Church Bag

During the pandemic I bought 30 yards of fabric from some friend of a friend of a friend in Ghana who was trying to earn some money. I was hoping to use the fabric for mask covers (I made more than 1000), but it took so long for the people bringing the fabric to get here, that it was too late for masks. So, I ended up using some of the fabric for American Girl doll clothes, gave some to an African man who came and bought something at our house, donated some to a charity that makes bags, then made a few bags for us. The fabric is heavier than quilting cotton, but not as heavy as duck cloth. I wanted to record here that I think the perfect size for carrying a folder and a few things to church is 14" x 32" with 3" x 27" straps.

I don't need to go into great instructions on making the bags, but you need to fold the big piece of fabric in half and sew up the sides and create your depth in your preferred manner. For the straps, I just ironed in each long edge 1/2" then folded the whole thing the long way in half and sewed down each side. I probably put each end of the strap in from each edge of the bag about 3-4". I re-enforced each strap also.

12 Days of Christmas 2020

Everyone's been missing everyone, so to make some connections again we decided again to do the 12 Days of Christmas for all my 7 Primary activity girls' families (one of them being us). As I was planning it, I got a new partner, so she planned 3 of the days I hadn't purchased for yet. I didn't take good pictures, but wanted to at least make note of what we did for future reference. It was nice because we didn't need to deliver to ourselves, my partner took care of that! Our family all took turns delivering. My 11-year old probably enjoyed it the most, but it was a great family activity. I wonder if anyone didn't know who was making the drop offs since all of them have doorbell cameras!

1. I was going to do pears and a tree and a picture of a bird or something, but my partner got some nice pear chapstick.

You can see that my partner does way cuter stuff than me!

2. Turtle candy individually wrapped from the dollar store and Dove soap. I hope the chocolate didn't taste like the soap in the end!

3. I can't remember what my partner ended up doing for this, but I was going to make French bread and shape it like birds.

4. Chicken in a Biscuit crackers.

5. Ring Pops.

6. I was going to do a half dozen eggs, but my partner did those European egg candy things with the toy inside and cute golden-sprayed feathers on top. I'm sure the girls enjoyed the egg/candy more than actual eggs!

7. Hot chocolate pouches with a bag of marshmallows for the swans.

8. Graham crackers and milk (Honey Maid(s) a Milking).

9. Pirouettes, but I got the Pirouline's from Walmart and put a Pirouette label on them, since Pirouline's isn't a balet move.

10. Grasshopper cookies for Lord's a leaping, but I got the Winco kind and put a Grasshopper sticker on it.

11. Instead of pipers piping I did poppers popping with popcorn.

12. Instead of drummers drumming, I did dummers dumming with Dum-Dum suckers. Yeah, I got *really* creative.

To make things cute, I added a little text to pictures online.

Parrot Costume

I decided to be a pirate for Halloween this year. I had everything I needed except for boots, so I decided to make some shoe covers that looked like boots with some fake felt I had. I tried and tried shapes mainly for the Sonja costume, but still needed to know how to do them for myself. I found a couple tutorials that helped:

http://littlestonecape.blogspot.com/2012/10/childs-pirate-boots.html
http://www.practicallyfunctional.com/diy-rain-boot-liners/

For my little parrot I just made some wings to pin to a red fleece thing I made her (ok, I probably made it for her brother 12 years ago?), then made a little hat. I really liked this pattern, but made the hat too small, so she really ended up looking like a squid. I didn't bother putting a beak on the hat when I realized it was too small.

Sonja the Hedgehog

Did you even know there's a Sonja the Hedgehog? Yep. It's Sonic's sister. I think she turned out pretty cute, pink hair and all.

Colonial Day

In the middle of Halloween madness, it was Colonial Day for the 5th grade. I was crazy and decided to make a dress a week before. I was able to borrow a pattern and the dress turned out great. A little big, but super cute. I should have made the 10 rather than the 12 so it would fit my smaller daughters in the future in 5th grade.

Halloween Fun - Boho Bag

I used this tutorial for this cute hippie bag:

Sergers Rock

My daughter keeps asking for skirts. Sometimes it's just easier to make them yourself, ya know?

This one was a women's XXL from Target, cut down:


This was a L shirt from Kohl's cut down for a 7 y.o. I might round out the bottom, but we'll see how we like it on.



Then, I bought this HUGE poncho shirt (it was marked a small, but it's more like a man's XXL in width). I found this AWESOME tutorial from It's Always Autumn on making a easy t-shirt and simple baseball/raglan shirt. I didn't want to mess with the cute neck on this one, so I just did the easy t.


I also took in a cute peasant top, but didn't take a pic. My old one is just a little tight in the bust since I'm nursing and fatter thank I'd like to be. I needed a bit more room.

These were my starting experiments with old t-shirts:

I also learned how to put in elastic with the serger!

This is so awesome. The options are endless. I should probably take a class.