{Love} Month: Ruffled Tuxedo Front Shirt

I made this cute little shirt to go with the
{The Isabella} Pleated Flounce Skirt
I made for my Isabella back in January.
I knew that since I used my favorite Riley Blake fabric for the
skirt that I would save it to be worn for Valentine's Day.
This weekend when we went to Knott's Berry Farm I
thought it would be the perfect time to debut the cute little skirt.
However, she needed a shirt to go with it!

In keep with the pleated idea of the skirt,
I wanted something pleated or ruffled for the front of the shirt.
I used the same technique for the shirt that I use for my Ruffled Headbands.


HOW I DID IT
I figured out that I wanted my ruffle to be 4" long,
so I doubled the length and added a 1/2" for folding under the ends.

Then I decided how wide I wanted the ruffle to be and added
a 1/2" so that I could do a narrow hem on each side for finishing.
If you have a serger or want a frayed effect, you can do that too.

So, I ended up with a piece of fabric that was about 8.5"x4".



First I did a narrow hem down each long side of the strip -
ie fold over an 1/8", iron, fold over an 1/8", iron, and edge stitch.

Then I ran my gather stitch up the middle and gathered/ruffled my fabric..

Next, I laid a remnant piece of single fold bias tape down the middle.
I used the bias tape because I had it and it matched :)
You could easily use ribbon, twill tape, ric rac or a strip of fabric.

I pinned the bias tape down and sewed it to the ruffle with an edge stitch.

Then, I found 3 cute buttons and sewed them in place.

I ironed a piece of fusible interfacing that was slightly larger than my ruffle
to the inside of the shirt.
I used the lightweight fusible interfacing because I already had some,
but you could use that or stabilizer.

Finally I sewed the ruffle to the front of the shirt by edge stitching
around all four sides of the ruffle.


Now we have a fun, sassy shirt that matches her flouncy skirt!

January Fun: Snowman Hair Clip

Here's a fun little snowman guy you can make

and turn into a pin, hair clip or ornament!


What you'll need:

3/8" grosgrain ribbon in white, black, red, brown, and orange
scissors
lighter
black craft paint
pearl topped straight pin
ribbon covered hair clip
glue gun

Step One:
Cut your ribbon into the following lengths.


Step Two:
Using your lighter, heat seal all of your cut edges to prevent fraying. You can also use a wood burning tool - it will cut and seal your ribbon at the same it. It's awesome!


Step Three:
Slightly overlap the edges of the 2.75" ribbon piece for the body to create a circle.

Step Four:
Repeat with the 2.5" body pieces so you'll have 3 circles.
I make second 2.5" piece slightly smaller than the first, so that they will fit snugly inside of each other in the next step.

Step Five:
Take the larger of your 2.5" body pieces and slide it into the 2.75" circle body piece, matching the seams. Secure with a dab of hot glue in the back at the seams and in the front by slightly pulling the 2.5" circle out, dabbing with glue, and slipping back into place.

Step Six:
Insert the smaller 2.5" body piece into the two-stacked body and secure with glue the same way.


Now you have your body! Onto the head!

Step Seven:
Repeat what you did in Step Three and make the two pieces for the head into circles - roughly the same size. Then, slightly flatten them, careful not to crease the edges and slip them inside of one another - forming an "X".


Step Eight:
Secure with glue on both sides of your "X" where they "cross" one another.

Step Nine:
And now you have your head! If you were careful not to crease your edges when forming your "X" - it should pop up like this.

Now we'll give that headless little snowman body his head.

Step Ten:
Set the snowman head on top of the body. I like the "inside" circle to face forward and be my face, but you can place it however you think looks best.

Now secure with glue in the back where the seams of the body are by put a dab of glue at the top of the body seams and holding the head there until it cools.

Step Eleven:
Then flip it up and place glue where the arrows in the following photo indicate. Then gently press the head down and hold until the glue cools.


Step Twelve:
12A & 12B: Take your 1.5" black piece from the hear muffs, and clip closely to the seam, so that you have a piece that is about 1/16" wide. Heat seal the cut edge.

