This KCW has been all about making gifts for babies. I thought it would be super quick and I could crank em out. Not so. As I’ve gotten better at sewing, I’ve gotten slower. Seems counterintuitive, I know. Yes, I can sew faster, but now when I make things I want to make them better not faster. That means slowing down and ironing a hem before I sew it–pinning it even! [just as an aside: I listened to a podcast where the interviewee, Soyna Phillip, said the same thing. It’s a good one, go listen! ] (more…)

I don’t have any finished clothes to show you today, but I do have a bunch of stencils. I’m not a big fan of Things On Shirts, but my kids are. Freezer paper stencils to the rescue!! I’m worried the ice cream will look weird, but I’m excited for the beetle. Any freezer paper stencils in your plans?

Before easter we went to a fantastic birthday party for a 2 year old. A two year old who loves hot dogs and balloons more than anything, so of course the party had lots of balloons and hot dogs. awesome!  I had plans to make this shirt weeks before the party, but of course I ended up doing it the night before.  I was inspired by this picture I found on flickr:

I just used freezer paper and paint and it was done. I tried to make the bun a little less 2 dimensional, but I’m no artist so it only kind of worked. It’s good to know that freezer paper prints don’t have to just be blocks of color–you can art it up all you want.

A few people have emailed me to ask what the hell is freezer paper anyway. And because I’m lazy and waaay behind on replying to email (sorry) I will just tell you all here: it’s like butcher paper, where one side is paper and the other is plasticy. The plasticy side can be ironed onto fabric and then peeled off making it perfect for a ton of projects. I even use it to make patterns so I can just iron the patterns on and skip pinning. The kind I have is made by Reynolds and it’s right next to the tin foil in my grocery store.  There is a whole group on flickr devoted to freezer paper stencils and there are some pretty awesome ones there.

The reverse applique swing skirt from Alabama Stitch Book by Natalie Chanin has been on my to do list for so long now, so long that she has written and published a new book in the mean time. I thought I might be able to make this skirt in time for easter, but it is far from finished. I’m not quite sure if it will work anyway. I went to Joann’s to get the cotton jersey called for and of course they don’t carry cotton jersey.  Poopy Joann’s, almost without fail they will be out of or not stock exactly what I what I go there for.   So instead of cotton jersey I got two different fabrics: the blue is a knit interlock and the purple is a rayon jersey. I don’t know if the blue is stretchy enough. I thought maybe the super stretch rayon jersey would make up for it, but then the fabric paint I got at poopy Michaels is hard and scratchy and it might keep the fabric from stretching even more.  Michaels used to carry the nice jacard fabric paint, but they stopped and switched to the cheapy kind. I need to plan ahead so I won’t have to go to these damn stores.

So we’ll see if it works. I might have to make it all again, but it’s actually been kind of fun so far. And I love me some freezer paper stencils. Printing this pattern over and over really makes me want to print my own fabric (for what, meg? more projects, really you need more projects?).  It wouldn’t actually be that hard now that I’ve discovered the lazy man’s way to use stencils.

and now for the lazy man’s freezer paper tip:

When I was making this skirt I didn’t want to cut 20 or 30 leaf stencils, so I cut 3 and used them over and over again.  I couldn’t wait for the stencils to dry between uses (time is precious! the baby is napping!) so I put another piece of freezer paper over the stencil, plasticy side down, and ironed over both. Then I gently peeled the top freezer paper off and voila! the stencil was ready to use again. The paint was still wet on the stencil, but as long as there are not glops of it, it won’t come of or bleed onto your fabric. The stencil might come loose a little in places when you peel off the top sheet, but this is the lazy man’s way after all, if you want perfect, well then do it your way miss perfect.