Bunny Shirts!!!

These are so cute :D, I've been making a ton of them for Easter lately!!

The kids that get these are going to look completely adorable, my poor children haven't had theirs made yet(haha oops!). It's just a simple appliqued bunny and with little touches here and there and the child's name, but it turns into such an adorable Easter shirt!

So, I wrote this last April.

Talk about better late than never? Lol

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It's been awhile....But I have a surprise so read to the end!

I've been neglecting my poor blog. I'll admit, it's laziness and a lack of documenting the things that I've been making lately. Honestly, I haven't made nearly enough in my absence here; I wish I had a better reason.

There are a few things that I've been obsessing over lately, though, that might surprise y'all. Tutorials like this one from Make it-Love it!

Or pinning things like this:

I actually made one of these:

Maybe, by now, you're starting to see a reoccurring theme with these things? Well that's because of something extra special that I've been keeping under wraps for the past 6 months!

I'm having a brand new baby boy this July!!!!!

It's so exciting to be able to share with y'all finally. My husband and I couldn't be more thrilled to have another son and are anxious to welcome him this summer :)! There's going to be another little firecracker in our family!!

Some Pumpkin Patch goodness!

My kids love Halloween, the costumes, the candy, and all of the excitement leading up to the main event is cause for major mayhem at home.

They're all crazy excited for the trick or treating that will happen tomorrow and can hardly contain themselves. Both younger kids put their costumes on anytime they find them and walk around the house expectantly lol.

To help them let off some Halloween steam, their daddy and I took recently took them all to a church pumpkin patch and they each picked out their very own.

They even had stickers to give to each child for decorating! You better believe that every single one of those stickers made it's way onto those pumpkins.

We have the pumpkins proudly displayed on the mantel; they're small so they fit perfectly up there with everything else.

~Allison

P.S. I got a job outside of the home at a fabric store, this could be dangerous!

Dolly and Me aprons

I've mentioned before the vintage fabric that I have, well I've just begun to skim the surface of using all these wonderful classic gems. Well this particular one was begging to made into a couple adorable 50's style play aprons!

These aprons are great since they fit an age range of 3yrs-10yrs old! The doll apron can fit most stuffed animals and baby dolls, including American Dolls.

What little girl wouldn't love one of these matching sets to play kitchen with her favorite dolly? Or better yet, she could wear this apron to help her mommy cook in the real kitchen; all seams are professionally finished and this garment is completely machine washable and dryable.

My daughter thought these were so cute she didn't want to take them off, and there were multiple requests for some baking time. I had to remind her that she already has an apron and then everything was better.

This is an original design and will not be found anywhere else. If you like this set be sure to head over to my SHOP and snatch this up for the little lady in your life.

~Allison

Graceful Turtle

Ok, so maybe turtles aren't very graceful, but this one is very cute! Who could resist a ballerina turtle? No child that I know, at least.

Dancing in the sun!

It's been a while since I made anything for my kids, so I thought I'd start by making them each a little toy turtle (pattern found here). This ballerina turtle was supposed to be for my older girl, who's actually in dance, but my younger daughter discovered it and fell in love, I couldn't break her heart and tell her no after I saw her sweet face.

A nice fluffy tutu

Now, to make 2 more! I'm thinking a pirate turtle for my son and a fairy turtle for my big girl, I'll definitely post picture of the other 2 when they're finished!

Cute little turtle bum!

 I've got a few more things to share with you guys tomorrow and then even more next week! Keep checking in to see all the lovely things coming up.

~Allison

Happy 4th & Smocked Garden Dress

source: http://www.prageruniversity.com/4th-of-july-declaration.html

Being Independence Day, I had to say Happy July 4th! Now onto other exciting things :)! My newest creation, the smocked Garden Dress. It's such a light and airy little dress and it's so stinking cute too.

I love when my kids can look so effortlessly adorable and they love being comfortable. This dress turned out to be one of those pieces of clothing that can be worn without the complaint of itchies or lots of fussing to keep it looking right.

Isn't she such a good model?

A few of the things that I loved about making this dress is that 1. I used a vintage pillowcase 2. The hand smocking on both the front and back(sorry no pic of the back) came together fairly quickly 3. You have the option of doing the straps crossed in the back or just straight. The straps are attached in the back with buttons and it makes the garment pretty versatile. 

This is going to be put into my etsy shop ASAP, so if anyone has fallen in love with the Garden Dress you'll have your chance to purchase it yourself :). If you'd like for me to create a tutorial on how to make it yourself send me a message or leave a comment and I'll be happy to create another of these cuties!


~Allison

Something's Fishy Infinity Scarf

See the little fish? I love this fabric! I made this infinity scarf last night while I was working on some shorts (I hit a creative block with them and needed a break).

 The scarf is made with the softest sky blue fishy fabric and is lightweight enough to wear if you live in an area with mild weather.
 

The best part for me is that it fits both my daughter and myself lol! That doesn't happen very often, considering the fact that she's only 2&1/2.

I used the techniques found on The Cottage Home blog. She has so many great tutorials including one for infinity scarves.

 Of course, like most things I do, I didn't follow her instructions exactly, just used the same end closing technique. 

