Ellie Inspired

I'm finishing up writing Nanny Etticoat this week to send to the testers and just loving this latest pattern so much!  I can't wait for you to see it so I thought I would give you a sneak peek. 

For every pattern, I design an original fabric swatch to use in my graphics and diagrams.  I started off doing this because I didn't want to violate any copyright violations and now I do it because I love it!

For Nanny Etticoat, I wanted something that was ultra girly, soft, and sweet.  This pattern is for a collection of four slips, petticoats, and camisoles.  So I designed a fabric with soft greens, pinks and little rosebuds.  Here is a little glimpse at one of the pattern pages.

And here is what the graphic looks like:

Lil' Bluebird is already at the testers this week but I'll show you what that little fabric graphic looks like:

This one has bright colors with the robin's egg blue.  Can you tell I love working on these?

My challenge when working on any of the graphics for the patterns is:

• do the colors and pictures still look good in grayscale if people choose to print them that way?
• are the patterns too busy that the detail of the diagrams are lost?
• is the scale proportional?
• will there be too much empty white space when it is on the diagram so that the right side can be confused with the wrong side?

I draw them using every photo and paint program on my computer because I don't want to take the time to learn a new software!  Someday I suppose I'm just going to have to.

If you would like to be the first one to receive these two new patterns as well as a whole bunch of others FREE, run, run, run to SewBaby and enter the Giveaway!  It ends tonight!

Be watching for these two new patterns very soon!

This is going to be a shocker to my family because I've long stayed away from Facebook because I spend enough time on the computer as it is!  But I just set up a business page and I have no idea what I'm doing!  If anyone has any tips for me like how to add the company overview and founded date, I would greatly appreciate it!

On the sewing front...this has been a busy weekend for sewing!  I have lots of pictures to show you this week.

Check back tomorrow for a new FREE pattern that I'm really excited about!

And oh what a fun time we had!

Meet my crew:

And my pattern-packers:

It was a long car trip but the kids were fabulous!  We stayed beyond the Convention for a little vacation with my family and everyone was excited to see the ocean and the mountains.

The Fine Stitchery booth at the Market :

Her booth was hopping during the Market.  Many of the ladies I helped would hold up a bolt of her fine batistes or lawns and say, "Is that price RIGHT??"  When I told them yes and that Barbara always has the best prices on her beautiful quality fabric, they would go get their friends and bring them back to buy.  It was fun to see the groups of friends buying fabric together.  As a result, we would talk about what projects they were going to use it for and I kept adding to my mental list of what I wanted to take home with me, too!  I am absolutely sure I spent more than I made!

Many of the samples displayed were ones that I had made:

See those cute little dress stands sitting on the table with my dresses on them?  Hubby made them all for me to take and we couldn't use two of them because we had run out of room.  So....Jeannie Baumeister's booth was right next to ours and she asked me if she could use them during the market!!!!!!!!!  (Insert huge scream here!)  I was too shy to get a picture of her though.  My husband also sells these dress forms so if you are interested, just click here.  They come in two sizes.

I got to meet Mrs. Dot there who is good friends with Barbara.  Barbara had told me that Mrs. Dot does not like gushing so with a great deal of effort, I simply said, "Hello, Mrs. Dot!" instead of excitedly telling her how much of a sewing idol she is to me!  She had on a different blouse each day that she had made and her handwork is just exquisite!

We had a little time the next day to play at the beach:

The banquet Saturday night was so, so, SO good!  We had fun little table favors at each place setting.

Barbara O' Brien and I at the banquet.  This weekend was the first time we had met face to face!  She is just as sweet and delightful as she is on the phone.  I had a really good time with her.

I had missed Lyn Weeks at our local SAGA chapter last weekend when she taught a beautiful ladies' nightgown class.  But, the sweet ladies had told her that I was going to be at the Convention and I got to meet her there.  I was so flattered when she introduced herself at the Market.

I met a super fun girl, Cindy Hayes, who owns Smocked Tees.  She has had things featured in Sew Beautiful a couple of different times.  I wish I had a picture of her but you can see her on her website.  Her little t-shirts are cute as can be.

I could not wait to meet Martha Broyles (from Southern Matriarch blog) and we had such a fun time talking.  She invited me to come see the Christening gown she was working on and this sweet dress that she has shown on her blog.  I asked her to take a picture of me holding it so ya'll could be jealous that I got to see it in person!!  (Yep, that "ya'll" was thrown in there because I think I'm from the South now!  :))

There are so many more delightful people that I met, and so much more I could say, but it was truly a wonderful trip and I'm so glad that I went.

I hope that I will be able to attend next year in Annaheim!!

My 100th post and this is one of the most special to me because it proves I am not talking to myself!  LOL  I also have 81 members of my site and 59 followers.  Some of those are duplicates and I didn't stop to count but I'm guessing about 100 followers total too so didn't that work out perfectly!? 

Okay, so anyway, here is why this post is so exciting to me and soon I'll tell you why it should be exciting to you.

When I checked in at a sewing forum tonight, I saw a new post entitled Ruffle Halter Dress and lo and behold, this sweet lady had made not one, not two, but THREE of my Ruffle Halter Dresses that we did for the last sewalong!!!  The free pattern is found here.

I asked her if I could please, please, please post her pictures on my blog and she agreed so enjoy these beautiful examples of the Ruffle Halter Dress.  (The first one was lavendar and she didn't get pictures of that one.)

I am going to post the variation of the circular flounces soon (in fact, that was what I was thinking of doing for our next sewalong with a different bodice for a dressy dress for Christmas.  But, are you sick of ruffles?)  Let me know what you think!  I wasn't so super excited about the pillowcase dresses for some reason but I don't mind doing them if there's interest either.

