November...

Is upon me! Now that Halloween is past, I feel a little crazed about all the things I want to get done by Christmas, which seems to loom large in the very near future. I'm also full of holiday spirit as I remember my holidays last year leading up to my daughter being born just before midnight on Christmas day. I'm excited to think of all the traditions that we'll create in the years to come and defying the odds of Christmas birthdays being a drag. My husband and I are committed to making her birthday just as special, if not more so, as if it were any other time of year. So there!

I have several custom orders from friends and family to complete; makes me feel good to be busy, even if it's business from biased sources, it's still business!

My headaches have subsided for the most part. I wonder if I was stressed about Halloween? Surprising, but maybe that was it. Halloween was wonderful, incidentally. I couldn't have asked for a better 1st one for my baby girl. She had a great day. While I got ready she played with all my stage makeup on the floor of the bathroom. We visited her Daddy at his work (a bookstore) along with my sister and her family, who were also in costume.

A pit stop at the smoothie place afterwards was grand fun and delighted the smoothie girls as well. On the way to the car, D had a blowout and got her entire outfit dirty, but I had taken her important costume components off already and had spares of what she was wearing. I also didn't have any wipes with me (she really never has these blowouts, it was quite the fluke) but it happened when Celena was still very close by so the Bears came to the rescue and it ended up being no big deal. The weather was really nice too.

Then we went to our neighbors' little girl's birthday/Halloween party; where Dicey got to have a couple nibbles of cake and found lots of things to pick up off the floor and was so excited to be in a crowd of kids. She was totally comfortable in her costume, which made me want to burst with pride.

We hung out on the neighbors' driveway, playing with tiny pumpkins and kids until it started to get dark and trick or treaters were coming. Dicey waved at the kids when they came to our door and got to meet her first parrot, Gustavo!

We kept the babies up a little bit late because of daylight savings time, which was fun because D likes to stay up later than normal for exciting things. The Bears stayed and we watched ridiculous horror movies while passing out candy and eating pizza.

I'm in denial about Christmas present shopping though. I hope I don't start getting headaches before every holiday!

Costume Basic for Baby 12 easy steps!

This is a pattern that I created for my 10 month old (who is a little on the small side, but this would fit a wide range of sizes) daughter's Bride of Frankenstein Halloween costume using cloth diapers! She will be wearing a long sleeved white onesie, long white pants and white socks underneath. I have also made her a Bride hairdo hat to complete the look. This tutorial is for the white gown/robe/tunic portion of her costume. Click on the pictures for larger versions of these images!

You will need:

4 white cloth diapers (the kind everyone uses as burp cloths these days)

white thread

needle

4 snaps

(sewing machine is preferable for a couple of steps*, but not necessary)

Steps 1-2

First, you lay out two of the diapers; then fold over the inside edges to the middle, away from each other.

Steps 3-4

Next, sandwich the top edges of the diapers together so that the open flaps of the foldover are on the inside. Sew all four layers together just to the width of the folded over section. This creates your first shoulder seam. You will repeat steps 1-3 on your other 2 diapers so that you have 2 halves of your costume.

This caption reads (other side of stitched edge) It shows you what the shoulder of your finished costume looks like when it's folded right side out.

Steps 5-7

Now, lay your costume halves wrong side out again. Bring the two long edges that were folded over in step 2 together to make a side seam *easier with a sewing machine; leaving space for an armhole. Again, do this for the other half of your costume as well.

Step 8

Now to start bringing your two halves together! First (a somewhat optional step - mostly for aesthetics, somewhat for fitting) accordion fold and stitch the top edge (the leftover part that was not sewn into your shoulder seam) of one of your front-of-the-costume pieces to create a gather at the neckline of the costume. Do so to the other half as well.

Steps 9-10

Next, bring the two long edges that form the front of your costume together and sew the entire length *easier with a sewing machine. The gathered edges should be at the top of the seam you are creating. You will then (another aesthetic step) fold over just the edge of your gathered section and stitch it down so that the serged edge doesn't show on the front of the costume.

Step 11

Check your costume. It is almost complete! 11a is what the front should look like; 11b is the back.

Step 12

On the back of your costume, there are two side pieces of cloth diaper that will overlap easily when you hold the garment by the shoulder seams. In order to finish the costume, you will need to sew 4 snaps (2 pieces to a snap = 8 sides to sew) so that they will serve to adequately close the back of the costume and keep it from falling open when your child bumbles around in it. You could do this step with velcro, ties, buttons, hooks and eyes, etc. Whatever your preference is will probably work just fine.

I'm using this pattern for the Bride of Frankenstein, but it would work for many fun characters; such as Princess Leia, Gandalf, Mr. Spock from Star Trek IV, a ghost who didn't like to have their face covered...and that's just with it being white! You could throw it in the sink or washing machine with some fabric dye of your choice and the possibilities would be endless!!! :D*

The cloth diapers I used were ones with a pretty thick middle section. I preferred these as they created the big square shoulder that I was trying to achieve. You could use a less padded diaper if you wanted less of a shoulder pad effect.

Here comes Halloween!

I don't have much time these days to write nice posts, but thought I'd at least share some pics of some of what's keeping me busy!

As you may have guessed, I'm making my baby girl's first halloween costume; the Bride of Frankenstein. Here, you see my concept sketch, and my usage of my compost canister as a mannequin (it's the closest thing I have to her head circumference). I've had to buy a few things, it was supposed to be an easy peasy 1 2 3-sy kind of project, which I think it basically will be, but I've had to purchase a few more items than I originally thought. Isn't that always the way?

Dicey was very cooperative for her first fitting! Here, the hat is just basted together. It's made out of fleece. I plan on putting some lightweight plastic boning in the hat to help it keep its shape and adding ric rac chin straps to mimic the stitch lines on her throat. I couldn't find the skinny ric rac, so I bought the regular width, but am not sure I will be happy with it. Sigh.