Two finished Jump Rope Dresses & more fun!

The Sew-Mama-Sew Jump Rope Dress sew-along was so much fun! I finished a day or two late, but now my girlies each have a new dress!

I haven't gotten a perfect picture of the view A dress yet, but here's a peek. It really turned out so cute! The woven plaid is thin and so soft! I made the long sleeves but added a tab with a buttonhole inside the sleeve and a button on the outside at short-sleeve length so that the sleeves can be rolled up. This works well with the thin fabric but wouldn't with anything much thicker.

I really like how view B turned out as well!

Today I spent a little time working on a new tutorial for Moda Bake Shop! It's turning out really cute - I can't wait to share it with you all!

I read about fun contest I may try and join in on! Purse Week at Lemon Squeezy Home! I'm going to do a bit of thinking and see if I come up with something to try!

Quick blankie, Jump Rope Sew-Along and a fun suprise!

I wanted to share a quick little project I sewed yesterday! A friend's little girl was so sad to outgrow her very favorite dresses so I was happy to turn them into a special keepsake for her. I thought about what would be the best way to do it for a few days, and finally settled on a simple 4-triangle-panel design because I wanted to keep the ruffles all around the edges.

Here's the before:

And here's the after!  (Excuse the cruddy lighting on both - just phone pictures taken in a rush so the blankie would be ready for the little girl's birthday party.)

In other sewing news, I've been having fun with the Jump Rope Sew-Along at Sew Mama Sew! I decided to make 2 dresses, 1 for each of my girls, although I'm sure they'll both wear each since they they both measure the same size for this pattern! I've chosen a woven plaid for view A and the floral print I mentioned previously for view B! Here's a peek at both in progress (turn you head and pretend Blogger is not rotating for no reason).

And one last bit of fun - my little Strip-Pieced Pleated Skirt recipe was featured at We All Sew! Take a peek - there's a huge list of free project tutorials and several I'd like to try!

New fabric swatch, a pillowcase & request for fabric selection help!

Remember that little contest I held back in July? Well Aubrey AKA Mauby was the winner and she chose a custom design based on my digital scrapbook paper pack, Rough & Tumble! She actually really liked the way the paper pack preview looked, with the patterned stripes, so that's what I used as the basis of the fabric design! Here's the final product! (You can pick some up for yourself at Spoonflower!)

Making this fabric inspired me to finally round out the paper pack and turn it into a full kit, which you can see more about HERE.

Back in May, when I visited a quilt show my little 4-year-old chose some fabric for a new pillowcase. Somehow that little project kept getting forgotten, but no longer! I cut and partially sewed it a few days ago and finished stitching it up today. It has her seal of approval!

The fabrics are all "Spring Meadow" by Cheri Strole. I have a bit left of the main print, about 1/4 yard. and just a bit of the stripe left. It would make a cute t-shirt applique I think!

Have you heard about the about-to-start Sew-Along at Sew Mama Sew? I decided to join in the fun! I received my Oliver + S Jump Rope Dress pattern in the mail yesterday and I'm trying to decide which fabric to use now. I'm determined to use something from my stash because I have way, way too much stocked up! If I don't use all the yards of fabric I've bought to "someday" make an outfit with for my girls, soon they won't want me to make them anything with it! Right now I'm thinking of using a cute floral off-brand I picked up at Hobby Lobby last year or maybe the year before that. I found a photo of the floral on flickr -- click over and let me know what you think! I wonder if it is too busy -- I don't want all the nice Jump Rope dress details to be hidden. I  have enough of a coordinating multicolor dotted fabric to use it for the whole dress and just use a bit of the floral as an accent, but I don't know that my 6yo would be pleased because it's not super-girly.  Now that I'm writing all this out I'm leaning toward setting this fabric to the side making a run for the fabric store for some nice shirting material or a not-at-all busy print like the pink shown HERE. Tell me what you think!