SHB Sew-Along: Baby Accessories

Before I had SHB, our house was littered with cat toys. Catnip mice/beavers/squirrels/other rodent-like creatures, dingly balls, crinkly tunnels, small stuffed animals, and feathers-on-a-stick, all for Walnut's enjoyment. If I thought that was bad, though, that was because I didn't know about babies. SHB has so many toys (some gifted, some made by me, some purchased by us because they were too cute to pass up), and while he isn't old enough to make a mess on his own yet, somehow there is a mess on our living room floor at the end of the day.

I wanted to make a containment-type object for Category 2 of the SHB Sew-Along (doesn't that sound like I'm talking about hurricanes instead of sewn items?), and while it would've been nice to have more marine-themed prints to coordinate with his other nursery items, I figured that stash-busting (and saving money) was more important. I pulled out fabric leftover from this dress and this skirt to make into a fabric basket using this tutorial. The only changes I made were to make the basket a couple inches taller and to use a couple layers of acrylic felt from the stash for the interfacing instead the quilted interfacing they recommend. I think the final basket reads nicely gender-neutral, despite their fabrics originating from my wardrobe.

Walnut models with the basket. Doesn't he make it look so attractively basket-like?

SHB checks out the basket contents. "Why are all of my toys in there instead of scattered all over the place for easy access?"

So that was one problem solved, but of course there are always new, unforeseen problems popping up when one is in charge of a small human being. For example, I theoretically knew that babies like chewing and sucking on everything when teething, but to see it in practice is a different story. I'm more or less resigned to SHB drool all over me, but the Ergo carrier straps can't be washed as often as my clothes. Apparently this is a common problem, as there's a thriving Etsy economy just for home-made suck pads. I found this DIY tutorial and figured it would be easy to make my own. Since I'm stingy with printer ink, I decided to wing my own pattern instead of printing out hers, and I used Velcro instead of wrestling with my snap setter, but otherwise they're fairly similar. My fabric was leftover from making SHB's lovey and interfaced with stash fleece. 

I'm pretty pleased with how nicely the colors coordinate with the gray of the carrier!

Summary:
Fabric: Various scraps and remnants, all stash, probably totaling 1.5 yards
Notions: Twill tape for the handles of the basket, velcro for the suck pads
Hours: Five total, for both projects
Total cost: Free! I love shopping my stash.
Final thoughts: So useful. No more thoughts necessary.

Once again, let me reiterate how glad I am that the SHB Sew-Along gave me the kick in the butt I needed to set aside time for sewing! These were such easy projects, but if I didn't have that motivating factor, I would've kept thinking about how much I needed them but never gotten around to doing anything about it. There were a couple of other accessory items I made for the sew-along as well, but were less necessary; I made a cover for my nursing pillow and a couple of toys for SHB, but more on those in another post...

SHB Sew-Along Wrap Up

A common theme among moms seems to be Where Did The Time Go: how is it that SHB is almost ready to crawl, how is it that the nap is over already and all I've done is browse FB and Pinterest, how is it that April is over and the SHB Sew-Along is theoretically done? Something about the sleep deprivation, I think.

At any rate, it's May! The AP exams start Monday and my job is more or less done (one more review session tomorrow, and then it's out of my hands), but somehow amid the madness of exam prep, concert-going, and trying to keep an eye on a suddenly mobile SHB, I managed to do more sewing than I ever expected to do. Part of that is due to Mr. Cation's family being in town and willing to play with SHB, but a lot of it is actually due to the feeling camaraderie that the sew-along inspired. I loved seeing what people were coming up with on IG and Flickr and blogs, which in turn made me excited to create as well. Besides the shirts and costume, I've also made a couple of toys, a toy basket, and a Boppy cover, and I still have suck pads cut out that need to be sewn up. As predicted, I didn't end up making anything for me, but that's fine, because the momentum of this month will hopefully translate into more selfish sewing in the future. I'll share my complete list (and photos) of Category 2 makes just as soon as I finish those suck pads, but in the meantime...

If you've been sewing along this month and haven't done so already, head on over to Mikhaela's blog to post a link to your creations. We'll be selecting our favorites in each category (Baby Clothing, Baby Accessories, and Parent Items) to win subscriptions to Ottobre Kids magazine, and a couple of random winners to get PDF copies of the Oliver & S Lullaby Layette pattern. More details in Mikhaela's post. I can't wait to see all the cute little items (or large selfish items?) that you all have made this past month!

The LOTR Symphony: A Costume Extravaganza Weekend!

We interrupt your regular stream of SHB Sew-along posts with a special newsflash about the Lord of the Rings Symphony! (Actually, can it really be called a newsflash if my report is a week late? Ah well, I blame the upcoming AP exams and SHB. Always convenient for an excuse, the latter.)