Step Thirteen:
13A: With your 1" red pieces, create two similarly sized tubes for the ear muffs. I like to use one of my wooden dowels from korker making to keep the edge in place while I glue it together. And it helps keep them the same size.

13B: Now you have all the pieces for your tiny snowman ear muffs!


Step Fourteen:
14A: About half way down the side of the head, secure one piece of the headband portion of the ear muffs with a dab of glue.

14B: Repeat with the second side.

Step Fifteen:
15A: With the back of your snowman facing you, so you can see the seams, take one ear muff and position it so that the seam is coming toward you and the body seams. Secure the ear muff with a dab of glue so the ear muff seam is slightly more toward the back than the front.

15B: Repeat process with the second ear muff.


Step Sixteen:
16A: Now, just like you did in Step Nine, take your 2" brown piece and clip closely to the seam for a 1/16" to an 1/8" wide piece, but do it on both edges, so that you have two pieces. Heat seal the cut edges.

16B: Then clip two 1/2" pieces from one of the 2" pieces, heat seal the cut edges.

Step Seventeen:
Position the 1/2" pieces at opposite ends of the 2" arm piece - making little snowman stick hands - and secure with dabs of hot glue.

Step Eighteen:
With the back of the snowman facing you, put a dab of hot glue on the top body section and secure the arms to the back. I like the "hands" to point up.


Now our little snowman just needs his face!



Step Nineteen:
19A: Take your 1" orange piece and fold it in half, securing it with a dab of glue along the open, heat sealed edges.

19B: Then, cut down the 1" piece, about a 1/3 of the way over from the edge and heat seal the cut edge.

19C: Put a dab of hot glue on the edge of the nose and position on the face.

19D: Now he needs eyes! You can use googly eyes - like I do on my turkeys - but I prefer painting on the eyes for the snowman. Take your black craft paint, a piece of paper (or paper plate) and your straight pin and get ready to paint some eyes!


Step Twenty:
20A: Pour a teensy amount of black paint out onto a piece of paper, and dab your the pearl end of your pin into the glue. I then dab once onto the paper and then onto the snowman - creating an eye. Repeat the process for the second eye.

20B: Now your snowman has a face! Holla!

Now at this point you can turn him into a pin, an ornament or a hair clip. We're going to make him into a hair clip today.

Step Twenty-One:
21A: Take your ribbon covered hair clip and put a line of glue from the end that opens, right up to the point where the clip bends. Don't glue where you pinch to open the clip.

21B: Then secure your snowman to the clip with the bottom of the snowman butting up to bottom edge of your line of glue.


He's done! Now if you want him to have a girlfriend, just make a bow instead of the ear muffs!

January Fun: Roll a Snowman

The January snowman fun continues!

When I first started this project, I was going to make
it out of paper, but decided making good use of the
abundance of felt that I've collected over the past year
would be an awesome idea.

You'll need:

• felt
• snowman template
• Roll a Snowman Card
• old cereal box
• freezer paper (not necessary - but awesome)

First I traced the snowman shape onto freezer paper.
I love freezer paper, because then you can iron
it onto your fabric and it adheres temporarily.

Next I cut two pieces of felt that were slightly
larger than the piece of cardboard that I cut from
the cereal box.
I wanted it to be semi-stiff.
If you want yours to be soft and pliable,
you can skip the cereal box.

Then cut out your snowman and sew it to one
of your larger pieces of felt.

I hadn't planned on giving him arms,
but this really bothered JT, so I used some
pieces of ribbon as arms.

On the other piece of felt I sewed a little pocket.
Mine was 7x9" and I folded the top down 1"
and top stitched before using a 1/4" seam
to attach it to the large piece of felt.


Next I stitched around three of the four sides with a 1/4"
seam, leaving the top open so I could slip the piece
of cardboard in between.


Then I closed off the top and my snowman board was ready!


Next I made the pieces.
Except for the hat, I just free-hand sewed the shapes.
It was my first time doing such a bold thing and it was a lot of fun :)


I used kind of a reversed technique where
I had two squares or rectangle pieces of felt sandwiched together
and then I would free-hand sew the design on and then cut it out.
It worked really well.


I made both a carrot and button nose again for JT,
because, "Mom, Frosty has a button nose."
Awesome.

