Birthday Girl

Yesterday was Coleen's birthday. We celebrated on Saturday with banners, and friends and a special dinner.

Included in her gifts was a new outfit.

My little girl is growing up! The tshirt pattern is the first garment I've made her from Ottobre Woman. The pants are a TNT from Ottobre.

Sunday we went over to Perrot to see the trumpeter swans that are on their way through. Oh, what a sight!

Halloween 2010

Coleen decided she wanted to be Elizabeth Bennett from Pride and Prejudice this year.



The exciting thing is she made her costume herself (with only a little help from me, mostly in the pinning things together correctly area). She used the pattern offered by Sense and Sensibility for a Regency Dress. She was initially intimidated by the several pages of instructions, until she realized that they were just a lot more detailed than what she is used to and they really did not involve many more steps than other things she has made.
Her dress turned out very nicely and we found the perfect accessory in a lace sweater that I wore to my wedding. The tshirt and pants underneath were a bow to Halloween in Wisconsin, which is usually a bit chilly.

Birthday Girl

Coleen's birthday was Sunday. She is 11! Sometimes it seems like just a moment has passed since I was able to hold her in my arms. Now, she's less than 6 inches shorter than me- I think I will soon become the shortest in my family :)

After William made her birthday cake (cheesecake with blueberry topping), we took her down to La Crosse and bought her a bike. She was so excited! She is going everyday up on the cul-de-sac to practice riding and really has made progress in the last three days.



The outfit she's wearing in the picture with Biscuit was her birthday present from me. She was very pleased with the hoodie. She loves velour and I was able to manage to sneak this piece in past her and get this made without her knowing about it (one of her favorite things to do is inventory my fabric - so this is not so easy).

Most of the rest of the day she spent on one of her favorite pursuits- reading. She is devouring the Redwall books by Bryan Jacques right now - for the second or third time.

We ended the day with a delicious manicotti dinner and the glorious cheesecake!

Next year, she'll be in middle school... how time flies.

Coleen Made a Jacket!

Coleen just finished a blue corduroy jacket- perfect for fall! Yes, it was cut out and started last September and then has just been slowly progressing, but she is finally finished and I have a feeling it will see lots of wear this spring. Unfortunately, with having it on the table for so long -she has sprouted up and is now two sizes bigger - thankfully, I think we made it a little on the big side so I think it will work through spring. I just am not sure it will make it all of the way to next fall...

Details:

The pattern is from the Spring 2006 issue of Ottobre Design. Sizing 128-170 cm. She made a size 134. She had originally intended to make this from some light blue corduroy, but then we decided that it was too lightweight and we should find another piece of fabric... well, it was my stash to the rescue. I had this piece of dark blue corduroy that was a better weight for a jacket just languishing in the back of my cupboard and there was just enough of it! And when I say just enough - I mean that a couple of the pieces have selvedge seam allowances and the pocket flap facings are cut in the wrong direction!

I think the jacket went together smoothly for the most part. I would help her with pinning (and in fact the one big error was mine - I pinned one of the sleeves in so that the top of the sleeve was lined up with the front princess seam instead of the shoulder seam - oops! Easily resewable and since it was my mistake - I even ripped the seams out for her.) She had a little trouble keeping the top stitching straight, which I think had to do with the corduroy tending to want to shift in the machine.

We really liked all of the details on this jacket and Coleen found some great buttons- again in my stash- silver with some Celtic knotwork stamped into them.

She was thinking on moving onto an easier project, like pajamas next, but I just happened to have a pair of pants cut out for her and so she has already started on those.

Pumpkins

For fun we grew pumpkins in our front flower bed. They filled in the end of the bed that we weren't quite sure what to do with quite nicely. In fact they took over! and climbed down the hill all of the way to the mailbox.


We planted three plants and harvested one pumpkin from each. Here is one as a baby. They grew quite large.
Two of them were cooperative and grew up in the flowerbed. The third grew over the edge of the hill. It was quite a challenge for William to get it up and of course it was the largest!


I had Coleen and Biscuit pose with the pumpkins after William rolled them around the house. As you can see Biscuit is a little distracted...

by the cat!

Enough to make a sewing Mom proud

Coleen walked out to the kitchen this morning with the biggest grin...

smugly, she says

"I made everything that I'm wearing."

1st day of school clothes

Coleen's first day of school was Monday and this was the outfit we made. Coleen made the shirt and I made the pants. Both patterns are from Ottobre magazine.

Of course, after a very cool August, it has finally warmed up and it was too hot for a long sleeve shirt. She ended up wearing the t-shirt she dyed in her batik class at College for Kids.

She is very enthusiastic about school this year (of course, Coleen is always enthusiastic). We were able to meet her teacher last night and were very impressed. She is on Safety Patrol this year and has crosswalk duty in the mornings so she has to be at school half an hour early. The exciting thing about the Patrol is they get to go on a two day trip to Wisconsin Dells in the spring. Besides they really stress the responsibility the older kids have for the younger kids. They make sure all the kindergartners get on the right buses and help them during lunch to get through the line, etc.

Here's to the beginning of a great school year!

Tag Team Sewing

Coleen needed some capris for summer.

We took some time last week and sewed up a couple of pairs. She made the blue ones and I made the khaki ones. This is the best way to teach her sewing. I can show her every step without doing any of it for her. She constructed these all on her own. She even serged the seams!

