Grace Kelly and The Hipster - Creative Kids' Halloween Costumes

It's nearly Halloween again, and I just realized I never took a moment to share the kids' costumes from last year. So, without further ado, I give you Grace Kelly and The Hipster:

Three year old Meg and I were watching an old movie one afternoon when she told me, "I want to be her for Halloween," gesturing to the lovely Miss Kelly. We searched through Google images to find a suitably fabulous gown to recreate (taking some serious artistic liberties), and I then set about making a skirt with miles and miles of pink, black, and white tulle. Meg already had the hat, purchased from the adult section at Target on clearance for $5. A black long-sleeved top and an old purse of mine finished the look off splendidly.

I made the skirt by simply cutting long, thin strips of tulle and looping them around a piece of elastic. I stacked pieces of black and white or black and pink tulle before looping to be sure the colors were variegated nicely and not too stripey.

A few strips of tulle tied around the hat helped it blend seamlessly with the rest of the costume.

Baby costumes are my favorite, because you can get a little silly or whimsical or downright ridiculous, with no protests from the wearer.

James already owned the hat, t-shirt, jeggings (I purchase all his jeggings and leggings from the girls' department, because I love the fit and variety), and socks. I picked up the flannel top and shoes from the kids' consignment store for less than $5 total, the glasses from Dollar Tree (just popped out the lenses), and cut out a mustache from craft foam and hot glued it to a pacifier.

We're still giddy we managed to catch this awesome candid on camera!

Handmade Pom Pom Headbands

Meg's going through a stage of preferring to do her own hair. Most days she chooses to just comb the tangles out, push on a headband, and get going, so I thought I'd make her a few cute new ones so she can still be fancy, which is apparently paramount when you're four. I've seen a number of pom pom headbands like these for sale and just love them, so I used these tutorials to make a few myself.

They came together quickly, and I think she looks just darling in them. Most importantly, she thinks they're fab.

Disney-Inspired Monsters, Inc. Mike Wazowski Shirt

I needed one more Disney-themed shirt for James to wear on our Disneyland vacation, but I wasn't liking anything I saw in stores. The only thing that struck my fancy was a Monster's Inc. onesie from Target, but it only came in infant sizes. So I decided to make my own. Finding a lime green top in his size proved difficult, but I finally spotted one in Wal-Mart. It had some screen-printed saying on it, but it was easily covered up by the applique. And it was only $3.50!

I used felt for the applique, because that was the only fabric I had on hand in the right colors. I went to our recycling shelves and grabbed some plastic lids in a few sizes to use as circle templates. I made two of the white one so it'd be thick enough that none of the screen printing underneath would show through. Then just a smaller blue and an even smaller black circle all bound together with fusible interfacing and stitched to the shirt with coordinating thread. I didn't have to tightly zigzag the edges, because the felt won't fray, so I did a simple straight stitch the disappeared nicely.

And here it is in action:

We got so many compliments on his shirt in the park. This is definitely one he'll be wearing over and over again. I was worried the 4 layers of felt would be cumbersome, but that didn't prove to be the case at all.

Disney-Inspired Mickey Head Shirts

Another easy Disney project I undertook in preparation for our trip was to make simple coordinating shirts for the kids. I stole some plain black shirts from their closets, cut Mickey heads from fabric in my stash, and appliqued them on. Couldn't get any simpler, and they looked darling. I wanted to make sure that any clothing I made for the trip was something I'd put the kids in later. No need for one-time-use clothing. By using the simple shape and fashionable fabrics, I have no stylistic misgivings about my kids wearing these shirts again and again.

Here they are in action:

Disney-Inspired Ribbon Sculpture Hair Clips - Jessie, Belle, and Mickey

We recently got back from a trip to Disneyland, so this blog is about to get Disney-heavy for a while. I went a little crazy crafting clothes and accessories for the kids, which just served to build our excitement and anticipation.

I don't have a tutorial or in-progress photos for this first one. I just Google image searched pictures of ribbon sculpture bows for the characters I wanted to use as inspiration and winged it from there. I matched the clips to the three outfits I'd planned for my daughter to wear on our trip. They really were so very simple and didn't take more than 10 minutes apiece to construct from grosgrain ribbon, alligator clips, tiny rhinestones, and hot glue.

Here they are in action:

Unfortunately, I didn't get any great photos of this one.

If you have any specific questions about the process, I'd be glad to try to help!