I love my new scarf, and my daughter loves it too. I have a feeling I'll be making A LOT more infinity scarves.

~ Allison

My new minis :D

I don't think I've mentioned this before, but most of what I make is either repurposed or upcycled. I'll take fabric from a huge t-shirt and turn it into a dress for one of my girls or a cute skirt, or completely take apart an item of clothing and use the pieces to make something much better with them. Repurposing and upcycling!

My newest creations are an upcycle from a vintage Dior sweatshirt jacket from the 80s! Lol it was actually one that I considered keeping intact and settling as vintage, but the zipper pull was completely broken and some the seam finishings were already looking a but pitiful.

So after a good wash and dry, I turned something that might have otherwise between thrown out into a new cute item for lovers of bows!

I know, pretty "green"of me right? Lol not only is this ecofriendly, but there are a lot of ways to wear these miniature beauties.

 

My favorite is wearing 2 at once under a high bun, so so cute and fashion forward! (sorry, forgot to take a picture of this one)

Can you tell I really love these? I've got a surprise too...are you ready? Too bad, you'll have to wait until tomorrow. I won't be cruel though, my post will be early and you'll like what I to say so that'll make it even better.


~ Allison

Playing Catch Up

I was doing the Kids Clothes Week Challenge last week and actually fulfilled the challenge of sewing children's clothing for at least 1hr per day the entire week. Posting, unfortunately, didn't happen every day though :/. I ended up hosting family at the last minute, so I was too busy to post. Them coming did, however, help me finish the challenge because their three little girls got three pretty new skirts out of being in the right place on the right week! Plus, I just really wanted to make their precious faces some new skirts.

This week I've been playing a bit of catch up. I've had some half finished projects I've been putting off for awhile because at some point or another I either got stuck or put out on them. Now that I've been sewing kids clothes for an entire week, everything else look extremely appealing; well for right now at least.

I'm so bad there are projects that have been neglected from as far back as Christmas, Yikes! There are a few things that I'll be posting about that I'm adding to With Sunshine, my shop on Etsy, that are new and very cute!

Sorry phone pics, my camera is getting cleaned!

As I finish these poor put aside projects, I'll post them for everyone to see :).

~Allison

Kids Clothes Week Challenge Post 2

Jumping for joy :)

Tuesday, I showed you all how to refashion a stained shirt using simple polka dot stamping. Today, I don't have a tutorial, BUT I did make another garment yesterday that matches Tuesday's shirt!

Sorry about all the wrinkles, I had the skirt all nice and pressed, but

 this little gal was being CRAZY and had it entirely creased in 2mins.

This is just a simple little high waisted skirt, with a teal accent zipper in the back. I ended up having to put in a couple little darts, because I didn't measure my daughter and made the skirt a tiny bit big.

Love the little bit of baby fat still on her little body!

Again, sorry for the wrinkles.

She was very happy to hear that she had a new skirt after I got her up from her nap, so it shouldn't be a struggle getting her ready for church this Sunday.

This is what she was really wanting to do, instead of taking pictures!

This angel face is fully in the terrible 2's.

Tomorrow, I'll be showing you something for my little man that I made today :) you're going to love this one!

~Allison

Kids Clothes Week Challenge & Refashion tutorial!

Source: http://www.elsiemarley.com/kids-clothes-week-spring-2013.html

If you've visited my blog before, you know that I LOVE sewing for little people! Their clothing is just a joy to sew and they're much sweeter and easier critics (most of the time). Since it's Kids Clothes Week in the mommy blogging community, I thought I'd put out a few post of my own with some things created specifically for this week!

Today, I refashioned this little ruffled shirt for my little redheaded princess!

She's had this shirt (from Target) for a little while now and it got nail polish in random spots on the front (ahem, grandma). I couldn't bring myself to throw it out because I love the way it looks on her and she's overwhelmed all the time with pink and purple, so grey is always a nice break from the norm.

I knew I wanted to paint something on her shirt to cover the stains, but since there were stains on the ruffles AND the main body of the shirt I ended up doing tiny mint colored polka dots.

Want to do this for your little one? Here's how I did this shirt:

I wanted a nice mint color(as mentioned above), so I mixed white, green and dark teal to create my paint color. Make sure to slip a piece of cardboard, or thick paper between your layers, then start painting!

I wasn't worried about it being perfect, so I just eyeballed the distance between the dots and then when I got to the next row I just shifted my dot placement to match on the diagonal of the previous row. It's sounds complicated, but it's really simple and very easy.

 My secret weapon to making this as quick as possible, my hair dryer! It drys my paint really fast so I don't accidentally smudge anything when I want to move onto another section and who wants to wait an entire day for a project to dry? Not me. The only drawback is that, if you're using puffy paint(which I dislike to begin with), it makes your paint look weirdly spongy when it's dry.

After your shirt is fully polka dotted, make sure you heat seal your paint by running an iron over it through a pressing cloth. This will ensure your paint doesn't peel off in the wash, or during playtime.

Model Moment :)

It worked perfectly and looks ridiculously adorable, plus still a good calm color with the mint dots on the soft grey.

She looks fabulous and completely approved of her "new" shirt.

~Allison

P.S. The fabric in the first picture is part of another project this week, so come back to see what it turns into!