Pinterest - Most Recent Pins - Sewing for Boys

I love sewing clothes for my little boy. I love making toys and play accessories for him the most, but comfy shorts and pants for play and childcare days are my favourite clothes to make for him.

Here are five of my most recent pins to my Pinterest board "Sewing for Boys".

1. Jaden T-Shorts

This idea is great - turn a favourite adult T-shirt into a pair of shorts! I love ideas that encourage re-using and upcycling.

2. Baby Yoga Pants

Along the same lines as the T-Shorts. Recycle an old T-shirt to make some comfy pants. So simple!

3. Toddler Tour Pants

Cute pants with a patchwork insert down the sides of the legs and a really easy to follow tutorial.

4. Men's Shirt Baby Romper

Along the themes of upcycling - turn a cotton button-through shirt into a summery romper for a little boy.

5. Free Boy Patterns

A great collection of exactly what it claims to be - free patterns for boys. Heaps of easy to follow and easy to sew clothing for little ones.

Please share any great finds that you have below in the comments - I would love to find more!

Pyramid zipper coin purse

Earlier in the year, I went to a craft fair here in Brisbane, where I bought  a little kit to make this tetrahedron zipper pouch. When I saw it, my geeky side (I used to be a high school maths teacher) loved the idea - only a long zipper and a strip of fabric to make a little purse. The fabric strip is sewn along the zipper and as you close the zipper, a purse is formed!

And then of course, my 3-year old and 5-year old spotted it, and being zipper-obsessed as most kids are, begged me to make them both one.

The fabric strip was great, but it was fiddly to deal with the lining, so I perused the internet and came up with the perfect solution for a kids version - ribbon! Follow the link to Craft Passion where you'll find some great pictures and very useful instructions.

So I bought some ribbons... how cute are they?!?!

And some very long zippers, and got to work with the colours chosen by my children.



My kids are not really into coins, but the purses are the perfect size for storing tiny little treasures, like that one favourite car, dinosaur, or hairclip, or for just zipping and unzipping for fun.

Baby Doll Swaddle - Pattern and Tutorial - Easy DIY

You will need:

• Approx 0.5 metres/ yards of a print fabric for the main fabric.
• Approx 0.5 metres/ yards of a plain lining fabric for the inside of the swaddle. 
• Approx 0.5 metres/ yards of a light wadding, such as Pellon fleece.
• Velcro
• Small scraps of felt for heart decorations.

1. Start by printing the three pages of the pattern and cutting out the pattern pieces along the solid line. The pattern pieces for the main part of the swaddle will need to be joined together along the dotted line, by matching and then taping the two pieces together.
2. Place pattern pieces with the marked straight edge along the folded edge of the fabric and cut out one piece in each of the two fabrics (main and lining), as well as the wadding.
3. Depending on the wadding used (and following the directions for the wadding type), iron the main fabric over the wadding piece to secure.
4. Begin by sewing the darts into the separate fabrics. Fold over the fabrics along the centre line of each dart and sew along the outer line to create shape in the foot pocket and top part of the swaddle.
5. Then take the two pieces of lining fabric, right sides together, and sew together around the round bottom edge. Repeat for the outer fabric. Snip along the curved seams and turn one of the fabrics out the right way.
6. Place this piece inside the other, so that right sides are together. Now join the two fabric cases together by starting in the middle of the top seam and sewing around all of the edges, leaving a space of about 4cm (1.5in.) as you return to where you started.
7. Trim all corners and curved edges and turn the swaddle out the right way. Iron the seams flat, especially where the opening is at the top seam.
8. Top stitch around all edges, closing up the opening at the top seam.

9. Pin a strip of velcro to the position indicated on the pattern for the foot pocket. Sew this down and sew the matching velcro to the flap that you prefer to fold down first (on the inside). Then sew two small pieces of velcro onto this same flap, but on the upper side and the matching velcro to the underside of the flap that will fold down last (see picture above for velcro placement).

10. Finally, attach your felt shape (be imaginative to match your fabric, or to suit your child's preferences here!) to the top flap.

Simple Rainbow Ribbon Skirt Tutorial

Miss 5 loves rainbows. Her first drawing that resembled anything was of a rainbow. Since then, we have had rainbow beetles, rainbow birds, people wearing rainbow clothes and more feature in her drawings.

I saw a skirt somewhere online that had bias binding strips along the bottom to create a rainbow effect, but as I am always on the lookout for the most simple and effective ideas, I thought I would replace the binding with grosgrain ribbons.



To start, I measured my daughter's waist and doubled the measurement. That gives you the width of fabric needed.

I then measured the length from her waist to where I wanted the skirt to end (in her case that was just on her knee). I added around 4 - 5cm and that gave me the length of the fabric needed.

Open out the rectangle and fold over the bottom edge by about a centimetre and iron down. Pin the ribbons along the skirt. The bottom one serves as the hemline and the spacing is dependent on personal preference really and how many colors you choose to use. Sew the ribbons down by sewing along both edges as close to the edge as possible. To finish off at the ends, fold the ends under and sew down.

Fold the rectangle with right sides together and sew down the open side. Then press the top over 2cm and then another 2cm. Sew along the bottom fold as close as you can to form the elastic casing. Leave an opening of about 2 - 3 cm and feed the elastic through. Sew the ends of the elastic together and sew the casing closed.

Oh so cute!

Sewing tutorial - Heat/Cold Packs for Kids

Unless there is a lot of blood, we cannot use band aids or sticking plaster at our house. The noise and pain that is experienced with their removal is never worth the pain that they alleviate at the time of injury. The next best option is the ice pack.

