Bibs for self feeding

Little Sir hasn’t let me feed him anything other than yogurt and cereal for a couple of months now. Very independent eater which he loves and so do I as it frees me to organise Little Lady’s meals and my own so that we can all sit down to eat together. However, the mess is quite astounding, particularly since Little Lady was such a neat self feeder by comparison. I have a mountain of teatowels that I use to tuck around his belly and over his legs to catch the worst of it but he’s loves playing peek-a-boo with them and typically has no interest in having his clothes changed after each meal. So I needed something less removable to cover him with.
I had a rough pattern that I’d taken from a similar bib I was given as a gift when Little Lady was born. The only thing I really kept was the raglan sleeves – I changed the length and width of the sleeves and body and back fastening. The first one I made was a little short (the grey on the left) so I adjusted the length and also added a second layer if flannel to the body to help protect his clothes from more liquidy foods like custards and yoghurts. Once I had the measurements correct I made 4 more in varying colours. Oh, and they’re just made of jersey as I wanted something soft with a bit of give and it was on sale at the time.

They fasten at the back with velcro and wrap slightly around his sides. How this child winds up with food in his armpits I’ll never know. Talent, I guess.

The wrists are elasticised which was a learning curve for me. Initially I was sewing the hem and threading elastic through, sewing the ends of the elastic together then sewing shut the gap in the hem but with such tiny little wrists it was a real pain and very fiddly. In the end I cut a length of elastic just long enough to wrap around his wrist and stretched it while sewing it with a zigzag stitch to the seam allowance of the cuff, then folded over the cuff hem and sewed that down before sewing the inner arm seam. Just thinking about it now tho, next time I’ll zigzag the elastic on, sew the inner arm seam then fold the cuff hem and sew, that way there is less bulk to irritate his wrists where the seams meet…. just rambling to myself.

I finished off the edges with some bias binding - my first attempt and I think I did a pretty good job.

Finished and ready for mess.

My work space

Tho it may look like a squished, cramped corner of chaos, this is my little slice of sanity.

 

The ironing board doubles as my design table and cutting surface and my entire stash of fabric lives in a clear box on the floor behind me.

For now it'll do because the biggest advantage it has is that it's right in the middle of the action that is my kitchen/family room where my two little monkeys play. But when they're older, look out! Big plans for big renovations. Sigh. Ah, one day....

I must, I must, I must increase my.....skill

Free motion quilting - I need practice. Lots of practice. My first attempt was just hideous. Lots of knots, bunching and pulling, the other side was just awful. I'm lucky I didn't break anything. So rather than waste the effort, I'm going to make something useful while I practice.

Placemats for our dinner table. I'm going to try stipling first then as I get better I'll try some free motion designs to quilt them.

Emma's Quilt...al...most...there!

It's so close to being done - it's staring at me, quilted and full of pins. Course it's been like that for a week lounging over the back of my couch. I'll get there, it's just that.....well.....do you ever get that feeling once you've finished something like "Oh, it's done then. What no more? Oh, OK. Shame, I was quite enjoying it." That's how this quilt makes me feel. I've really enjoyed putting it together, I love looking at the bright colours. So here's the quilt top. I tried something different with the binding but you won't get to see it until it finishes staring at me.

Nicola's Baby Quilt - finished and delivered

Lots of crafting going on at the moment. I finished Nicola's quilt a month ago and was finally able to give it to her 2 weeks ago.

With wider, shorter sleeves for the rope and bound again - just waiting for the rope.

Finished front...

...finished back...

...and tassles. They're attached by wrapping in and around the rope and looped over a colour matched button so they can come off when the quilt needs to be thrown into the washing machine.

I've also been working on Emma's baby quilt. Just need to finish binding it and then I have an idea for a matching change mat. Remaking Lincoln's quilt and the baby playmat for a venture I'm hoping to get off the ground with my sister. Knitting little slippers for Little Lady who is just chewing through them right now (my carpet is ridiculously hard on socks and slippers). Finally sewed the velcro on Little Sir's long sleeved bib which is a little short for what I had mind so more of these to come. Lots to do. Aahhh it feels good to be useful.

Nicola's Baby Quilt - almost there...

This has been picked up, put down, sewn and unpicked more times that I can count and the baby it's intended for is now 5 months old. The design started out as a crazy block quilt similar to Lincoln's baby quilt then became a reversible quilt that converts into a bag, 2 elements I've never tried before. As usual I'm not following any sort of pattern so lots of improvising along the way. Enough blabbing - pic time.

