Ballerina Birthday

 Here's the second birthday we celebrated this summer... (check out yesterday's yellow LEGO birthday & if you're looking for more birthday party ideas last year we threw an octopus party & princess Rapunzel party).

This year the birthday girl had a ballet themed party, the color scheme was pink with a little white & a touch of silver and here is how we celebrated...

The decorations:
:: store bought ballerina scrapbooking stickers
:: one roll of store bought pre-ruffled pink ribbon
:: 5 pink ballerinas using this template cut out of pink construction paper

 :: I sewed tutus for my daughter's 2 (doll size) dress forms
:: fish bowl shaped punch bowl filled with one yard of pink tulle

 The sweet treats:
:: pink marshmellows
:: pink & white heart shaped candies
:: pink cookies

 Step-by-step photos on how I created the ballerina birthday party invitations...

Inside the invitations:
Come dance and twirl with the birthday girl!
Ballerina (name) is turning (age)!
Date, time, location, RSVP.
Be sure to wear your favorite leotard!

 The cupcake topper was a bamboo kabob stick cut down to be shorter & store bought ballerina outfit scrapbooking sticker.

 The cupcakes:
:: pink ruffled cupcake liners
:: chocolate GF cupcakes with pink frosting

 20 apple juice boxes decorated with tutus
:: 4" X 8" pink construction paper
:: 2" X 8" pink tulle
:: 7.5" pink grosgrain ribbon
:: double sided tape

 One of the crafts: ballerinas with cupcake liner tutus

 We rented a dance studio & a conference room (for the party room) the first part there was dancing lead by a teacher which included "ballerina says" which is like "Simon says" but ballet themed, the girls also played tutu dress-up using tutus from my daughter's tutu collection.

 The birthday girl got a fancy bun hairstyle.

If you need some ideas for your own ballet birthday party, here are some:
ballerina printables
ballet slipper book mark
diy fun tutus
ballerina tote bag
tutu totes
ballerina pop-up cards
tulle pom party wands
tulle pom poms
Not too tutu tutorial
Ballerina cotton candy party favors

PS I've caught up on my summer blog posts and now I'm going to be taking a little blog break, it'll be pretty quiet around here the next 2-3 weeks as I'll be getting my three kids ready to go back to school, then sending them off to school, then I'll be sewing, sewing, and sewing for Project Run and Play Season 5. Until the next post, take care :)

Yellow LEGO birthday

 We celebrated 2 summer birthdays again this summer... Looking for kid birthday ideas? Last year we threw a boy octopus party (for an 8 year old) and a girl Princess Rapunzel party (for a 4 year old).

This year for the birthday boy it was a yellow LEGO theme (his favorite color and his favorite toy), here's how we celebrated...

The invitations were yellow card stock and made to look like the top of a LEGO brick. Super easy to make using 6 circles from  a 1 1/4" circle paper punch and attaching them with 3D foam mounting squares.

 We decorated by putting up 9 paper LEGO minifigures on the wall. We took this LEGO minifigure template, enlarged it, printed out 2 halves, taped them together, traced them onto yellow construction paper, then cut them out.

 The LEGO minifigure head jars were baby food jars...

 spray painted with yellow paint...

  and black permanent marker used to add faces. Inside each jar was a LEGO minifigure. The jars were used for playing a game, just like an Easter egg hunt, we hid them out in our yard and the kids went hunting for them.

 Yellow LEGOs were used to build the fork holder.

 Yellow LEGO minifigure candies were made using a LEGO minifigure ice cube tray and yellow candy melt.

 From a local candy store we purchased candy building blocks...

 that you can actually build with.

 We baked a gluten-free LEGO brick cake in a bread loaf pan, using a GF yellow cake mix, 6 GF vanilla sandwich cookies, and yellow frosting.

 Juice boxes were served, to make these, take 4" X 8" yellow construction paper, with double sided adhesive wrap the paper around the juice box. Cut out 2 circles using a 1 1/4" circle punch and attach them to the front side of the juice box using glue dots.

 The gift bags were yellow lunch bag sized paper sacks with 8 circles, cut out using a 1 1/4" circle punch and attached with glue dots.

 The kids played a game of guess how many LEGO minifigures are in the jar, the prize was a LEGO minifigure.

 Our pinata was inspired by this, it was thrown together very quickly using a cardboard box, cardboard toilet paper tubes, yellow artist's tape, and yellow spray paint. It did not look perfect, but I don't even think the kids even noticed as they were more interested in the candy that was inside :)

 Supply list:
Minifigure Ice Cube Tray
LEGO minifigure head storage bin
LEGO brick alarm clock
LEGO brick lunch boxes
LEGO brick storage containers

See you tomorrow for the second summer birthday party!

Snow White Dress

 My daughter had a princess class in July where she wanted to dress up each day, so she 'needed' another princess dress. She didn't have a Snow White one yet, so Snow White it was. I was inspired by this dress and these adorable dresses...

And here is my version, a cute simple easy to wash and wear peasant style dress made out of cotton fabrics. What I used...

 The Fabrics:
:: for the bodice: blue broadcloth
:: for the sleeves: light blue with red polka dots, although if you look real close the red polka dots have a pink ring then a blue ring around them
:: for the skirt: yellow with tiny white hexagons, it's Karen Snyder - Studio Anna Lena for Timeless Treasures Fabrics

 The Pattern:
:: Sweet Little Dress pattern from Leila and Ben
:: size 5
:: I had .5 yard of the yellow fabric, so the skirt part uses 18inches, then the rest of the dress used the blue broadcloth
:: I topstitched the the blue bodice (where it joined the yellow skirt) to give it a finished look
:: the dress goes down to the knee
:: what I love about it is that it's completely reversible, no buttons, no zipper, just slip it over the head ~ she can put in on & take if off all by herself (she doesn't need any of my help), so it's perfect for dress-up ! 

