Update on "Dress For Success" Donation

Burda Kids 9494 view C

Butterfly print from Hobby Lobby, smock plate done on black sateen from Hancock Fabrics, piping and trim made from Kona cotton also from Hancock Fabrics. My fave fabric is sateen, it needles so easily! I still need to sew on buttons, I'm going to cover them with matching hot pink gingham. 

Here's my idea for the capris. Floral print will be the main body, piping out of the polka dot, ruffle from the stripe and edged with black sateen. I just hope this outfit won't look to busy. But I don't think it will; since so many boutique patterns now days are done with many, many prints you can put together.

Enjoy your week, I'm hoping to have the capris done soon and get started sewing on the dress for the FB challenge. I have to get that done by March 9th. Till next time, happy smocking everyone!

What I've Done

Hey Everyone,

Here's what I finished up for the FB challenge. I'm thinking I should have done pink bows. Well, I'm not going to take them out now. I'm already planning the rest of the dress. I'm going to have to start on the collar and cuffs pretty soon. I expect we won't have that much time to finish up whatever we decided to sew with our piece. I'm going to do the collar in white sateen with either shell pink piping or I'm going to stitch bead trios around the edge. Gail Doane just posted a new dress on her blog http://luluandannies.blogspot.com a couple days ago. The pink and grey dress is my kind of dress, well, because it's pink of course. Maybe my nickname should be Pinky :)

I've also been working on the bodice for the top on the outfit I'm giving to the fundraiser. I'm almost finished with the smocking. Since it's on black sateen, it's not going as fast as I normally can stitch. Twenty-one rows it kind of alot. I've got about 6 more rows to go and then I can get started on the bullion daisies. They are going to be 3 different pinks, baby, bubblegum and fuschia. And I'm making the centers of the flowers either beads or crystals. Gotta have bling!

Well, I'm off to go smock!

Four Days of Bliss

Sorry, no pics today. But lots of stuff happening. I have 4 days off work, a mini-vaca! I got some tax money back, yeah! Today, I'll have one of my brothers go with me to pick up a new ceiling fan for my bedroom. The old one only works on high and I don't necessarily want a wind tunnel in my room when I'm relaxing and smocking or when I need to go to sleep. The past couple nights I've been burning up. Going through menopause is no fun. Granted I'm only 43 and I've been in menopause for about 6 years now. That's pretty young, but I guess when your body decides it's done with certain things, well, it's done. Since I don't want to have more kids, it is taking longer than I want. Can't I just be done with the whole messy business?!
Anyway, I went and bought a few more pieces of fabric to go with the outfit I'm going to put into the fundraiser. I'm currently waiting for the dryer to get finished with the towels so I can put the black sateen into dry. I'm still in the planning stages of the top, but I will give you a little bit of a teaser about it. It's going to have smocking on the top of the bodice (can't not smock!). And it will be a teared, ruffled sleeveless top and capris. The main print has a black bground and hot pink butterflies. I decided to do a top with ruffles since they are so in right now. Thank goodness, I love ruffles. I'm thinking I will do a size 5 or 6 and decorate a pair of flip flops. I hope I will have some pics to tide you over later today or sometime tomorrow.
Oh, yes, wanted to share that I joined Pinterest a couple days ago. If you want to follow me there, type in janssmocking and go from there.

Happy smocking everyone!



In Honor of Spring

Vogue 7435, fabric is M'Liss print from Hancock Fabrics

I saw a dress on Facebook a couple weeks ago and loved the smock plate and knew just the fabric to make this dress. My smocking is a little different from the the original I saw, but I had to make it. I realized after taking the pic and looking at the dress, I should have centered the skirt under the yoke a little better. I made it longer that what the pattern called for. What they said was way too short for my tastes. And that's the beauty of sewing, you can do whatever you want. Isn't that wonderful?!

And yes, I know some are knee deep in winter, but here in Boise, Idaho we are not having much of a winter. So I wanted to give a little spring inspiration to everyone. Flowers, my favorite.

On another note, I just had a customer tell me today she is involved with Dress For Success. It's a group in Boise who help women get back into the work force or get higher paying jobs. They are going to have a fund raiser end of next month and asked me if I would like to donate something for it. Of course, I said yes and now I've got my creative mind in full swing! I'm ready to sew up something that will bring in lots of money for them. In this economy, women can use all the help they can get.

Happy smocking everyone!

The Princess Who Twirled

Little Miss E tried on this dress and twirled and twirled and twirled until she was so dizzy that she fell on the floor. She loved the dress and ran around and played in the dress the entire time I was visiting. Don't you just love stories like that?!

She put this dress on first, but didn't know me very well yet, so was a little unsure of exactly what was going on. But I just had to share with everyone what a cutie Miss E is. And she knows it too. I also brought her a smocked dress from one of my baby dolls that I'm not going to use anymore. I told "Mom" is was a hand-me-down and she said she would take any I want to give her. She had a friend visiting and having a girls sewing night. Miss E's gramma was also visiting. Her friend (can't remember her name and I hope I'm forgiven for having a faulty memory), was getting some sewing help. It was a fun evening. I hope everyone else there had fun too.

I'm off to work on the Facebook challenge project. This weekend I need to work on a dress I finished smocking the front to last Sunday. I will tell you, it's going to be a cute dress and it's from a new line of M'Liss fabrics from Hancocks.

Happy smocking everyone!

New Pic of January Challenge

Yes, I know it's now February now. But when I took the pics, it was still January. But I guess you could say that this is my first post for February 2011.

I did ask Laurie Brock, whose in charge of the Facebook challenge if I can add bullion rosebuds to my dress front, and I will know soon. I hope so, this dress front needs a little something more added to it. I'm pretty happy with how this piece is turning out.

Yesterday and part of today I was dealing some very hard family problems. So much so that I went to my bedroom this afternoon and spent a few hours crying my eyes out. Thank goodness I had some needlework to help me over the hump. It makes life a little easier to deal with.

Laura at Ellie Inspired is also hard at work on spring patterns. Hope she chooses me to help her out, but if not I am interested to see what she's going to come up with next. She had such creative ideas in that brain of hers.

Happy smocking everyone!