Heart Jeans

I made them for Valentine's Day. I didn't have a chance to blog them until now.
I made a mistake on them that turned into a wonderful thing. My embroidery machine made a crazy jump out of place and messed up an area of the jeans. My family needed me so I was not at the machine when this happened (doesn't it always happen that way). The mistake had way too many threads to pick out so I made a applique to put over it. I decided to make it a frayed applique to make it show up better and add more texture.

I think the frayed heart looks wonderful. I liked it so much I added one on the bottom of the other leg.
Very large heart pockets are on the back. Zehira was OK with this because she has hearts she can see all over the front.

I had a lot of fun making this pair of jeans.
They look very cute on her. I keep forgetting to take pictures of her wearing them.

Elmo Jeans

A couple weeks ago I cut up Travis's old jeans and made Elmo pants for Zehira.
The embroidered Elmo I digitized from a coloring page. I put large back pockets on the side of jeans.


My children don't like me embroidering on back pockets. Both my girls cry they can't see the characters when I put them on the back of pants. Large pockets on the side with characters on them make them happy. I like the look of big side pockets so everyone is happy.

For the back of the jeans I added some elastic and left them without any decorations.
The front has a red button, red top stitching, and a foe fly.

I think I made them back Feb 4Th or 5Th. I am a bit behind with my blogging. I have about 20 finished projects to blog. I hope to find some free time to catch up this weekend.

Holiday season and a bit of smocking.

Yes, I do think I am in the middle of a big holiday season. It is Black History Month and American Heart Month. We have had Ground Hog Day, Wear Red Day, the Super bowl (might not be a real holiday but the food and celebration felt like a major holiday), the Olympics, Valentine's Day, Presidents Day, and Chinese New Year. Looking ahead to Fat Tuesday, Mardi Gras, Ash Wednesday and Lent. Add in the bunch of snowstorms and we are having a CRAZY Feb! We don't have this much food, celebration, and excitement in the month of Dec!!! I am exhausted! I have a tummy ache! I don't remember ever eating so much chocolate candy, so many meals out, or this many hot wings in a single month. I always thought Feb. was a cold, sad, and very uneventful month.

When I am not eating, playing in the snow, or celebrating I am busy crafting. I admit I am falling way behind on blogging. I will try to catch up this week. Friday I tried smocking for the first time. I was able to find info on how to make the stitches online. I couldn't find any info on how to take the smocked fabric and turn it into a shirt.

Here is a pic of my first try at smocking. I don't have a pleater and I didn't make my pleats by hand. I used my sewing machine. I am sure that must be a big smocking NO NO because after hours of online searching I didn't see anyone write they did this. The only choices I could find was buying pre-pleated items, using a pleater, or doing it by hand. In the pic above my pleating threads are still attached. I have to admit I was afraid to pull out the pleating threads. I thought my baby waves would all come undone if I pulled out my threads. Below is a picture taken after I pulled out all my pleating threads (except for the very top holding row). I was amazed how it all held together after I pulled out the threads! I think it is almost like magic how the fabric feels elastic. After you pull on it, it magically springs back into shape on its own. In the picture above you can see how the smocking is very close to the top and near the edges of the fabric. That ended up being a big headache for me. I didn't have enough room to cut it into a pattern piece! I didn't have enough room to make a traditional shoulder seam. After a few hours of thinking of ways to use my smocked fabric I decided to make it into a simple peasant top. I had to use very thin elastic and a very narrow seam allowance to make it work. In the end this is what I made. I like how it turned out. Demi loves it.

I hope my next try my smocking stitches look more lined up.Next time I will try to place my pleats in a better place so I can have more options with choosing a shirt pattern. I think you will be seeing lots of smocked clothing made by me in the future!

Big brother jeans and Daddy's lil girl top.

Here is the hot new look the Peacock girls are wearing in 2010!




I think my girls ages 2 and 4 are too young to wear something called "boyfriend jeans". They are too young to have boyfriends!!! I did a bit of thinking about this and came up with what I think is the perfect solution. My new style I am calling Big Brother Jeans. My girls didn't need to steal them from 9 year old brother. We waited until he grew out of them. By the time he outgrew them, they had a very naturally worn out look to them. This pair I placed the pockets crooked in the front. I did this because...
1. I wanted to cover up the grass stains.
2. I wanted to cover the knee to keep them from wearing out.
3. Because I LOVE the fun look of the very large pockets.
4. Placing the pockets crooked and on the front I think gives the jeans a very original look.
I added the adjustable waist band to the top of the jeans. A top stitched fly and a turned up cuffs completed the jeans.

Here is a close up of the crooked pocket. I think this would also be a fun look for a little boy.

