Another reason I haven't been blogging ...

So ... there's a baby coming.  That's another reason I haven't been blogging - I was really, really sick for what seemed like forever (but was really just the first trimester).  Sewing made me want to puke.  Typing made me want to puke.  Puking made me want to puke.  Pretty much everything except, oddly, spinach salads for breakfast, made me want to puke.  Thankfully, I don't feel that way anymore.  Though, if we are being honest, I have been consuming far more Oreos than spinach lately.




After Christmas, I finally started sewing little baby things.  We opted not to find out the gender. We've had two surprise-at-birth girls and one found-out-in-advance boy, and we have found that we prefer not knowing.  This does, however, make sewing baby clothes problematic.  I have seen some wonderful examples of truly gender-neutral baby clothing (here and here, for example), but I was limited in my fabric choice as I had determined to sew all my baby clothes from stash.  And gender-neutral clothes often seem more boyish to me. It's horribly unstylish of me, but I know from experience that once the baby is born and I know who he/she is, I want the girls to look girly and the boys to look boyish.  It's just how I am.   (And as we I was positive the little man was our last baby, I gave away all our baby things - so we are really starting from scratch).  In the end I am pretty pleased with how these particular items turned out, but I guess the proof will be in the pudding if we have a girl ... will I want to dress her in them?

I sewed this bodysuit and pants of a double-faced gauze I bought on super-duper sale at FabricMart last year.  I used a different color way to make my second Late Lunch Tunic and it didn't hold up that well.  I think that was because that tunic somehow ended up a tad too small around the rib cage though it could be due to the fragility of the fabric.  Just in case it was the latter, for these items I sewed 1/2" seams on my sewing machine and then used the serger to sew a 3/8" seam for reinforcement.




I had quite a bit of difficulty getting the fabric in general, and the bias strip in particular, to behave.  I think in this fabric I should have cut a wider strip.  I ended up giving up and there are bits where the strip didn't get totally turned under.  I zigzagged those to prevent fraying but the inside neckline does not look so pretty.

Both items are size 0-3 months, but I lengthened the bodysuit to the 3-6 month length to ensure room for cloth diapers.  The fabric is so lovely and light and soft - it is perfect for baby summer wear.  Just don't look too closely at the topstitching.

To distract from the messy inside neckline, and also because I think it's funny, I used one of these strange twill-tape labels I got free with purchase from Land of Oh a couple years ago.  About half the labels say "Handmade," which of course makes sense and is useful.  But the other half say "Sunbonnet."  Underneath that it says something about handmade things being made by people with their hands.  Cracks me up.

I made a second set of pants out of this lovely striped linen I picked out of the remnant bin at Joann's a few years ago.  The pockets and waistband are also remnant-bin linen.  The top is fabric reclaimed from my only-worn-once July 4 Washi dress of frumptastic frumpiness.  I used the same striped linen for the neckline binding, and yellow KAM snaps.  The size 16 KAMs really are too big for the pattern (and they are a little tough to unsnap) but again, I was working from stash and I didn't have the right kind of snaps.

The pattern, as I had expected, is a well-drafted with clean details and thorough instructions.  The only view I didn't make was the jacket.  I'd like to make one in knit - though this will be a late spring/summer baby a cardi will come in handy for air conditioned spots - but I'm having a lot of trouble with knits on my machine these days so it will have to wait until I'm really motivated.