 Boy this Sweet Little Dress pattern sure has gotten a lot of use by me, if you're looking for different ways to us it, I have made one:
:: that was granny smith apple green with white polka dots for Christmas
:: repurposed from a vintage pillowcase with hand embroidery & crochet lace trim
:: from a man's white dress shirt into one that has 3 ruffles down the front
:: from a white eyelet strapless summer sun dress

If anyone is looking to start sewing for little girls I highly recommend starting with the Lazy Days Skirt (free) pattern, actually it's just a tutorial as no pattern is needed. But after you've sewn a Lazy Days skirt, I think this Sweet Little Dress pattern would make a good next step.

PR&P Season 5 Challenges

The Project Run & Play Season 5 challenges were announced today...

Have you seen them yet? Check them out!
Week #1-- Pattern Remix--"It's okay to be Bias Skirt Tutorial"
Week #2-- Fashion Icon Challenge
Week #3-- White Sheet Challenge
Week #4-- Boy's Wear
Week #5-- Holiday Wear
Week #6-- Signature Look

I have so many ideas I cannot wait to share with you. I think I'm most excited about Boy's Wear, which will be Week #4, I have an awesome look that I hope you will like, too, but I have to get enough votes during the first 3 weeks to be able to make it to Week #4. Although I do have to say that I'm a little scared about drafting pants, any advice on drafting pants?? Please share :)

As far as photographing my creations, I'm hoping to have the modeling photo sessions at different locations in my area, to give you a tour of where I live (Twin Cities area of Minnesota).

So I'd love to hear what are your thoughts about the themes each week? Which one are you most looking forward to? Do you plan to sew along during Season 5? If so, do you have all the updated measurements for your child(ren)?

I guess I better get started cutting bias strips.

Alright everyone, now it's time to "make it work"...

Super Duper Exciting Announcement

I'm so happy to share this news with you today:

I was invited to compete in Season 5 of Project Run & Play !!!

And I said yes.

What perfect timing... just before I was invited a child sized dress form (in above photo) arrived in the mail, a brand new tool for me to use, so I am ready to dive right in.

Season 5 will start September 10th with voting starting September 14th.

Check out the other 7 designers in the competition, should be fun, huh?

This will be a wonderful opportunity to improve my designing/pattern drafting/sewing skills. I want to push myself and learn more. I also want to have fun, try new things, and to step it up a notch. We will see what time and my ability will allow.

Can you tell I am so looking forward to this? Many thanks to Elizabeth & liZ of Simple Simon & Co for the invitation !

OK, now I'm off to finish cleaning up my sewing room, shop for fabrics, and sew, sew, sew...

I sure hope my sewing machine doesn't break anytime soon.

I'll see you on the runway!

PS Tomorrow the Season 5 challenges will be announced :)

Yellow Submarine

This is a re-post of a tutorial I did a couple of weeks ago for Melly Sews, just in case you missed it...
*****
 Hello Melly Sews readers! I'm Rachel and I blog at nest full of eggs. I have 3 children, 2 of whom are boys. I enjoy sewing, but I have to admit that I mostly sew for my daughter, so I was thrilled to be asked to contribute to the Sew in Tune series because it pushed me to do more boy sewing and I enjoy a challenge. I picked "Yellow Submarine" by The Beatles because yellow is my 2nd son's favorite color and the submarine part inspired me to create something water themed and sailor/nautical styled.

Let's start off with the sailor pants... The pattern I used was the Oliver + S sailboat pants pattern. I found this gray chambray (or is it linen? it's a very lightweight fabric) as a large remnant at a menswear fabric clearance table at a big fabric warehouse, I decided gray would be the perfect neutral to go with the yellow ~ that it would make the yellow really pop. I really liked the idea of adding piping around the button front pant detail which I saw from Gail at Probably Actually. So yellow piping (made out of broadcloth) it was and this being the first time I'd ever made (or even sewn with) piping I followed this tutorial on how to make your own piping. 4 yellow buttons with anchors (etsy to the rescue) were the perfect touch. The buttonhole function isn't currently working on my sewing machine, so I used this tutorial for making a button hole using the zigzag stitch.

 For the lining I opted not to use the gray chambray (or linen?) and instead I used yellow fabric with white rain drops (helping with the water theme going on here), it is from the Hoodie's Collection "Raindrops" for Timeless Treasures Fabrics. I took extra care to make sure the thread color matched the fabric (gray thread on gray fabric and yellow thread on yellow fabric).

 Now let's move onto the yellow striped sailor shirt...

 For this I repurposed an old adult sized long sleeve white t-shirt from my closet.

 I reduced it to my son's size and by doing this I got rid of those ugly underarm stains! I simply turned the shirt inside out, on top placed a t-shirt that fits my son well, and traced it with a purple disappearing ink marker. This purple line became my sewing line. After sewing it, I trimmed off the excess fabric, and turned it right side out.

 I painted on yellow stripes by using yellow Tulip soft fabric paint, this was a technique that I learned from Justine from Sew Country Chick that she shared at Project Run&Play.  The stripes are spaced about 1 inch apart from each other and I used rulers to help with the spacing and also for aiding in painting straight lines.

 It took about an hour to paint the stripes on one side of the shirt, then it takes 4 hours for the paint to dry. Flip it over and repeat.

 Lastly I sewed on 4 yellow buttons with anchors to the shoulders (2 on each shoulder).

Thanks Melissa and Stacey for having me!