I've seen the LOTR Symphony twice before, but that was 1) several years ago, 2) before I knew how to sew/make costumes, and 3) just select pieces played from the soundtrack in a standard three hour-ish long concert. When I first found out about the Symphony Silicon Valley's three concert, play-along-live-to-the-movies extravaganza, I knew right away that I had to go to all three and dress up. After all my sadness about the movies being over and done with, it was one last chance to be immersed in the world of Middle Earth with other equally enthusiastic fans. Well, the concert series took place last weekend and it was everything I ever wanted. The music itself was incredible, of course; Howard Shore's score is a masterpiece and the musicians deserve all the props for learning that much music and performing it so perfectly over the course of three very long concerts. But this is not a music reviewing blog, it's a record of my creative output, so let's recap the costumes instead!

For Saturday's FOTR concert, since the focus is on introducing hobbits, I pulled out my hobbit maiden costume again, but added a dark green apron for another layer over the skirt. It's a small thing, but I think it really helps to pull it all together. Fashion bloggers (and San Francisco tour books) are always harping on the importance of layering and apparently that applies to hobbits, too.

So excited about the series of concerts I'm about to attend! I love that the San Jose Center for the Performing Arts looks so Rivendell-y in architecture. Okay, they were probably just aiming for Art Nouveau, but then elves are very Art Nouveau. 

My companions (only two, alas, not eight, and I am not so fortunate in my friends as to have elves and dwarves in my company) were my sister Emily and her boyfriend; they went a decidedly more offbeat route with their costumes:

Can you tell what they are? Travis is the black hole down which Pippin (Fool of a Took!) dropped the bucket and skull in Moria, and Emily is an assortment food from the seven hobbit meals!

A hobbit and her breakfast, second breakfast, elevenses, luncheon, afternoon tea, dinner, and supper. 

A shortcut to mushrooms! Also non-broken carrots, ashless-tomatoes, and some nice crispy bacon! I don't think hobbits had lobster or farfalle pasta, but then IKEA wasn't really aiming for making hobbit meal plush toys, I don't think. 

For Sunday, I decided that if I was going to do this, I would do it right, so I brought two costumes (and a breast pump and freezer bag!) with me so that I could have different outfits for TTT and ROTK. Since we were sitting by the same people, by the time ROTK rolled around, they had definitely noticed that I was crazy enthusiastic with my different outfits for each movie.

I had originally planned to make Arwen's mourning gown for TTT (I even had fabric stashed for it!), but time and SHB got the better of me and it never happened. This just means that there has to be another LOTR event in my future, right? Anyway, I settled for an easier elven look and just added the stereotypical long elven sleeves to an existing floor-length white gown. Drafting the sleeves was easy enough, and I cut them out of white rayon jersey from the stash so that it would be sufficiently flowy without needing a hem. The most difficult part was actually unpicking the old sleeves, which I originally sewed on with a stitch length setting of 1, for reasons unknown to current-day me. Totally worth it, though, because something about those sleeves reads instant elf!

Ideally this would all be silk chiffon instead of polyester and rayon stretch knits, but hey, I'm a low-budget elf. Besides, my elven princess doesn't need to destroy Middle-Earth with dry cleaning chemicals. Also I don't get unsightly wrinkles even after sitting through a three-hour concert. 

Here's what the top part of the sleeve pattern looked like. They ended up being 45" long from the top of the sleeve cap to the bottom and floated beautifully behind me when I walked. 

So swooshy and fun when I'm moving!

I got carried away with flapping my sleeves and realized I could use them the way Zhang Ziyi does in House of Flying Daggers. 

Of course, the whole elven princess look was also helped along tremendously by a lovely delicate wire circlet made by my friend Kristy (Etsy store here, should you wish to order something similar for yourself; she does custom orders). She only had a week to make it (on top of her day job) so I'd say it was pretty great for a rush job!

A close-up of the circlet. The best thing was that it stayed on by itself; no need for bobby pins!

If you thought the stand I had it on was weird, it's because it's a plush octopus (not me-made, though). Even octopi deserve to feel like pretty pretty (elven) princesses?

I loved how swooshily elegant I felt in my Galadriel-esque gown, but I must confess that I was most excited about my ROTK costume. I decided to reprise my very first costume, the Eye of Sauron, which I originally wore for the ROTK midnight showing as a college student. Has it really been that long since these movies came out?! I find it incredible that Emily is older now than I was when these movies came out. She went offbeat again, dressing as the web-bound Frodo, complete with a giant stuffed spider.

Emily made the spider and pinned the white blanket around herself and penguin-waddled up the walkway of the theater...now that's dedication!

"Looks like old Shelob has been having a bit of fun!"