And now, why you should be excited....time for a super awesome GiveAWAY to celebrate my 100's!  But, this kind of snuck up on me so I'm not sure what it's going to be yet.  I'll think on it tonight and let you know soon and how to enter.

Thanks again Diane for making my day!

Taking off on our cruise!  Bon voyage!

So beautiful...

A sting ray swam right up to us when we were in the water!

I think this was his "another picture?" look and this is all I'm showing of my swimming suit that I finally found the night before we left!  The water was so clear and warm!

There were lots of jellyfish in the water. 

We have chickens so I'm used to them but it was kind of funny seeing the chickens running around the island!

Our formal night and the polka dot dress.  Thanks for all the suggestions on the sash.  I went shopping and looked for lime green and found nothing!  Then a friend told me hot pink but I didn't have anything that would work for that either.  So, I ended up going with something I already had...red.

We had a wonderful time, got a little sunburned, met some new friends, ate WAY too much, and relaxed.

I am happy to be home today though.  I missed my babies.

Be back later today with Tuesday's LWL and we're going to talk about hidden zippers.

Thanks for all the comments on my blog while I was gone.  It was so much fun reading through them when I got back.  I love you guys!

Ever since I saw Sivje's cute dress on her blog, I was inspired to try sewing for myself again.  Never mind the fact that in the last year I made 300 some garments (exactly "0" were for me) and the year before I tried a couple of times and ended up with "wadders".  After a much needed phone call from her and vote of confidence, I got the pattern and started...

So, I started with Simplicity 2739 out of some silky brown/white polka dot material from Joann's.

I'm not modeling this because, while I thought it looked cute on the dress form, it looked hideous on me!  The pattern is actually for a nightgown and that's what it looks like on me.  I think it will be wearable once I do some alterations, though.  Here it is unhemmed:

And with a sash I pinned in place.  I thought it might help a little.

So,  I pulled out my only tried and true pattern to boost my confidence again.

This is Simplicity 4632, View C.

I lengthened it a couple of inches for the short view and ended up taking it in about 5 inches on the sides and pulling up the shoulder seams so they didn't hang so low.   Because the bodice was so wide and it was already constructed, I made a center inverted pleat to take out the extra fullness.  It's been awhile since I made this and I must have made the wrong size. I will have to add notes to the pattern cover so I remember next time.  But, it's wearable.  Not perfect yet, but much better than my first attempt above.

I added pockets because it felt retro to me with the cap sleeves and white collar but they poof out in places I would rather not "poof out"!  So, I may take them off.

So, Sivje, I hope you are proud of me.  I am trying boning next!!

Sounds so sad, doesn't it? 

Tomorrow morning will start in a flurry of chatter, warm yummy cinnamon rolls, more chatter, posing for pictures with new school bags, laughter, chatter, and more chatter.  Probably all while I'm reminding them to eat their vitamins and get their shoes on and did you remember to put the box of markers in your bag!

So, after supper, we went for a nice walk, for as long as the mosquitoes would let us, and soaked up the fading rays of the sun while we tried to shake off that melancholy feeling of summer truly coming to an end.

Wait, who's pulling who??

Has my little boy REALLY gotten this big already?

Telling them all a story.  Yeah, that's really my girl!

"Ok, the mosquitoes have bitten me here, here, here, and HERE!  Can we go now?"

And now, in case I've made you sad, here is what my boys were busy with today:

I was getting the Twirly Girl dress ready for a photo shoot this morning and told the kids to get in the car.  As I finished loading everything up in the car, Jacob tells me that he is ready to go and he packed up his toads.

"WHAT?????"

"My toads.  Luke wanted to see them." (their little cousin)

"WHERE ARE THEY???"

"In the back of the car."

Okay, now I am running frantically to open the back of the car.  I see the stacked buckets.  I see an empty bucket and I see dirt on the floor.

"Jacob, how many toads did you put in here?"

"Just one, Mom.  But don't worry, we stacked the buckets so he couldn't get out."

"Please get these buckets out and check to make sure he is still in there and you better hope that he didn't hop out and is now somewhere loose in my car!!!"

The toad was still safely where they had trapped him.  We had a discussion about not bringing toads in the car and I reiterated a now-famous speech that they also don't belong in the house.  (Something that hasn't happened yet and I sure hope doesn't!)

When we were walking tonight, we saw a snake and that, combined with the earlier Toad-Ride-Along, made me think of this poem I'd heard before.  Enjoy!

Mother Doesn’t Want a Dog

by Judith Viorst

Mother doesn’t want a dog.

Mother says they smell,

And never sit when you say sit,

Or even when you yell.

And when you come home late at night

And there is ice and snow,

You have to go back outside because

The dumb dog has to go.

Mother doesn’t want a dog.

Mother says they shed,

And always let the strangers in

And bark at friends instead,

And do disgraceful things on rugs,

And track mud on the floor,

And flop upon your bed at night

And snore their doggy snore.

Mother doesn’t want a dog,

She’s making a mistake.

Because, more than a dog, I think

She will not want this snake.

Can you tell what she's doing?

I hear her say,  "Stand still!"

Then, she's muttering to herself about needing more pins and needing to take out a few inches here and there.  (do I really mutter like that?)

Yep, that's my girl!

My sewing area is a crazy place right now with half finished garments hanging up all over the room.  I am in the middle of designing the fall patterns (you will be seeing them very soon) and when Ellie and her little friend woke up this morning, she came running to see if she could use one of my strips that the serger cut off.  When I saw what she was doing with it, I ran for my camera.  Too funny.

Designing in your jammies....sounds like a good day to me!