Winter Vogue picks

The Winter Vogues are up and here are the ones topping my wish list:

First up - this jeans pattern V8774 - I still haven't made the Jalie jeans, but why should that stop me from wanting to try these...

This Today's Fit pattern, V1275, is really cute.

V8764 is another custom cup size pattern - cute, too

V8771 looks quick and easy - cute, too!

My princess and the fair

This is Gracie wearing the dress I made for her pageant. This is also how she wore her hair at the pageant...I refused to go for the Toddlers and Tiaras look that a number of the girls had. Did she win? No. Did she have the most beautiful and original dress? You bet. Was she the only little girl that listed "computers" among her hobbies? Sure was. Did she get compliments on how cute she was? Of course

...but most importantly, she had confidence in font of an audience and did better than her brothers did in public situations at that age. Poise and confidence matter. I know she felt pretty because "Mommy made mine" as far as the dress goes.

These are just a few of the little girls in the pageant, but I don't need a judge to tell me which girl is always the queen of my heart.

You can see her looking out and not being fussy about her appearance or nervous about the large gathering of people. That's my girl!

(And I do think that dress is darn nice!)

Here are a few more fair highlights:

I had every intention of entering the NC State Fair, but due to some crazy-busy-ness at my job, I didn't get to it in time. Oh well!

I have sewn up 4 (now almost 5) garments from "the pile" since 10pm last night. I'm off to do some scrapbooking this evening and then hit some more sewing tomorrow.

Now the pile has shifted...

First of all - update from the fair: I won 17 blue (1st place), 4 red (2nd place), and 3 white (3rd place) ribbons (and $126 in prize money!).

I have been working through my pile of cut outfits and I have now embroidered or appliqued on most of the things I have ready to go for Gracie. So the pile is now ready to sew.

My most recent Fabric Mart order has arrived - plenty of ponte knit in lovely colors (not the polyesther ponte, the nice stuff). So I have a pile to sew and a pile to cut...

The growing pile

I just can't do things on a small scale. I dropped off my entries for the local county fair today - I had 26 of them (all separate categories, of course). Nobody seemed to want to get in line behind me and my laundry basket piled high of sewn entries. Now I get to wait until Tuesday to see how many winners there are! There is a cash prize for each ribbon and I could walk away with over $100 if I am lucky.

I also can't cut fabric on a small scale. I started cutting items for Gracie's fall wardrobe yesterday. I have lost count of the final tally, but I have a fairly large shopping bag FULL of cut patterns & fabric. My plan is to do embroidered embellishments while I tackle grading papers (a necessary evil in the life of a teacher). Then I can sew the items based on thread/needle changes in my machines. That does make things more efficient and there is a bit of a color story running through the clothes. Gracie will be wearing a lot of bright pinks, brown, oranges, purple, and golden yellow with some turquoise thrown in.

So, now, I just need to get motivated to clean up the area around my sewing machine. I had to cover everything hastily as we had some unexpected ceiling drips in its vicinity last night thanks to my children not being proficient toilet flushers. Hopefully, that stage will pass soon.

Satin and roses

Friends, this is what I have done all day (or at least 5 hours worth of it):

I have been stitching out what will be five roses on the front of the skirt of a satin dress I am making for Gracie to wear at the local county fair's petite miss pageant. I have to confess that I am entering her in the pageant because I wanted an excuse to make a fantastic dress, but she was very into the idea as well. She likes to strut around...it should be fun. I may enter the dress in the state fair as well the following month.

I am using the straps from the top with the dress. I appliqued a piece of embroidered organza on the top band after deciding to switch up from my original plan of using the organza as an overlay. I have shiny, soft glitter tulle to use for a pettiskirt under the dress. I think it will be really pretty on her.

Of course, I am a biased mommy and any dress I make her will only be gilding the lily. ;-)

For the pattern, I am using "Summer Separates" by Sew Beautiful.