It's been such a long time.....

I have not been faithful to this blog lately. I have spent my summer with friends and family making lots of memories. I will post about all of them soon. I am also preparing for a craft show, so I will be sure to post sneak peeks along the way.

When I started on the PTO for our school, I gave up a girls ministry at church that I really love. So, now that I am done with PTO, I am back at GEMS. We are reviewing curriculum, planning crafts and special events.

Here is one picture from one of our summer photo shoots to tide you over. Much, much more to come.

NYC Here We Come!

Tomorrow Courteney and I head down to Detroit to hit up Home Goods and Ikea before we fly out on Saturday morning. We will be meeting up with Vicky in Dearborn and staying there for the night. The three of us head out early in the morning and are in the city by 10:30 am. We will stay until Tuesday and have much planned. You will have to wait for all of that, but I did whip up some wristlets for us last night.
I did 3 large floral patterns with ruffles and vintage buttons. Did I mention that 2 button shops are on my must see while in NYC?
I didn't have a pattern, but they went together very easily. I did get some help from here on how to sew the zipper to both the outside and lining at the same time. It worked great.These would be a great gift for bridesmaids or maybe coordinate for a prom or homecoming.
I will not be sewing for about a week and then I have a couple of promised things to finish first. I am also getting ready for the Legacy Christian School Craft fair on November 5. I figure if I do a little all summer I will not stress out the end of October. Good plan, right?

Claire and Lilly's Birthday Party

Time to celebrate the girls' birthdays! This year they settled on a butterfly birthday party. We used all of the china I have been collecting as well as my grandma's silver. It was HOT! So, we added a sprinkler for cooling down and the craft was moved inside.
We requested that in lieu of gifts, each girl bring what she would have spent on a gift and we would collect money to buy a water filtration system for a village in Haiti. Boy did they come through. All told, we collected enough for 2 filtration systems! My girls are still running around the house collecting change to see if they can get to 3.
The invitations were teal and orange so those colors spilled out onto the tables. I rented the tablecloths and napkins and it was more than worth it. I borrowed the tables from work and the chairs from my wonderful neighbor.
I cut fabric strips and ribbon for the back of the chairs. The chairs did not all match so this tied them all together. The tissue paper flowers were the pop of color.
Lunch was sandwich and fruit kabobs and jello. The girls made their own sandwiches using whatever they liked from the skewer. The rest they left behind.
We arranged the fruit on the kabob in the order of the rainbow. Each girl received a bag of goodies and a pair of wings. The bags had tattoos, rubber bracelets, rings, suckers and more. All in some form of butterfly. The girls strung bracelets and colored their backpacks with fabric markers. All of this was from Oriental Trading.The cake was made by Deb Penning. After sitting out in 90 degree heat, it started to lean a bit. However, it was delicious! We have so much we will be sharing for awhile.I bought face paint off of Amazon.com. It was GREAT! It went on very easy and washed off with little effort. The girls loved getting made up like butterflies.Another successful party. The girls all had a great time and I think that my girls learned that it is not the gifts that make the party, but the friends that you surround yourself with.

Lilly's Birthday Gift

I have been trying to figure out what to get Lilly for her birthday. She doesn't need anything. We don't need any more crap in our house. For their party with friends, we are not having gifts. Instead, we are collecting money for a water filtration system for Haiti. They need to learn that it is not about the gifts. They were not happy about it (maybe still not), but it is a lesson that we all need to learn.
Claire and Coco are getting her earrings. Jim wants to get her the game Mousetrap. I decided to make her some clothes for her hard-to-fit doll. We bought these dolls for the girls in 2007.I got them off Etsy from Jill Zurzolo. She was living in Japan at the time and started making dolls. I emailed her pictures of the girls, along with a description of their personalities, and she created these awesome dolls. The girls love them. I have had to "fix the hair" on these girls many times due to the sleeping with them in bed, playing and adventures.
They are custom dolls, so they are custom sized. Commercial clothes don't work. So, these girls are either in their cute dresses they arrived in or naked. Poor girls....
In comes my brainstorm.
I purchased a dress pattern from Avery Lane also on etsy, downloaded a free pants pattern online, and got started. Oh, I also ordered a sweater off of etsy, but it will not get here by tomorrow. Surprise mail is always a treat though.


Claire's doll decided she would help model. I made a total of 3 dresses, 3 pairs of pants, and 2 jackets. I suppose I will be duplicating this work next month for Claire's doll, but they go really fast. Including cutting, it took about 5 hours. It will go even faster next time because my serger will be fixed. I straight and zig zaged each seam because my serger is on the fritz.

Notice my new logo side tag in the seam of this dress? Isn't it cute? turtledove is the name I have chosen for all of the kids stuff I do. It is often the name I call the girls.

Each dress has matching pants. Can't see them in this one, but they show in the picture of Claire's doll.

Anyway, I am very satisfied with my most recent project. I am putting it all in a little case so she can take her doll and the wardrobe wherever she wants. I sure hope she is as impressed with it as I am.

Teacher Appreciation Week

This week is Teacher Appreciation Week. I know I probably should have put these ideas up before tonight, but I just put the finishing touches on them this evening. Teach girl will bring their teacher one gift each day this week. We LOVE our teachers do doing something like this for them is a lot of fun for all of us.

Monday:

You are a lifesaver! Thank you for teaching me so much this year!

Hobby Lobby had their glass containers 50% off. We filled them with individually wrapped lifesavers so the teacher can use them as treats for the class if they want.

The printable for the top is available from eighteen 25.

Tuesday:

You really measure up! Thanks for making this year great!

Measuring cups and spoons. Our Meijer had these for $5 for the whole set!

I have seen this several places, but I know it is shown on Smile Monsters.
Wednesday:

You deserve a hand!

These are cut outs of the girls' hands holding a small hand lotion.

This was actually a Valentines Day gift idea from Baltimore Mommies.
Thursday:

Teacher survival kit.

This is filled with paper clips, binder clips, post it notes, candy, thumb tacks, etc...

The idea for this wonderful gift came from one of my favorite blogs eighteen 25.
Friday:

Thanks for helping me bloom!

This idea and free template is from Skip to My Lou.
Hopefully you will still have some time to work in some of these ideas this year.

A special "Thanks" to all of the teachers out there. You are appreciated.

A New Beauty!

One last order wrapped up before I go on vacation. My cousin Lindsay asked me to make her a diaper bag similar to the one I made for a dear friend awhile back. She requested black, cream and pink.

Here is her finished bag. I LOVE it! The inset zipper came out great and I love the crystal button! I hope she likes it as much as I do.

Oh How Time Flies

I can't believe it has been a month since my last post. Work (my "real" job has been so busy I haven't had a lot of time to sew. I have a few orders to finish this week, so I will be making time. I did sew 2 bags for the school auction. I have made them for the last few years and they tend to do pretty well.

Here is a new ruffle style that I labeled the Uptown Girl. She made $200 for school. Not too shabby!
This beach bag went well last year. This year this bag went for $90.



I also made some headbands for the girls recently.

The flowers are made by wrapping pipecleaners with fabric and then rolling them into a circle. Super EASY!!

Hope this is a little crafty fix for you!