

Step Three:

 

Pin in place.
Now just a warning the trainer are rarely perfect. One side never seems to match the other when I know my pattern is even so just do your best here.

See? Same template different trainer. 

Only one out of three trainers actually was "right."


...or is the word "square"??

 

  

Step Four:

 

Stitch the flannel/PUL layers to the trainer within the serged edge.

And then you have:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Flock together blog hop!

Check it out:) Sorry so short y'all!! Apparently blogging from a nook is a no-no.

More Gifts For Babies!!

Who does not love making things for babies?

I for one love it:)

I made these three lovelies for 3 mom's who are all having baby girls!

Yeah, I love them too:)

Remember that custom order dress? Here 

The middle pillow is for her.

These ones are for my two friends in Michigan.

It's amazing what you can do with a little Pellon wonder under and a free downloaded template:)

Now, with Pellon wonder under-ed appliques, I ALWAYS stitch around the edges. I figure these pillow covers will not be washed often but old habits die hard! It is one of those instructions that come with the product that says "if desired" well for me that means DO IT. I first started my love affair with Pellon wonder under when making those little tie onesies for my son!

You can recreate this using the template I did by checking out Blueskyconfections.blogspot.com 

HERE

**She has graciously offered this template as a free download for those using it for personal use NOT to produce things for sale. Please follow the rules so the awesome bloggers out there keep sharing with us:)

Estate Sales

Have you ever been to an estate sale before??

Yesterday was my FIRST time ever going and I went to 6 that I found on good 'ol Craigslist.

Truthfully there is two more I'd like to go to today too but I won't.

I had a self imposed $20 limit. The places that were duds for treasures were rich in character. The architecture was amazing. Some of these old houses in Pittsburgh are full off all these special little floor plans that I never would have thought of. Houses built today are pretty straightforward; you can almost figure out the layout without ever stepping indoors. One house had a wrought iron gated yard, gorgeous greenhouse, HUGE perennial garden, a sitting room with an entire wall that was floor to ceiling wooden bi-fold doors to the outdoors. It had an oval master bedroom with beautiful fireplace and ceiling medallion like nothing I've ever seen. Check it out here on Zillow. They (zillow) did not even get a great picture of the gardens. There was nothing there for me to buy, unless I wanted some crazy expensive antique furniture but it was definitely worth the stop!

What did I buy you ask?? 

Just remember you asked for it-and remember I did not spend more than 20 bucks for EVERYTHING!

Vintage wooden rolling pin and cornbread cast iron pan.

Cast iron meat grinder-my momma will be so proud lol

Really I'm a vegetarian but it will make an awesome 

Christmas gift!!

How sweet is this little linen set?

I actually bought two baskets of random sewing supplies from two different sales. I honestly did not really look through them until I got home.

Lots of old needles, marking pencils, zippers, point turners, hem rulers and various doo-dads.

Look at the awesome Holly Hobbie wall plaque. I had a little Holly Hobbie sheet set when I was little! Swoon:)

Sewing Susan needle set; pretty awesome considering that is my name!

My only regret...not buying any vintage sheets.

 I did buy glass sun tea pitcher and a Tupperware Stack Cooker that I did not photograph. Have ya'll ever used a Stack Cooker? They are awesome! I got the complete set sans cookbook for $1.50 and I already found most of the recipes online for free:)

Not a bad haul for only $20, huh?

Hemming Jeans

So my niece's birthday is coming up and I always like to her something every pre-teen wants--

NEW CLOTHES!

Only one small problem-her pants NEVER fit her right. She needs one size for her waist which leaves her pants miles a little too long. 

Now there are a million and one tutorials on hemming jeans using the original hemline which is what I'm doing here today with one small change. So from start to finish here we go!

Step One :

 Determine how much shorter the pants need to be-I'm taking them up 5" so if you take that length in half I need to fold up 2.5" and pin them all the way around. Careful to keep just the two layers pinned together not all the layers or else there is no place for the foot to come out! haha

Step Two:

Pick your thread, I chose a navy colored Gutermann thread. Since we are keeping the original hem intact you want the thread to blend in to the original jean. Then you need to stitch along the original hem line on the wrong side of the jean.

Step Three:

Now you could stop here and just cut off the excess fabric. 

Not me though, remember I'm doing these for a growing child! So keep following along if you want to keep that fabric!

 

Iron the new hem line as is to get a nice crisp line.

Then flip the jeans inside out and iron again.

Here comes my twist. I don't want the extra fabric to accidentally flip out and cause my niece any embarrassment.