The blue and pink pieces are for Nicola's quilt, the orange and green for another baby quilt next on my list of quilts to make.

This was the original layout for a rectangular quilt before I realised I had boo-boo-ed, got creative and changed things around. For some bizzare reason the blue homespun I used on these blocks wasn't the one I had originally picked out. This blue was too dark and not aqua enough to go with the backing I had chosen so at this point I put the quilt down not happy to continue with it as is. Had a chat to hubby (fabulous sounding board and my greatest supporter - I'm always amazed at how I can chat to him about a topic he has absolutely no interest in, ie quilting, and he answers and provides suggestions as though it's his passion too). So as tedious as it was the blue had to go - unpick, unpick, unpick... 31 blocks. Sigh. Cut replacement pieces and resew 31 blocks with the right blue. By this time I wasn't happy with the layout and since the baby's birth had come and gone and this gift was now going to be late I figured, what the hey, lets do something different.

A screen shot of my plan of the hexagonal quilt front. I actually used powerpoint to create the image as until recently I didn't have any drawing programs.

Piecing the blocks and sashing together. I really like the woven effect of the sashing when it's done this way and the challenge to remember what needs to be sewn to what first to achieve it. If you're not sure what I mean, have a look at the sashing on the design image above.  

 

The back design. I had planned to use a pink and blue ballerina print as the backing but when I changed the design the quilt became wider than I was planning and I wasn't going to have enough ballerina print so the plain backing became a reversible quilt side with plain pink and blue homepsun added in. I thought of quilting this by stippling or some other free motion design but I haven't learnt how to do that yet and wanting to finish this gift, good old faithful 'in the ditch' it was. That meant fiddling around lining up the blocks on the back (which were slightly wider to account for the sashing between blocks on the front) with the blocks on the front. Here's a shot of how the back stitching came out:

I then wanted to add sleeves along each of the edges to thread a rope through so it could be gathered into a bag. Sewed them in when attaching the binding and then hand finished the binding. Threaded the rope through to find that it wouldn't gather because the sleeves were too narrow and way too long. More sighing. Unpick, unpick, unpick. And this is where I'm at now:

Lotsa pins, gotta iron and resew the much shorter sleeves, ie loops, and then reattach the binding and add the rope. BUT it is almost finished!!! Yay!!

No excuses....

I have photos, I have finished projects (well one at least) and loads of UFO's, yet I don't have time to drink a cup of tea while it is still hot let alone post. Poor excuse, I know.

I have finished the booster cushion custom made to fit my dining chairs. I wanted to move Little Lady out of the high chair before Little Sir needed it so she didn't feel like she was getting booted out of her chair because of him - it became a necessity so it got done. The covers I had planned to make to slip over it are still sitting near my machine waiting to be sewn. Quick pics:

I bought some upholstery sponge from Clark Rubber and used my trusty scalpel blade from my Uni dissecting kit to cut it to shape. Like my stencil? Empty nappy boxes are used for all sorts of things in my house.

I made it from some rubber backed curtain lining I had left over from making all my drapes. I added a strap with a Velcro end and a ring for attaching to the chair to limit movement when Little Lady squirms around - the cushion that is, not Little Miss Wriggle Pants.

And fitted to the chair. Anal I know but I wanted a snug fit against the back of the chair so Little Lady could scoot right back into it and have cushion under her toosh the whole way.

I'm still quilting Nicola's quilt tho at the rate I'm going she'll get it at her 21st! Gorgeous little thing is 5 months old now and I've changed the layout and design so many times that I could have made it 3 times over by now. It's now destined to be a hexagonal double-sided quilt that gathers to form a bag.

Emma's quilt hasn't progressed past having the crazy blocks sewn. She's around 3 months old now. Slack Mary-Anne, slack!

And I've been obsessively devouring Kellie Wulfsohn's blog Don't Look Now which has inspired me to rethink my whole attitude towards quilting my quilts. She produces such delicious pieces in wonderfully vibrant colours and uses free motion quilting the way I believe it should be used - to enhance a quilt and not detract from the blocks its designed to show off. So many beautiful patchwork quilts get lost in the obsession with quilting the eyeballs out of it. Not so with Kellie's work - simply stunning! Go check it out, you won't be disappointed.