Flouncy Apron

Another girl's birthday party, another chance to sew a gift.  We were away on vacation all of last week so I only had a couple of hours to make something, start to finish.  I chose a simple apron.  I've made a variation of this in the past and combined it with a store-bought cooking item so I thought I'd go that route again.  This time I added a flounce to the bottom of the apron, shortening the basic apron pattern the depth of the flounce.  The upper portion of the apron is made from a heavy woven twill, the bottom from quilting-weight cotton.  I used the watermelon stripe fabric to make the bias binding and embroidered the recipient's name on the bib.  This is a fast and unique gift for the birthday girl (or boy, with some modifications). 

Preschool starts back up tomorrow and to say I am looking forward to this particular Monday morning would be an understatement.  My youngest will be hanging out with me at home for a while longer while we "perfect" the use of the potty, but I am hopeful he will soon be reunited with his friends and teachers, and I will have a little bit of free time all to myself.  Can't wait.

Tutu Tote

Another little girl's birthday party today, hurray!  I am really enjoying making little gifts for the girl friends of my two sons.  It is finally an opportunity to sew some frilly stuff.  Today's party theme was princesses so I created a little bag for the now-3-year-old birthday girl that is reminiscent of fairies and ballerinas. 

I made this bag using the instructions for my ribbon-handled tote which you can find here.  Since the outer fabric I was working with was fairly light weight, I added a layer of thin batting before embroidering the recipient's name on the front.  For the tutu portion I cut tulle 12" deep by the width of the fabric.  I pieced together three widths and then folded the long strip in half lengthwise, making a very long 6" strip.  I stitched a gathering stitch just inside the folded edge, drew up the stitches and pinned the tutu around the bag, overlapping the two ends.  I stitched it in place on top of the gathering stitches on the outer portion of the bag before inserting the lining as per my tutorial.  Striped ribbon handles finished it off.

I love the pink and chocolate brown color scheme (as you can tell from two other projects I've recently completed here and here) and I've just about depleted my stash of these fabrics so I guess it's off to the fabric store next week to restock.  I'm sure I will have many other girly-girl birthday parties in my future.