Cloth Diapers for Poppy Seed

While I'm still feeling quite sick, much worse than during my pregnancy with Margaret in fact, I've been hit by a sewing bug the past week or so. I took the opportunity to get some projects done for Poppy Seed, namely cloth nursing pads and cloth diapers. We're on a veeeeery tight budget until we see if Poppy Seed is going to behave and allow us to go through with a midwife birth, so I wanted to do these as economically as possible.

The nursing pads are simply 1 layer of fleece and 3 layers of flannel. Both materials were cast-offs from my mom. Free is great! I traced around a Nesquik lid for the shape (we have plenty of those hanging about, as it's all I can stomach many days) and surged all 4 layers together. Easy peasy.

I've never cloth diapered a newborn. We didn't start with Margaret until she was 6 weeks old. We used basic pinned prefolds and covers for her, which worked fine, but they could be a bit of a pain sometimes. For Poppy Seed, I made a variety so we can see what fits and works best.

The 2 all-in-ones are made from 1 layer of PUL and 2 layers of Birdseye pique (both of which I already had on hand), and 8 layers of flannel for the internal soaker (more free fabric from my mom).

The 2 pockets are made from 1 layer of on-hand PUL and 2 layers of Mom's flannel. The inserts are 3 layers of cute flannel remnants I had left over from making blocks.

The pocket in action.

The cutest diapers are undoubtedly the flannel fitteds. They're made of 3 layers of nice flannel I had on hand with internal soakers of 8 layers of mom's flannel.

I can already picture a little bum all snuggled up in these.

I made all the diapers in size small rather than newborn, as I assume we'll get a bit more wear out of them this way. They have fold-over laundry tabs and an extender tab in case I manage to get a peanut of a baby this time. I'd love to get a snap press at some point so I can make one-size diapers. Ahh, someday. For now, I managed 24 nursing pads and 8 diapers for a grand total of... FREE! Yay!

Self-Sufficiency: Week Two Update

I'm a little late posting my update this week because of this:

Margaret bashed her face on the concrete on Monday, and she's needed plenty of attention and cuddles since then.

So, week two is complete. This week I made:

A dress from an old childen's XL t-shirt. (Yes, I agree the huge neon words are slightly tacky, but it's what I had on hand, and it'll make a fine play dress.  Besides, we must compensate for all the "Daddy's Girl" items she's so frequently sent. ;) )

This was a simple and fun project. I laid a sleeveless dress of Margaret's on the middle of the XL shirt, matching the collars together, and traced around it. I took the shirt in on the sides and cut out the sleeve holes (I didn't even have to finish them off, because the stretchy fabric rolls rather than fraying). Then I opened up the shoulder seams and tied the new straps together to shorten them. This shirt had a faux tank strap beside one of the sleeves, so I took it up slightly to make it the same length as the new straps.

On the baking front, I made whole wheat bread, pizza crust, and English muffins.

While the wheat bread was very tasty and we always love that pizza crust recipe (we make it with a mix of white and wheat flour and add some rosemary to the dough), the English muffins were the real stars this week.

Good thing, too, because they were a pain to make. January's baking challenges are doing nothing to endear me to the art, and the English muffins were much more work than this kitchen grump cares for. They taste great, though.

I don't own a biscuit cutter, so I used a heart-shaped cookie cutter. Kind of cute, no?

Whew, halfway there.

Margaret's Valentine's Outfit

I found some sweet little rose-covered tights for Margaret at, of all places, Wal-Mart last week. They were inexpensive, and I thought they'd be cute for Valentine's Day. I picked up a hot pink shirt to go with them, and I figured she could wear it all with magenta corduroy skirt she already has.

I wanted the Valentine's shirt to be deliciously gaudy (as everything Valentine's Day should be) so I cut out a loud rose from some fabric I had on hand, tossed it on some magenta net to tie it in to the skirt, and sprinkled on some buttons and a crocheted flower. I stitched around all the elements in black thread to mimic the outline of the rose.

I also made her a simple korker bow to go along with it.

Korkers are so easy to make. I just wrapped some grosgrain ribbon around a pencil, tied the ends with thread to keep the ribbon in place, spritzed it with water then spray starch, and popped it in the oven at 225 F for about 20 minutes.

Once the ribbon was curled, I cut lengths of it and hot glued it to a hair clip. I also added some white tulle loops for... I don't know, kitsch. You can use more ribbon lengths than I did for a fuller bow. (I used about 2 pencils worth here. I like it a little daintier than the typical korker style seems to be.) When I had it assembled how I wanted, I sprayed it with starch again and hung it upside-down to dry.