The pattern is from Ottobre Design 3/2009. The pants are full of great details - like these waistline pockets-


They also had a narrow waistband with an invisible zipper in the side seam. They have a long slit at the hem. Very cute!

Kyuki-do test

Coleen had her test in kyuki-do on Tuesday. See this post for the difference between Kyuki-do and karate

When they test, they work through the forms for all of the different levels up to their level and then they also practice kicks and punches and then do sparring with a partner.

Coleen and Sergei both started around the same time and usually test for their belts at the same time. They really like to egg each other on.

In kyuki-do there are 13 belts between white (novice) and black (expert). Coleen just moved up to her sixth belt.


We're proud of you kid!

Then and Now

Coleen - March 2005



Today on her way to school. I am amazed this dress still fits her, though it is more of a tunic now. I made this from an Ottobre Design pattern for her birthday four years ago!

Coleen's Year in Review 2008

Working on William's Christmas present. She made him a hooded sweatshirt and sweatpantsShe also made me a skirt. Somehow I have no pictures of either William or I in these clothes. I'll have to correct that. I admit I actually wrote most of this post in January and was waiting to post until I got pictures, but I'm giving up...or else it will be time to do the 2009 review before I even get 2008 published.
We forgot to shorten the sleeves...

She made her whole outfit in both of these pictures.



After looking through pictures to find what I had done last year, I really thought Coleen's sewing should have it's own post. She really has done a lot and I'm quite proud of her. She is a good listener and tries to follow directions. Most of these patterns come from Ottobre magazine, so she traces the patterns, reads their brief directions and then I give her mini-tutorials as we go through the different steps. She doesn't cut anything out yet- I will let her iron and use the sewing machine, but I can't hand the rotary cutter over to her. That thing just makes me too nervous! Since the patterns come from Ottobre, they don't have any seam allowances and so it is easier for me to cut them out then have her add s.a.s before she cuts them with scissors.

Karate tournament

Ok, life keeps going forward, though I don't seem to be getting much blogging done.

Coleen had her karate tournament the second week of March. There is a new form (series of moves) each time you earn a new color belt. Most of the competition is judging groups of kids on how well they can perform their form.
Here she is doing one of the kicks... I'm not sure if I've figured out how to take action shots yet.
There were four kids in Coleen's group. She did quite a good job and won a blue ribbon. She was quite proud of herself! And we are quite proud, too...

We interrupt...to bring you a sewing post

Hmm... don't know what happened to the rest of the trip. Not much computer time lately, but will get back to editing photos and posting the rest of it soon (Though I won't so brazenly post that it will get done this week.)

Coleen had her spring piano recital this past Saturday. She played a theme from Don Giovanni by Mozart and an arrangement of 'Don't Get Around Much Anymore' by Duke Ellington. We decided she needed a new dress to perform in. We chose a dress and jacket from Ottobre and got to work. Coleen made the dress and I made the jacket. Both fabrics are from my stash. She is getting good at figuring out the directions on her own and I only really helped her with the gathering of the skirt and the zipper.

As usual, I found these patterns well-drafted and they went together well. We took what shortcuts we could - the insides could definitely be prettier! All seams are serged on both the jacket and dress, but if I had more time, I think I would have done a Hong Kong finish on the jacket seams.

I am very happy that we were able to get both done in just under a week - it really makes a difference when there are two working on a project... as the saying goes - many hands make light work.



Her concert was a great success!

New Hobbies

Last winter we became a little stir crazy in the long Wisconsin winter- so how do you combat that?

Find some way to get outdoors! We are all learning to cross country ski. We have enough snow now to do some practicing and went out in the woods for a couple of hours. It will be quite fun once we get the hang of it! Both Coleen and I have never been on skis before so there is a bit of a learning curve, but even after only a couple of times out, we are feeling much more confident - at least on the groomed trails.

I'm looking forward to more snow!

And now finally, the coat

So, here's Coleen ready for winter. William knit her the tam and the scarf is my family's tartan, which really ties the green coat and red hat together.

Front


and back:

I am quite pleased with it. I had lots of fun with the needle felting on the belt and the pocket welts. I am also pleased with the buttons I found. They have interest without overpowering the other details. - I didn't think about it, but on the back belt the buttons and needle felting are quite close together and a lot of the buttons I looked at clashed with the felting. Thankfully one of the ladies at the quilt shop saw these (I had passed right over them after trying the same design in red and not liking it).




I re-sewed the lining and it looks much better. The sides do not pull up any more.



I really learned alot making this coat and now want to tackle them for William and me. I know there are things that I can improve the next time around and look forward to the challenge.

Coleen's coat...almost

I said I was almost done with Coleen's coat. That all I needed to do was add buttons.
Well, I went to La Crosse on Friday and found buttons I really liked at the local quilt store A Stitch in Time. I realized however when I had Coleen try on the coat to make sure the button placement was right that the hem was unacceptably wonky



So I ripped the lining hem out and realized I either cut it too short or misunderstood the directions and sewed it in wrong because the coat hangs perfectly if I just scoot the lining up about an inch. I had bagged the coat and sewed this in by machine originally, but I am just going to resew it by hand.





This picture, with the really bad shadow shows that the lining came all the way down to the bottom edge of the coat - in fact if you were really looking the lining showed (just barely)- so I am glad that I ended up ripping it out anyhow.

After I ripped it out and pinned it where it hung naturally when she was wearing it, it looked more like this:



Hopefully there will be pics tomorrow with it done and ready to wear!