My first knitting project...

How adorable is he?

OK, I have to admit that I used a knitting machine.  But it was the first time I've done it on my own, and fixed the places that skipped as it was going.  I'm kinda proud of this little project.  I'd like to make one for Carolina, but this is a tight fit on Enoch. I need to learn how to first.

A couple more diapers that I made earlier this month.  One for Carolina and one for Enoch.

A nursing cover for myself.  I used this tutorial from Craftbits.com .

I made a shirt for Daniel first thing this month, but I put the left sleeve on the right side and vice-versa.  I still have to fix that, and it's top of my to-do (sewing) list today.

I used this pattern for his shirt:  Style 2386

Fleece Turkey Hat Tutorial

Last week I asked Delsin if he'd like me to put a turkey on a long sleeve shirt for him and he asked me to make him a turkey hat instead.  I didn't think it could be done till I saw something similar on another website.  I didn't make this one at all like the other one except that it's from fleece and is a turkey, so I decided to do a tutorial of my journey to make this hat.  

It didn't turn out quite as cute as what I'd pictured, in my mind, but it gets the job done.

I especially like the real feathers.  Adds a nice touch.

To make your own:

Start off by cutting two rectangles.  I cut mine 10.5 inches by 7.5 inches for my 6 year old.

Fold them in half width wise and round the edges of one side.  (The rounded edge side will be the top of the hat.)  I wish I had rounded mine starting a little lower and making it more narrow near the top of the head.

Next, cut the ear flap pieces.  4 rectangle pieces 3 x 3.5 inches.  Round the corners on one short side for each rectangle.

I bought this feather trim from a craft store and cut 12.5 inches of it for the top of my hat.  If you make yours more narrow at the top you'll need a shorter piece.

Now you want to cut your facial pieces.  I hope that you can tell how to cut them by my photo here.  Be sure to sew the pieces to the right side of your fleece.  You'll need a piece of stabilizer for the back of the white eyes fabric.  I made the pupils by using my satin stitch (zigzag stitch on the widest setting and closest length setting).  I turned the fabric under the needle to make like a star or circle in stitches.

The beak is a long narrow triangular strip of yellow fleece.  It's only secured at the top, with a satin stitch.

The finger (that's the red thing between the eyes and the beak) is cut from red fleece and secured the same way as the beak.

Put the right sides together and sew down the sides of the hat.

Put the strip of feathers inside the hat so that the edge of the strip is sandwiched between both hat pieces and the raw edges are together.  As seen below.

Now stitch through all the thickness.  You'll need to use a 100/16 needle and go slow because you can still break it on those feathers.

  Stitch 1/4 inch from the raw edges and again 5/8 inch from the raw edge.

Now we want to make the ear flaps.  Just put two pieces right sides together and stitch.

Turn right side out.

I decided at the last minute to add some turkey feet to the bottom of the flaps.  I simply cut them out of yellow fleece and then satin stitched them onto the bottoms of the ear flaps.  Then sew the flaps onto the inside of the hat matching the seams to the center of the end of the flap.  You want the flap to be inside the bottom edge about 1/4 inch or somewhere around there.

Now turn the whole thing right side out and Voila! It's done.

He loves it!
Let me know if you have any questions.  I love comments too!

Thanksgiving Dresses for our girls!

I wanted to do turkey appliques on their outfits this year, and originally I was going to put ribbons as the feathers.  I've seen some really cute t-shirts done that way.  However, when I got out the Thanksgiving decorations I remembered having all these leaves left over from when Daniel and I dressed as trees for Halloween one year.  

Delsin was a dragonfly and Kai was a peacock.

So I put them on as feathers for our turkey appliques.

Kai's outfit:

I used this pattern for her jumper and also for the pants.  

I cut them off where I wanted the ruffle to start and added more fabric to the ruffle before gathering it and sewing it back on.  I made the turkey applique on my own.

Here is Carolina's outfit:

I ran out of the orange corduroy fabric and had to improvise with adding the green polka dotted ruffle.  I bought that fabric at the same time as the brown polka dotted fabric and the orange corduroy and wanted to use them together, originally, but couldn't get imaginative enough to incorporate it until it was forced upon me.  This morning Kai asked me why I made Carolina's dress prettier than hers.  I tried to explain that I wanted to make them both like Kai's, but I don't know if she understood.  I do like how Carolina's turned out and wish that I had done both of theirs this way.  Oh well, what can I do now?  Nothing.

Hopefully she won't grow up scarred for life thinking I show favoritism to any of her siblings.

 

I made Carolina's dress pattern.  I couldn't find my store bought jumper pattern, until after I was finished making the dress (of course).  The pantaloons are from this pattern:

I also made them some hair clips.

Nothing fancy.

I'm really happy with how these outfits turned out.