Reality is - Kids are mean. They will pick on a kid for anything and I don't want my hemming to be a reason!

Plus now the hem can be dropped when she has a growth spurt as these are those adjustable waist jeans:)

 Step Four:

 Measure out some stitch witchery with a little extra to overlap. 

Place under the extra fabric all the way around the hem line being careful not to twist it up.

Over lap the ends and iron it well to fuse the layers.

There are ways to remove stitch witchery at a later date; but that's another tutorial and we'll cross that bridge when we get there!

TA-DA!

And we are done!

 Beautiful, aren't they?

Car seat canopy!

So I was roaming on the bloggies and found this:

 

and I LOVED it. I knew I had to make it. Fabulous tutorial is from The Ribbon Retreat here.

 

Fabulous blog, really. You need to check it out, like now!

I wanted to make something this for an upcoming baby shower and this tutorial fit the bill.It is really easy to follow with fabulous pictures.

Here is my finished canopy.

It's for a friend that is not super girly but is having a girl.

I hope she likes it!!

 

Custom Ordered Dress

Custom Ordered Dress

Loosely based on Simplicity 1814

This dress is just ADORABLE. Unfortunately it is no longer available. However I was able to find the fabric to match the original and a pattern that I could modify to work. 

Here's the original:

Here is mine:

Looks like I tied the band to snugly in my pictures-It just wouldn't stay without a little body in it. 

 I like that my band at the bottom is wider it shows off the awesome Toile I found, I think I need more of it to make something else with!!

My Pattern Review-Jalie 2912

 Jalie 2912

View D

Pattern Description:
For View D-
Short-leg singlet/biketard with crotch panel, racer back, banded armholes and neckline (front neckline and armholes are lower than View B's).

Pattern Sizing:
22 sizes starting at approx a sz 2.

Did it look like the photo/drawing on the pattern envelope once you were done sewing with it?
Yes.


Were the instructions easy to follow?
Yes. I have to say compared to the other view I did with the thicker contrast panels on the top I like it better. View D does not need elastic!!

What did you particularly like or dislike about the pattern?
Came together easily and looks very nice on.

Fabric Used:
Nylon lycra from the seller on Ebay Lycra4Sale

Pattern alterations or any design changes you made:
None

Would you sew it again? Would you recommend it to others?
I will be sewing this again. . .frequently.

Little guy is in gymnastics and he LOVES it.

 Do you know what else he loves??

 

 

 

ALL the leaves that are starting to fall. I suppose summer really is coming to a close.

 

Words of Wisdom

Never sew when tired. NOTHING will turn out. 

After sewing a ton over the weekend, like I am sure many of you have done, I am tired.

Only problem....

That one last thing I wanted to get done before tomorrow morning was a new singlet for my son's gymnastics class that restarts tomorrow evening. I seriously must have re-threaded the dang serger fifteen times four times. Maybe it just felt like fifteen but hey who's counting? So then I said "Screw it!" and just jumped on the machine. Yeah, I'll show you Serger. I can zig zag and straight stitch on old faithful another machine that failed me tonight. 

I give up.

I'll just try to do it again after work tomorrow; that is if I have time after work but before gymnastics.

Pesky job get's in the way of my sewing.

For those that want to know what sewing I did-

1) 2 burp cloth sets for babyshowers up coming-one more set is cut but not stitched yet. I think everyone and their mother has made these. If you haven't and you want a tut-just leave me a comment and I'll do one!

2) Cami/tap pant combo- here and here . Hope you can read foreign languages! I can't but I figured out the diagrams pretty well.

3) Drafted a pattern for a dress someone wants me to make.

4) Were those PJ's for the little man over the long weekend? I think so for some reason...yup just checked-those were posted on Sunday.

Pattern Review of Simplicity 3669

Pattern Review

Simplicity #3669

View B & E

Pattern Description: 

 
Child and Boy/Girl Pajama Pant, Shirt, Knit Top and Tank Top

Pattern Sizing:

 
Children's 3-14; I made a four.

Did it look like the photo/drawing on the pattern envelope once you were done sewing with it?

 
Yes

Were the instructions easy to follow?

 
Very, very easy to follow.

What did you particularly like or dislike about the pattern?

 
It was easy to follow pattern with good directions.

Fabric Used:

 
Camo thermal cotton from Fabric.com

See link HERE

Pattern alterations or any design changes you made:

 
None.

Would you sew it again? Would you recommend it to others?

 
I will be making this pattern again at least until he grows out of the sizes of my pattern!

Conclusion: 

 
I made these much to big for the little one, he will be able to wear these ones for A LONG time!