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Friday, May 23, 2014

Ninja Turtle Princess Dress

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In my last post I talked about Cordelia's third birthday- but I didn't mention what she was wearing! Part of creating a perfectly girly, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle, birthday party means coming up with a girly Ninja Turtle outfit! Or in her words- a princess ninja turtle outfit. 

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My hubby gets a lot of credit for helping come up with this design. We spent a lot of time bouncing ideas back and forth. I knew the dress had to be long, because Cordelia adores twirling and swishing in long dresses, and really no Disney princess wears a short dress right? He came up with the idea of the medallion on the belt having her own initial, and not one of the turtles from the show. He also kept me in check when I thought the belt went under the shell and not over it!

So after I sketched it out, and refined some things, off to the fabric store I went to buy more calico cotton- because if I can't make it out of calico or novelty quilter cotton, I'm probably not making it at all ;-) 

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The green is a speckled/uneven tone which I thought made it look extra turtle-ish, the shell is a similar pattern but a much darker green, and the yellow has tiny vines and flowers. I added lots of brown top stitching to create the look of stomach and the shell. I forgo-ed a mask, or a pink headband to give the idea of a mask, because I knew there would be no way she would keep it on and it would make me nuts for the afternoon! 

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The shell has batting in between it's layers to add weight and stiffness- so it could stand up on it's own and really give the idea of a shell, even when people looked at her from the front. I like that it adds a cape like effect too- which is very princess like. The best part of the whole dress:

It's machine washable, and the pink frosting came off it just fine. 


Happy Birthday, Dear Cordelia, Happy Birthday to You.

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Brendon and I have a great kid. A really truly, fantastic kid. She loves so many things, and with such enthusiasm- which is a really cool part about this age, she always seems soo willing to throw her arms around my neck and tell me how much she loves me, or how happy she is to see me, or how much she has missed me. So far age three is all about emotions! Ecstatically happy, or dramatically upset- total roller coaster. Anyways, she has many many passions-  Bugs, animals, singing, riding her bike, princesses, art, and Ninja Turtles. Right now, especially Ninja Turtles. Which is why she requested a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle Birthday Party. 


The challenge then became how to make the theme fit her! She is as girly as she is a tom boy and I knew she would be totally disappointed if there was no pink involved. So, I came up with the idea of making her the 5th Ninja Turtle- making her into a ninja turtle- the pink ninja turtle.

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We didn't go crazy with the pink turtle but it was a great jumping off point, and I feel like it tied in the pink cups, forks, and balloons. And these super cute (and tasty- creamcicle flavored) cupcakes my sister made- with awesome toppers our other sister made! I am lucky to have such a creative and talented family. 

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We ate veggies, fruit, Oreo "man hole covers", marshmallow pops in the key TMNT colors, chocolate pretzel  turtles, and pizza of course. 

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The chocolate pretzel turtles were the best- and super easy! It's just a small pretzel with a piece of candy melted on it- I used Recee's cups, Andes mints, Kisses, and Rolos. I have such an all consuming obsession when it comes to party planning, making lists, thinking up new ideas (with lots of help from Pinterest, check out my party board!getting everything done, but when it comes to the day of the party I never manage to stop and really get good photos! It makes me nuts at the end of the day. 

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One of the things I most enjoyed about this party was that it was the first party Cordelia really had friends at- kids her age! Kids I got to make goodie bags for and plan activities for! The bags I made, and they were filled with coloring books, stickers, bubbles, TMNT masks, homemade green slime (mutagen!), and temporary tattoos. 

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For activities we had "Ninja Training" where the kids fought balloons (and each other) with foam swords made by Brendon, "Target Patrice" was a bean bag toss made by me, "Make a Ninja" was a play dough station- with homemade play dough made by my sister, and you could "Take a Picture With a Ninja" thanks to the amazing photo station painted by my brother and sister in law! 

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She must have left food on her face. 

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It was such a fun party- and it was really neat to watch her open all her presents, and inspect everything, and get soo genuinely excited and grateful for everything. I'm really grateful for my family who helped sooo sooo very much, and to everyone who came out to help make Cordelia's 3rd Birthday amazing!    

