Nutcracker

Peanut and I were at Jo-Ann's and she saw some snowflake material and she grabbed it and asked if we could make twinning dresses. How on earth could I say no?!?! I can't even begin to tell you how proud of this girl I am. E sewed the entire dress accept for setting the sleeves, setting part of the zipper and working the pedal. I told her what to do and she executed it like a pro. 

She is incredible! She took her time, she asked questions and she kept telling me too slow down. I love that she is confident and strong.

 We wore our twinning dresses to the Nutcracker and we got a lot of compliments on them. People were so impressed with Peanut and how nice her dressed looked and I loved seeing how excited she was to tell people!! I love watching her develop talents. 

 This was our first time to the Nutcracker and I loved it. The first half was just so gosh darn magical. I love the Mouse King. Favorite part hands down! the costumes were also stunning. Oh my heart!

 

 E loved Clara and she found an owl nutcracker at intermission that she fell in love with. It was pretty darn cute!

 The second half was a bit confusing, I had no idea what was going on. It turns out that all of the dancers are dolls that the magician gave to the other girls in the first act. they were pretty dances, but the second half was a touch slow. 

 E keeps asking if we can go again next year? Who knows maybe it's a new tradition! It was such a wonderful night with out sweet little girl and I was amazed that she stayed awake for the whole performance. 

Bow Dress

Since we are going to Houston for Thanksgiving I decided that I wanted the kiddos to have matching outfits. While I was in the store I stumbled upon this bow fabric and knew that I just had to make a dress for E. Does she need a dress? No. Do I need another project? No. but it was calling to me so I had satisfy my urge. 

 This is the first time that I have EVER followed a pattern. Usually Mom Tobler and i are designing our dresses and projects using several patterns as we go and really just winging it. Let me tell you... Creatively it wasn't as fun, but time wise it just went right together. The whole thing took me around 3 1/2 hours to do. Piece of cake. 

This neckline was a bear. Curves, corners, slits... It's still not perfect and after stitching it and taking it apart 6 or so times I decided just to leave it. I had planned to put the trim on anyways and it hides the flaws just perfectly! 

I just love the buttons on the back. So pleased with this dress. So quick, so simple, so fun! Now.... onto my next project!

Princess Dress Make-over (Sort of.)

My SIL Janet sent Ethnie some adorable princess dresses. Unfortunately E is not a fan of skirts. Thankfully I have a sewing machine. In less than 10 minutes I took those two pieces "skirts" and made then in to....

 Princess dresses that were "So cute and beautiful Mommy" -Ethnie. Talk about your easy fix!!

 She also sent this SUPER cute Elsa blue skirt, which E wanted nothing to do with. (She can be such a stinker.) I had miss placed her Elsa dress (gasp!) and this was the perfect replacement. I went into her drawer and found a shirt that went with the skirt nicely. 

 Two minutes later.... Voila! 

 And this little princess couldn't have loved it more! 

 Thank you so much Aunt Janet for the treasures!!! You're the best!

Just Something I Threw Together... Not!

I have been wanting to make this dress since before E was born. Do you know how difficult it is to find 1/2" red dots on white fabric? Almost impossible. We found some while we were in Wal-Mart one day and bought the 3 yards that they had. Not thinking that was enough we continued the search. Fast forward to 2 weeks before Christmas. Mom and I were in Jo-Ann and I came across some navy dot on off white fabric. As soon as I saw it I was in love. We bought 5 yards and headed home to begin designing the dress. (Turns out I had enough red fabric the whole time. I'm glad I didn't make the red one though, I love the navy so much more!)

I'm not sure why I insist on designing every dress that I pick but I usually do. I used a separate pattern for the bodice, sleeves and skirt. I also had to design the sleeve (which was Mom Tobler's vision, she always thinks up the cutest things.) One day I will make a dress by following the pattern, one day! Aside from all of that mental labor, three muslin's later I finally had my pattern. I am actually really proud of myself. I made this dress almost entirely on my own. I needed Mom's guidance while we fit and worked on the collar but I almost flew solo, which is a big deal! 

Once my dress was done I had a TON of fabric left over so I decided to make a matching dress for Ethnie. Looking back there were a couple of things I wold tweak but the whole thing came together in a day and that is with having to redesign the pattern as well.

E was really excited that Mommy was making her a dress to match hers and she wanted to help. She was really good at pushing the back stitch button, lifting the presser foot and cutting the threads.

I love having a little helper!

Voila! This final product! Here are way to many pictures of us all matching. I even made a little doll dress out of the same material. Yes I was seeing spots by the end of it!

I {love} the back!!

For Christmas Grammy made us some matching aprons! They were so stinking cute and E was beyond happy to have an "apin wid a skirt!" (apron with a skirt!) She loves the little ruffle, the big bow in the front and the cupcake pattern! 

Thank you for the super cute apron's Mom!!!! 

My favorite blooper from our picture session! Hehe!

I couldn't hardly wait to wear our dresses to church, but the boys had to match us too! So I got Daddy and Duke matching contrasting ties. We looked pretty fancy!

The back of E's dress with her bow and hair up so you can see the flaps. If I was doing it again I would drop the neckline in the back WAY down. 

This was such a fun project and I am beyond ecstatic with how they turned out! I'm going through sewing withdrawals now that I'm all done. I think the next project will be designing a princess quiet book!

A Late Witch

 This witch was finished a few weeks ago but we just got around to taking pictures of it. May I just express how much I adore this dress. It came out better than I had imagined. Gosh I love creating things.

This is was the original dress that I was after. I love the look. Feminine and spooky but still appropriate for younger children. Of course I still wanted to change a few things.

 First we added some festive fabrics. Nothing says witch like spiderwebs. 

 We made this top twice. The first time I made it WAY too big! Ooops. Note to self even if it claims

 it's only a 36, measure, since I'm a 28. So Mom being the saint she is redid  the entire top. She also added extra corsetting up the back so I could add layers and gain some weight ;).

 I also didn't want draping sleeves. Too often I am face painting and draping sleeves are just a nightmare! I just love these skin tight spiders. They add so much to the costume. I also wanted a little somethin' somethin' for the shoulders. Mom set to work and came up with these beauties! LOVE THEM!

 And what would a witch be without a cape to keep her warm?

 I didn't get to wear it for this years festivities but I am super excited for next Halloween! As always I am anxious for my next project!