Don't worry, I took the eye off before the concert started so that people behind me could see! 

Impromptu shot with other dressed up fans after the show!

The first time I dressed as the eye as an enthusiastic but clueless college student, I was surprised that people kept stopping me for pictures; that was my first experience with the fun of cosplaying and in retrospect that was what got me hooked. This time, things were no different and I could barely get two feet during intermission without being stopped. In fact, many people said it was the best LOTR costume they'd ever seen, which was gratifying, of course, but probably not entirely fair to people who spend hours upon hours making elven armor or hand-embroidering trims. After all, my costume cost less than $10; I merely used Sharpies on a balloon again and used fishing wire to suspend it between two papier-mache horns. Tape and junk mail, that's all I ever use for my costumes!

I used red, orange, gold, and black sharpies to create the flaming eye look.
Nothing says all-seeing evil like a latex sack full of my breath... 

It turns out that plush red sea creatures are just perfect for displaying costume headpieces. I used hair ties to secure the horns to a headband, meaning that I can just reuse it again as a normal headband at a later point if I wish.  

My super low-tech rig for getting the eye to look like it's floating between the horns. 

"The eye was rimmed with fire, but was itself glazed, yellow as a cat's, watchful and intent, and the black slit of its pupil opened to a pit, a window into nothing." And an adorable red lobster. 

I am so grateful for Mr. Cation being willing to be on duty for so long so that I could enjoy myself.It was hard to be away from SHB for so long but it was so worth it!

I know, I know, I should've dressed him in his hobbit costume (and moved the Duraflame log)...

The Geekiest Baby: Clothes for the SHB Sew-Along

High on the excitement of having finished SHB's first real costume, I was able to use that momentum to launch into cake sewing. SHB has an abundance of short-sleeved onesies, but it's still cool enough (even in California, the land of 1.5 seasons) that he needs a few long-sleeved shirts for mornings and nights. And because I can't leave well enough alone, even his utilitarian "cake" ended up geeky.

The Blue Sun logo (from Firefly/Serenity), the baby scientist in training, and the biohazard symbol were all done with fabric marker. The first two were freehand, but the biohazard symbol was done with the help of a freezer paper stencil. The Cheat was fleece applique with lots of careful hand-stitching on the spots. All of them have held up very well in the wash!

I had saved a whole bunch of old free t-shirts from college and teaching that I had originally planned on making into a t-shirt quilt, but on second thought (and with some perspective provided by the intervening years), I realized I'm not actually that sentimental about them. If I'm honest with myself, I only really saved them because I felt like they should be more meaningful than they really are. So once I got over that, I realized I had a whole bunch of free stretchy cotton in lots of colors, already pre-shrunk...perfect for making baby shirts! I tried making one with an envelope neckline but didn't like how it fit on SHB (plus he's always scooting out of them), so I went with snaps at the shoulder instead.

And because I can't leave well enough alone (and because mass-producing tiny shirts is so fast and satisfying and mindless), I even made him a Kumamon sweatshirt to celebrate my sister's birthday. She's the biggest (okay, only) Kumamon fan I know.

I love how he has the same expression as Kumamon's here!

Bonus garment: When I was testing the envelope shoulder concept, I used an old tee that had a faux tux screenprinted on it, which made for a very bizarre-looking romper...

I used this pattern, but ran out of fabric so I had to settle for three-quarter length sleeves. 

Summary:

Pattern: Traced from an existing shirt, modified to make the shoulder button closure.

Fabric: Six old cotton tee shirts, resulting in four long-sleeve shirts, one romper, and a pair of pants, plus scraps leftover.

Notions: Lots of snaps. I am so pro at sewing snaps now. 

Techniques used: Binding knit necklines? Does that even count as a technique? Setting snaps for the romper, which was a whole ordeal in and of itself. In the end, I found this tutorial to be the most helpful since that was the tool I had on hand.

Hours: Once I got going, I was at about an hour per shirt, not counting the drawing/applique-ing. So with cutting and decorating and all, this was a good ten-ish hours over the course of two weeks. 

Total cost: I paid $5 for the snap kit (I already had the pliers) and $3 for the fabric marker, and the rest of the materials were shirts/scraps I've had for so long, they're basically free. 

Final thoughts: I seriously love these little shirts! It's so fun to have him participate in fandoms that I love, even if he's too young to know about them. I find myself reaching for these shirts first before his RTW shirts, and hoping people get the reference. So far people at school have loved the biohazard and baby scientist ones, but The Cheat and Firefly are probably too obscure. 

I think I got a little carried away with the embellishments...especially considering that SHB won't be able to wear these for very long. Oh well, that's my prerogative, right? Besides, it means that I can stage silly pictures!

Best use of tiny lab equipment: posing it with a tiny scientist! 