Thursday, May 22, 2014

Vintage May: Part Two

Vintage May: 50's inspired rick rack dress

The past couple of days have been nuts. I have had this crazy, non stop manic energy- I keep going going going until I crash. It's exhausting, and I'm not sure how productive it actually is, but it's helping out my sewing/blogging a bit! SO, originally I had only planned on doing one Vintage May post, but when researching ideas (on Pinterest of course, you can check out my board here) I pinned tons of darling dresses and my sister encouraged me to recreate one! and since I work best under a deadline, I figured I would give it a shot. I adore a good peter pan collar, so I modeled the dress I made off of this one

Vintage May: 50's inspired rick rack dress

Vintage May: 50's inspired rick rack dress

The dress is made from all things I had on hand! I am trying to use up some of my stash because I am running out of room- and If I run out of room I don't think my hubby will let me keep going to the fabric store! The fabric is calico print cotton from Joanne, the white is also quilters cotton but I have no idea where it came from, and the pink rick rack was purchased not to long ago because I have a rick rack problem (vintage, new, it doesn't matter I can't have enough of it). The pink buttons are also from Joann's. 

Vintage May: 50's inspired rick rack dress

A funny story to go with the dress. Our nap time is disappearing- and so is bed time, which isn't funny but the conversations we have when she is supposed to be sleeping are often funny, which keeps me from going crazy. Cordelia has always been a great sleeper, and it's spoiled us because I have no idea how to handle this nonsense. I give props to parents that have problems with sleeping children. Anyways, the other night I am cutting this dress out and picking trims out and Cordelia comes out of her room and starts talking to me about what I'm making. Then she says "mommy, I want to watch you make sombthin, I just sit here and watch". So I explain no you can't sweetie and take her back to her room. She comes back 10 minutes later as I'm picking trim, she examines what I'm doing and after discovering the stash of ball fringe insists that the dress MUST have yellow ball fringe. Instead I tell her that my next project will be a skirt with lots of ball fringe. I finally get her to bed and in the morning she is soooo disappointed that she didn't have a ball fringe skirt ready for her.  Then the next day when she sees this dress she was totally disappointed that it lacked ball fringe. Being three must be hard, so many disappointments. However, my next project is a ball fringe adorned skirt.  

Vintage May: 50's inspired rick rack dress

We took these photos at Brookside Gardens, again because I hoped for a backdrop of roses (they have a great rose garden) but we are just slightly too early for all the roses to be out. We did see a bunny, and that makes for a successful outing in my opinion. 

Vintage May: 50's inspired rick rack dress

The pocket made up for the lack of ball fringe I think- Cordelia loves anything with a pocket- because without a pocket where would she put her rocks and moss? I also made her pink head scarf, and when I put it on her she said "ooooh just like mommy wear".

Vintage May: 50's inspired rick rack dress

Vintage May: 50's inspired rick rack dress

At the end of the day I love dresses. I am always most proud of the dresses I make- they are my heart when it comes to sewing. They are also my personal favorite thing to wear. 

Vintage May: 50's inspired rick rack dress

And one last photo with a slightly silly face. And a big thank you to my sister Shauna for editing these photos- you are the best.  

Monday, May 19, 2014

Vintage May

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After thinking up a garment, picking out fabric, sewing it up, bribing the three year old to smile for photos, and then editing said photos, thinking up a name for a blog post is hard work! Actually, sometimes writing that blog post at all is pretty hard (hence the silence on the blog). Vintage May is a yearly sewing series thought up by the lovely ladies at Craftiness is Not Optional and Skirt as Top. I love seeing the beautiful creations by all the participants, and the readers creations too- which you can check out in the Vintage May flickr group! Really, I'm kinda a vintage enthusiast so this is an exciting month for me! 

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For this outfit I decided to use one of my Mother's vintage patterns- I think she used look 1 when she made it for my brother back in the day, However, I picked look 4, and decided to make the whole thing a little unconventional by using floral instead of a traditional sailor look. Overall the romper was fun to make- even if the instructions at times were a little vague. 

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The floral cotton was ordered from fabric.com to make a dress for me, but once I saw it in person I decided the colors wouldn't look terrific with my skin tone- and I really am not big on wearing white. Lucky for me, Miss C doesn't really have the same complication and she hasn't met a color that didn't look good on her. It was nice to do a project using only materials I had on hand- including the red rick rack which is vintage (handed down by my grandmother). 

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For our photos we went to the Franciscan Monastery- the gardens are beautiful and during the day it's very peaceful. I was hoping that all of the roses would be in bloom, but we will have to go back in a week or two because only a few bushes were ready. 

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The hat is one I found around the house- it actually has a black band on it, but I added the red stripe so it would match her "look". She actually did a pretty good job keeping it on which surprised me!

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It was fun how Cordelia had to stop at every patch of flowers to smell them, now she is very runny nosed even though I gave her allergy medicine- man spring is tough, but thank goodness we have finally said goodbye to all the snow!