A Visit from St. Nicholas

I seem to remember that after last year's sewing of the Christmas jammies from St. Nick, I decided it wasn't worth the time and effort to sew footie pajamas.  But then I found this super cute Charlie Brown Christmas fleece and couldn't pass up the opportunity for the kids to have matching PJs, so I found myself working on them at the last minute once again. 

I don't learn.

The Peek-a-Boo Classic Footed Pajamas pattern has been updated since last year, adding more sizes and a half-zip option.  The full-zip is easier with E, so I made that version again, but I think the half-zip would be much simpler.  I ripped out the part on the leg where the end of the zipper meets the inseam three times.  When my fourth attempt was still puckered, I decided that no one else would even notice, so I left it.

O's pants are also the same as last year, just a size bigger.  They're the large (size 10) pants from Kwik Sew's Sewing for children, with the side seam eliminated and the legs widened 3/4" on each side.  He's a huge fan of all the Charlie Brown specials, so he thought they were pretty cool -- as far as pajamas go.

Have you ever sewn footie pajamas?  Worth it or not? I find them kind of putzy to sew, but think they're just so cute when they're done, so I'm currently undecided.  I guess if I stick to just making them once a year, it's not so bad.  Ha.

Pajamas from St. Nick

The kids always get Christmas pajamas from St. Nick, and this year I decided to help him out a little by sewing up some coordinating fleece jammies.

O's are medium pants from Kwik Sew Sewing for Children.  I widened the legs by 3/4" at both edges and eliminated the side seam.  You really can't go wrong with the basics from Kwik Sew.

I was more ambitious with E's and went for footie pajamas.  I picked up the Peek-a-Boo Classic Footed Pajamas pattern on sale a bit ago with these PJs in mind.  The description says, "New to sewing?  No problem", but I would suggest that you not attempt these until you're pretty comfortable with clothing construction.  There are some pieces that are a bit awkward to put together, and the most potentially confusing part of the zipper installation doesn't have a picture or diagram in the instructions.

They went together fairly smoothly, although they did take longer than I'd hoped.  I was pretty crabby about them for a while yesterday, but now that they're done and I saw them with O's, I'm pretty pleased.  I cut a 4T width and 5 for length.  She hasn't tried them on yet, but they seem similarly sized to RTW pajamas.

Do you celebrate St. Nick's Day where you live?  In the U.S, it seems to be limited to very specific geographic areas.  It wasn't a thing people did in my hometown, but here on the other side of Wisconsin it's very common.

KCWC Days 2 & 3: Badger Pullover

Finished project, yay! When O. saw the Badger fleece for his cousin's hoodie, he asked me to make one for him, too.  He, of course, didn't want a simple raglan hoodie, but his preferred quarter-zip pullover, which I have so far just been buying for him.  I knew I had a pattern for it in his size in Kwik Sew's Sewing for Children, so I agreed to it.

In retrospect, I wish I had made one in a solid first.  There are some definite issues, especially with things that almost match up, but don't really, which make me think people may be asking him "Did your mom make that?" and not in a good way.  Ha.  Now that it's finished, though, it looks better than it did about halfway through the process.  It bugs me that the print on the front panel wasn't exactly straight, despite my best efforts, so I had to choose between inserting the zipper at an angle to line up with the print, or having it be straight, but off on the print.  I split the difference.

Not my best zipper attempt.

Overall, though, I think he'll like it, which is the important thing. I made a 7/8 and compared it to a 7x RTW pullover, and it's nearly exactly the same size.  Oh, Kwik Sew, how I love your accurate sizing!

It's still pretty early, so I'm hoping to get a shirt cut out for E. that I can sew up tomorrow.

Badger Hoodie

Today was the first day of KCWC.  I spent all of my time tracing patterns and cutting, so nothing photo-worthy.  I do have an item of kid's clothing to show you, however, as I made a fleece hoodie last week for my nephew's birthday.


It's a size T2 hooded raglan from my old standby, Kwik Sew's Sewing for Toddlers.  It's a basic pattern that I've sewn up a few times before, so other than some fussy cutting to get the logo in strategic spots, there isn't much to say about it.  I thought it turned out pretty cute.

Handmade Holidays 2010

One of these years, I hope to not be frantically sewing on Christmas Eve day.  2010 was not that year.  There's hope for 2011, I guess...


