Sewing Aprons for the Little Ones

After seeing a wonderful kids apron pattern by Beth Galvin at Craftsy I decided to make aprons for our three grandchidren and a friend's two children.  I have lots of fabric in my stash, and these aprons only take 1/2 yard, so I grabbed some fabric and went to work on these little surprise Christmas gifts. 

Here is the front of Vivian's apron. I like how Beth keeps it simple with a waist strap that secures with Velcro (hook and loop closure). Making the apron reversible is an easy way to finish the edges!

Here is the reverse side of Vivian's apron. The pattern size that Beth shared is for a 3 to 6 year old. Since Vivian is not quite 2, I reduced the dimensions of Beth's pattern. Used this size for Alex and Lucy who are both under 2 years old.

I made myself a pattern for the smaller size, which is
about 2 inches shorter
and about 1.5 inches narrower.
Used 14.5 inches of 3/4" elastic instead of 15 inches for the neck strap.

Here is the front of Alex's apron. He's 18 months old.

Here is the reverse of Alex's apron.

Here is Lucy's apron. She's almost 18 months old.

Here is Gavin's apron, made according to Beth's pattern here.

Here is Henry's  apron also made according to Beth's pattern.

I am going to see our grandchildren next week. I think these will be early Christmas gifts for them. I can't wait!

Thanks for visiting! I hope you are enjoying this season of love and giving.

Red Sunflowers

Today's red sunflowers are a result of the sweet comment that Carol Reed left on my blog yesterday.

She encouraged me to experiment with non-traditional colors. You can see Carol's cool sunflowers on her blog: Stampin With Carol Reed.

Materials used:

Stamps-Stampin' Up, Fiskars

Inks-distress worn lipstick, festive berries, Stampin' Up wild wasabi, Versafine onyx black

Red grosgrain ribbon

Stamps: Stampin' Up, Hero Arts

Stamp: Hero Arts

Thanks for visiting! Hope you are having a fun and relaxing weekend!

Blue Sunflower Mini Stampfest with Lynette

Lynette and I found a little time to stamp together on Wednesday, September 26. This is Lynette's card. Our inspiration came from Carol Read's blue sunflower card: Stampin With Carol Read. We used the smaller sunflower from the 2000 Stampin' Up Summer Sunflower Definitely Decorative set. The circles were made from Lynette's Stampin' Up's circle dies-I think they are called Stitched Shapes Framelits.

My card is lacking some blue! Wish I had added more sunflowers!  I really like how Lynette's card pops with all the blue! Lynette found the perfect ink colors for the two step stamping of the sunflowers: ballet blue and limeade from Stampin' Up and ultramarine from Vivid.

I made this card front at Lynette's and finished it at home.
The birthday wishes stamp is from Hero Arts.

Made this card today, trying to fit in more flowers like Lynette's card.
I had to make do with my inks: Stampin' Up's brilliant blue and old olive instead of Lynette's Vivid ultramarine and SU limeade.
I added a grosgrain ribbon and a paper "banner".
Sentiment from Fiskars.

Here is  look inside my card. Sentiment stamp by PSX.

Wanted to remember the evening at Lynette's so took a photo of the charcuterie we enjoyed with our husbands while watching some travel shows on TV.

Thank you for visiting! Hoping you have a fun week end!

Scraps into a Birthday Card

My stamping desk is a big mess with scraps and stamps. I couldn't part with this distress background piece. When I found this green cardstock to match, it was very fun to make this card. I'm still on a roll with Stampin' Up's What I Love set, which is also sitting with the mess on my desk.

Used Distress Oxides peacock feathers and broken china. The distress oxides are so much darker and thicker than the regular distress inks. I stamped off on some of the fill-in, more solid flower stamps. Sometimes the ink coverage was uneven, so then I didn't stamp off.  I wanted to let some of the paper show through. 

The Happy Birthday was from an old Stampin' Up sentiment set called God's Blessings.

Thanks for visiting. Hope you are having a GREAT week end!

Guy Birthday Cards

Sometimes I find it difficult to come up with ideas for guy birthday cards. However after seeing this PIN of a train/map card by Kim Smith of Crafting Buddy, I was inspired.

Stamps: Stampin Up 1997 Happy Birthday, 1998 Old World Map, Raindrops on Roses boat stamp

Inks: distress scattered straw, shabby shutters, spiced marmalade

Stampin Up certainly celery

Versafine onyx black

This card is the same layout at above, except for ink colors: distress salty ocean, dried marigold, barn door, early espresso

Here I've switched from a boat to Mr. Umbrella Man from Tim Holtz-a Visual Artistry Collection called Life's Possibilities CSS25870 clear stamps.

Happy Birthday stamp from StampCraft.

Inks: distress walnut stain, salty ocean, scattered straw

Here are color variations: distress broken china, dried marigold, spiced marmalade.

Thanks so much for visiting! 

Wishing you a day filled with happy thoughts and special JOY!