I briefly thought about trying to get a picture of SHB in his biohazard shirt with a biohazard container at school, but then I came to my senses.

"The Cheat is grounded! We had that lightswitch installed for you so you could turn the lights on and off, not so you could throw lightswitch raves!"

"Six men came to kill me one time. And the best of 'em carried this. It's a Callahan full-bore auto-lock. Customized trigger, double cartridge thorough gauge. It is my very favorite gun."

"This the best gun made by man. It has *extreme* sentimental value...I call it Vera."

So that takes care of Category 1 of the sew-along! Next up, Category 2: Accessories. 

The Geekiest Baby: My Little Hobbit

It is the curse of younger siblings that they always get the older sibling's hand-me-downs. Not that I would know what that's like, being an eldest child myself. And not that my sister would know what that's like either, being so much younger than me; in the seven years between my birth and hers, my mom had plenty of time to discard and donate my old things. Although the same number of years separates Walnut and SHB, he has no such luck. When Walnut decided that he wasn't a fan of the cat house that my sister painstakingly crafted for him two Christmases ago, we put it in the garage and saved it for SHB to play with once he got old enough to enjoy it. And by "enjoy", I mean "forced to take pictures in front of it to satisfy mom's geeky fancies."

In the spirit of the SHB Sew-Along, I decided to finally get back behind my sewing machine and make something, anything really. While I know what SHB really needs is more pants and pajamas, I also knew that the thought of such utilitarian sewing wasn't going to be enough to get the sewjo going after a month-long sewing standstill. So I did what I always do to get the creative juices flowing: I made a costume. And because I'm just a huge dork, I went for -- big surprise -- a Middle Earth-related costume. This outfit is based on Bilbo Baggins' first costume, when he has his ridiculous good morning exchange with Gandalf.

I realize, of course, that he should really have a pipe instead of the One Ring, but I don't want to encourage smoking. Also I don't have a wooden pipe.

I'm pretty pleased that I had a fabric in the stash that was vaguely similar to his waistcoat pattern! 

I actually started sewing the vest while I was still on maternity leave, but got stalled by a combination of the four month sleep regression and being undecided on how to finish the vest. The thought of doing bias binding around those tiny little armholes was just too much at the time. Well, the sleep regression never went away, but somewhere in those dark watches of the night my sleep-deprived brain hit upon a solution: if I had to make a long-sleeve onesie to go underneath the vest anyway, why not just combine the two and put the long sleeves on the vest? Then I wouldn't have to worry about an ugly armhole binding showing and it would be one less piece to make (and subsequently wrangle onto my little wannabe-nudist). So it's not really a vest anymore, which is fine. It does show, though, that the costume was conceived and cut when SHB was half his current age, because look at how short it is on his torso!

Good thing you can't really tell when he's sitting.

Confession: the dark green leggings are standard RTW baby clothes, which means there's a dinosaur appliqued onto the butt. Very unhobbit-like. Good thing you can't see it when he's sitting. Moral of the story: make sure your baby hobbit is sitting. Fortunately, he just started being able to sit independently in the last two weeks!

Testing the One Ring's composition by biting it...nope, not gold. 

Summary:
Pattern: Traced a bodice+sleeve "sloper" from his RTW clothes and heavily modified to get the vest and poofy sleeves.
Fabric: A fat quarter for the vest, and old t-shirts for the sleeves and scarf
Notions: Two gold plastic buttons, velcro, a tiny piece of bias tape
Hours: 2.5-3? Spread out over last November and this past week
Will you make it again? No, but I will definitely keep using his "sloper" for more garments, I'm sure!
Total cost: Everything was stash and/or given to me, so basically free!
Final thoughts: Um, I might love this the best of any costume I've made. Actually no, who am I kidding, that title is reserved for Thranduil. Or Eowyn. Or my pirate coat. But this is a close fourth!

Really, Mommy? Just fourth?

I'm pretty sure I took over a hundred pictures on my phone because SHB is so cute (and so wiggly), so indulge me as I spam you with more.

Hmm, what's this? A ring? 

You say it's a magic ring? Hahahahahaha you're so funny. That's nonsense! Great joke, but April Fool's Day was last week. 

You say mysterious writing appears on it? A secret that only saliva can tell?
Well that's easy enough to disprove. Here, I'll saliva it up right now.

Nothing's happening, right? 

Great Bullroarer Took, there ARE runes appearing on it!!!

My Black Speech is rusty, but it looks like it says "One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them..." 

Sigh...I guess it has to be destroyed now, huh? Phooey. 

He has to love Tolkien now, right?

(Also, extra geek points to me for finishing this in time to post on April 12, the actual day that Gandalf arrives in Hobbiton to tell Frodo the truth about the One Ring!)