I made the Roll a Snowman card
(which I plan to laminate),
and we are ready to ROLL.


You can download yours HERE!!!!



You can do this with paper and laminate the pieces
if the felt thing isn't your gig.
If you do make one for your kids, I'd love to see it!
You can link it up to my Flickr group - it's looking a little sad.

Tutorial Thursday: {The Isabella} Pleated Flounce Skirt

I'm slightly obsessed with making skirts for Isabella.
She loves them.
She likes dresses, but she {LOVES} skirts!

It all started with this skirt.


At Halloween, it was the tutu skirt
for her Little Red Riding Hood Costume.


Then I repurposed a pillowcase
dress I made for Isabella for her first trip
to Disneyland into this skirt
to match her the Minnie Cupcake shirt I made.


For Thanksgiving I made a skirt to match
her turkey face shirt.


And most recently I made a fabulous
little skirt for a cookie decorating party the
kids were invited to.


I just adore the pleats at the bottom,
so I decided to share with you how I made it,
in case you adore pleats like I do.



You'll need at least a 1/3 of a yard of your main fabric,
at least 15" of your contrasting fabric for the pleats,
and elastic to fit your little lady's waist.

Here is how I worked my math :) -
get ready for a wild ride into madness. LOL

I measured my little Isabella and I wanted my skirt to be 10" long.
However, I wanted my pleats to be about 2.5" long
and I need 1.75" for my waistband and work in .5" for
seam allowances.

10 - 2.5 = 7.5 + 1.75 = 9.25 + .5 = 9.75

I determined I that my main fabric piece
needed to be 9.75 inches long.

My waistband measurement comes from the fact
that my elastic is 1" wide, I roll it under .5"
first, and then 1.25" the second time to create
the casing. I roll it 1.25" the second time
so that I can topstitch the top seam too -
to keep the elastic from rolling.

First, cut your main fabric.
Using my measurements above, I cut 9.75"


When you open it up, you should have a long
piece that is 9.75" wide from selvage to selvage.


Next, you'll need to cut three 5" strips of your
contrasting fabric. Again, when you open them up
the will be 5" wide and run selvage to selvage.


Iron all of your pieces.
Then sew your pieces for pleating together
at the selvage ends, so you have one long strip that is 5" wide.
(Do not join the ends - you want a strip, not a tube.)


Now, go back to your iron and iron your pleat piece
in half - wrong sides together - so that it is now 2.5" wide.


Now it's time to make the marks for the pleat folds.
I decided I wanted my pleats 1.5", so every 1.5" inches
I made a mark with a Sharpie.
Continue marking the entire length of the fabric.


Starting at the right end of your strip, match
two marks together for each pleat. Pin pleat in place.


Continue pleating and pinning down the entire length of the fabric.



Run a basting stitch along the top edge of your pleats.


Pin the pleats to the right side bottom edge of your main fabric.


Sew the two together with with a seam allowance that is
just wider than where your basting stitch falls.

If you are fancy and have a serger, I recommend serging
the edge of this seam.
If you are not fancy like me and don't have a serger,
sew over the edge with a zigzag stitch to prevent fraying.

Flip your piece over and iron the seam.
Then topstitch.


Now it's time to join the selvage edges of your fabric,
creating a big fancy tube of fabric.


To create the casing for your waistband, fold and press the top
edge to the wrong side twice - first .5" and then just slightly larger
then the elastic you are using. I used 1" elastic
so I folded and pressed it about 1.25" the second time.
Now, topstitch both the bottom and top of the casing.
Leave about 2" open at the bottom of the casing to feed your elastic into.


I figure what length of elastic I need by just measuring
Isabella's waist. I don't add or subtract.
I know there are different methods for this.
I've been most successful by making the elastic the exact
same as her waist and then when I secure it
in the waist band, overlapping it about 1".

Feed your elastic through the casing by attaching a safety pin
to one end of the elastic and feeding it through the opening, all
the way around, and back out the opening.

Then, overlap the elastic about 1" and sew a rectangle on
the overlapping edges.
Push the remainder of the elastic back up in the
opening of the casing and finish the topstitching
to close off the casing.

VOILA!
You're done!