In the picture below you can see the natural fray near the top of the belt loops. I tried to keep most of the old jean look that they originally had.


For the top I got the inspiration from here.
I thought the picture of the front of this pattern book looked a lot like the fabric in this shirt.


It is a shirt Rob has worn forever. He told me the fabric was getting very thin from wearing it for so many years. He almost tossed it out. I am glad I didn't let him toss it. I didn't use the pattern in that Japanese pattern book. It looked like a simple peasant top and I make them all the time without a pattern so I grabbed my scissors and a bit of elastic and made this.
I promise to really try a pattern in this book sometime soon! I do think my top looks a lot like the one on the cover of the pattern book. I have to admit it took a bit more thinking than I originally thought it would to make up the top. I had to work around the buttons and large pocket. I wanted the buttons centered and I had to keep the pocket out of the side seam (reason the top is a bit wide). To get the pocket to look the way I wanted I had to pull out about an inch of the stitches from of the top of the pocket. I then folded it down and added a bit of elastic.

I know this look is not one everyone will love. I am crazy in love with it because I think it has enough of the boyfriend jean look to be in style. I love that I didn't spend any money to make it. I think the very large, crooked, front pockets are very fun and give an interesting detail to the jeans. Demi loves them. Travis likes seeing his little sisters wearing his hand-me-downs. I like the Daddy's Little Girl Top just as much as the Big Brother Jeans.

Here are a lot of action shots.









If you like the look you now have something to do with jeans that you are ready to toss. They don't have to be big brother jeans. They could be big sister jeans. Adult jeans will work just as nice (pockets on my jeans are smaller than the ones on my 9 yo sons jeans). Grab your seam ripper and join in the fun!

Lovely Little Ladybug

This was my last project I made in January... I found time to blog everything I made in the last month! This lovely little ladybug top was made from fabric I had in my stash. I used Child's Play to draft the pattern. I am loving this Child's Play software and I think I have already got $100 worth of patterns out of it (not bad for 1 month of use). To make this pattern I used the dress choice but cut it short into a top (a lot like the strawberry top I did a few weeks ago). The only change I would make next time is I might take an inch or so out of the center front because it looks a tad too big in the front. I wanted it to hang loose (almost like a woman's maternity top). I think an empire waist, loose fitting front, with a gathered bottom style gives it a cute and young look but not too "babyish" for little girls. This is just a tiny bit wider in the tummy than I had planned. It will shrink a bit in the wash and that might be just enough to make it fit exactly like I had planned.... Yes, I can hear you all gasping and yelling at me for not washing the fabric before I cut it!!! I do wash fabrics most of the time... BUT play clothes, every day wear, or first try with a new pattern are times I occasionally skip over the wash before I sew rule (I only do this when my children are sleeping or playing nice together and I don't have any fabric washed and ready to go).

On this top, I FORCED myself to expose the zipper. I have always thought exposed zippers in the back of little girl outfits = cheap made clothes. I have been seeing more and more exposed zippers in popular kid's clothing (in nice clothing stores). I am trying hard to keep an open mind with this idea and I want to move with the trends (in the back of my mind I keep hearing this is not the right way to do a zipper). Here is my small attempt to be "in fashion"...
I don't think I would say the exposed zipper up the back adds any type of "beautiful detail" like I read about in J Crew kids. BUT it doesn't look bad like I thought it would. I can't make up my mind if I think it looks "cheap" (like Walmart clothing) or if it is something I can learn to live with (move with the fashion trends). What do you think?

Below are a lot of pics. Zee didn't stand still for me. I hope a bunch of pictures will show all of the top. I plan to make jeans to go with it in the next few days.











By the end of Feb. I plan to make up a similar pattern for my 4 year old. I want to make one a bit "older" for her by taking out some of the fullness from all of the bottom gathers, changing the fabric, maybe adding some pockets, decorating with some fun trims, and maybe lowering the waist.

Peasant Top Retake

After I posted about this top I added a ribbon to the front of it (Demi requested it). It is only a play top. Glittery firefly fabric came from Joann's (hubby bought me a long time ago). I didn't use any type of pattern to make this. I have made so many of them in the past I can make them in my sleep without a patterns or rulers.

Church Dresses Retake

I tried again at getting pictures of the blue flower church dresses... I don't think I did much better than my first try... Play clothes are a lot easier to get pictures of! I let the children play and snap a few pics without any problems. My problem is I can't get a good picture of a dress when a child is sitting on the floor or running across the room. Here is my attempt to get pictures of the girls wearing the dresses.

Retro Retakes

I snapped a few pictures of the girls in the retro dresses. I already blogged about them but had sad blurry pictures of shivering children to share.

Here is Demi in her dress.




Here is Zee (I think she took better pics in the original blog post).