The first things finished were these reversible tote bags for a friend's sister-in-law's toddler. I had planned to use a lightweight iron-on interfacing, but was out and it was blizzarding that day, so I used the sew-in heavyweight I had on hand. I really like how sturdy they turned out.

A friend got married the week before Christmas (coincidentally, she's also related to the purse orderer), so I made a gift bag and tied on this cute ornament that I thought was fitting for a December wedding.  I usually make gift bags with a drawstring, but tacked the ribbon on the back of this one.  I like how it turned out, and will use that method for younger kids from now on, since it's easier for them to open.

If you're following the time-line here, it's now a week before Christmas, and I haven't yet made a thing for my own kids.  But there are therapist and teacher gifts to make first.... E. has a team of three therapists and an early childhood teacher who each come to our house twice a month. They used to come weekly, so they're a big part of our lives.  I made them granola, using a tweaked version of this recipe.  I found printable labels and then made gift bags.

Next up was O's teacher. I asked him if he had any ideas, and he said she likes dragonflies and tacos.  Helpful.  We spent some time looking at beaded dragonfly tutes to make an ornament and settled on this one.  I changed some things to use beads from my stash and added beads to the wings to make them stand out more on the tree.  I also made some note cards and a chocolate cobbler mix from printables here and added a gift tag from here.  Hooray for blogs!

The cards have her first initial on them, which is hidden a bit by the ribbon.

O. had originally picked out the following fabric for his teacher's bag, but I thought it might be inappropriate to give to a woman, so I strongly encouraged him to choose a more colorful print.  I don't know how I didn't notice it before -- maybe because I'd used it for kids before?  LOL  I thought my aunt would think it was funny, so I made a bag for her from it.

Isn't the spacing weird?  I think it would have less insult potential if the words were grouped together like "ho-ho-ho" or something!

O. needed Christmas jammies too.  The kids usually get them from St. Nick, but of course I hadn't made his by the 6th (E's still a blanket sleeper girl, so I bought hers), so he looked at the fabrics I had and chose "candy cane" jammies.  Both pieces are from Ottobre 06/09, the "Night Owl" top and "Stripy Legs" pants.  He's a 6 in RTW, and the 110 fit perfectly.  I sewed these on Christmas Eve day.  *sigh*

He swore he needed a candy cane hat to go with it, so I showed him this, and while it wasn't exactly what he wanted -- which was something that looked just like the top of a candy cane! -- he thought it would work.  The he refused to have anything to do with it, so I wore it on Christmas Day.

E's only handmade gift this year -- other than some of the playsilks from my last post -- was a fleece hoodie from this print I found at Hobby Lobby.  The poor girl takes after her mother, who is always cold.  This is a T3 from Kwik Sew Sewing for Toddlers (or KSFT) which has horribly dated photos, but is great for basics.  I added two inches to make it more of a tunic length. 

O. requested two things: a lion knight shield and a hat that looked like a police helmet.  One of the coolest things about being a sewing mama is that your kids think you can make anything, but it's a bit of a double-edged sword.  Hee.


The boy already has a dragon shield, but wanted a lion shield (a la LEGO Kingdoms) for battles.  I used the same basic pattern as the other one, from Ottobre 04/04, but changed the shape and used an applique pattern from McCall 5500.  I had planned to make it color-blocked like the LEGO one, but I didn't have any white pleather, just red, and since I was, of course, doing this pretty much at the last minute, I didn't want to run to the store for some.  He seems okay with the lack of authenticity.  ;)

The police helmet was a little tricky.  He suggested that I make it like E's fleece hat, from the Rainshed Convertible Bomber Hat pattern, but I wasn't sure how to get the word on it and have it look nice.  I'd had my fill of applique from the lion.  My next thought was to try the freezer paper stencil technique, but was afraid that ironing it on would melt the fleece, so I decided to try using printable sticker paper.  It worked pretty well.  The edges aren't as clean and crisp as I'd like, but it looks pretty good from a distance.

The lettering really is straight and even, it's just not flat in the photo.

In retrospect, there weren't even that many projects -- although I sewed up several gift bags that aren't pictured and there were cookies to bake, etc. -- but considering most of them were crammed into one week, it was pretty hectic.  Next year's my year!  Yeah, right.  Check back and I'm sure I'll be saying, "2012 is my year.  I mean it this time!"