And even better than the ice pack, is the rice pack. We keep one in the freezer and another on the bench, ready to microwave if a warm pack is better suited to the situation.

I made them out of flannel, after first drawing the outlines and cutting a front and back piece for each.

I cut wings, beak, eye and arm pieces out of felt and attached them. With right sides of the flannel together, I sewed around the edges, leaving a space to turn them out the right way. Embroider by hand any other features such as eyes, mouth etc.

Fill with rice and sew close the seams. I sewed in a small length of vecro to each opening to make it easier to replace the rice in the future.

Sewing tutorial - Colour your own art supply bag

Ikea. I love the stuff that they sell, but I'm not a fan of the shopping experience. Finding a parking spot, finding what you want in the store and then getting out before two young children lose it. This time we went in with a plan. Fabrics only. Straight there and straight back out. I didn't believe it could be done, but that is how it went. And they even had a little play area at the fabric section! Wow!

So I bought a few metres of the Tidny fabric and we love it. The kids spent part of a lazy Sunday afternoon colouring in and then I made it up into art supply bags. The bags now travel with us when we eat out, filled with some Frozen colouring in pages, coloured paper, markers and stickers. A success!

I washed the fabric and cut a wide strip out (allowing for handles and pockets too) and then the kids used fabric markers to colour in the designs on the fabric. Later I placed baking paper over the fabric and ironed over, applying heat to fix the colours.





I cut a lining for the bag, pockets and handles, and a second fabric for some of the inner pockets.



For the handles, place right sides together and sew along one short end and the long side. Turn it out the right way. Top stitch along the two long ends.

For the top pocket, place right sides together and sew along the two long edges. Turn out the right way and press. Top stitch along the top long edge.

For the two bottom pockets, place right sides together and sew along the top long edge. Open out, press and top stitch along that long edge.

Take the top pocket and pin it in place on the lining fabric. Sew a few mm above the lower seam to fasten the piece to the lining. Sew vertically to form smaller pockets.

Sew velcro strips to the lining and the lower upper pocket. Use a tacking stitch close to the edge to put the lower pockets and handles in place. Now sew the bag outer and lining together by place right sides together and sewing around the outside with all pockets and handles in place between. Be sure to leave an opening to turn it out the right way.

Turn the bag out the right way and press. Sew a top stitch around all outer edges to finish off. Fill with goodies and enjoy!

Kids Sewing Kit - Make your own doll - Sewing Tutorial

Two years ago I put together a sewing kit for my daughter who was then 2.5 years old. You can read the blog post here: http://richesandroses.blogspot.com.au/2013/09/kids-craft-toddler-sewing-kit.html. It has been a really popular blog post and attracts a lot of traffic on Pinterest. 

Over those two years it has evolved and she has now outgrown most of the original items that I put in the kit. She has started showing interest in actually sewing something and having a finished product at the end, so I had the idea of making an easy doll kit that is aimed at her age. 

This is what I came up with, and I have to say I am pretty happy with the finished product. Miss 4.5 is very keen to get started on making her own doll and I can't wait to see how it turns out!

I started out by cutting out all of the pieces. I wanted to keep it as simple as possible, and ended up with this design. I machine sewed the pieces together, leaving just two basic pieces for her to sew together - a front and a back.

I invested in a leather hole punch and punched around the edges of the doll pieces. Be sure to pin the front and back pieces together for this step so that the holes line up. I placed a piece of card under the felt while punching to make it a bit stiffer too. I made some small bows for her hair, cut out some felt pieces for the face, chose some sequin beads and added a blunt wool needle and some embroidery thread.

Stay tuned for the finished doll!

Sewing Project - Advent Calendar

Last Christmas I attempted an ambitious family project. My children had just turned 2 and 4 and I wanted to start some Christmas traditions with them.

We live on a day to day diet relatively free of refined sugars, so I knew from the start that I wanted a chocolate and sweet free advent calendar. I spent a lot of time on Pinterest and saw some ideas for daily activities for the month of December so I decided to incorporate those into our calendar. 

While on Pinterest I came across a design similar to this. I wanted to make the tree as big as possible, so I varied the original idea by putting the numbered squares around the outside perimeter rather than in rows along the bottom under the tree. 

I kept it simple by making everything out of felt. Felt does not fray and does not need hemming. For the numbers I used heat and bond lite - it is an iron on applique paper that you can draw on to (remember to make it a mirror image), iron on to the wrong side of the fabric, peel off and then iron onto the backing fabric. It is great for doing difficult shapes.

The first step was to cut out all the shapes and place them in position on the background piece. I then sewed them down. For the Christmas tree, I started sewing from the back most layer, finishing up on the front most layer. For the pockets, I sewed the numbers down first and then sewed each pocket on, sewing around the sides and bottom.

I then sewed on buttons, scattered over the tree, to hang decorations onto. And then began the long task of making each decoration. They were also made from felt, although some were trimmed with ric rac, buttons, embroidery thread or other notions. Each decoration had a backing piece to make them stronger, and ribbon with ends placed in between before sewing up to use for hanging on the tree.

Decorations were placed into the pockets and I made up a card for each activity by printing them all up and sticking each one on a card backing.

These are the activities we did over the 24 days:

• Learn a Christmas song.
• Make gingerbread.
• Make a Christmas craft.
• See Christmas lights.
• Decorate the house for Christmas.
• Make Christmas cards and send them.
• Go to carols by candlelight.
• Read a Christmas story.
• Wrap Christmas presents.
• Make salt dough Christmas ornaments for the Christmas tree.
• Watch a Christmas movie.
• Write a letter to Santa.
• Colour in Christmas pictures.
• Write your own Christmas story.
• Donate toys to charity.
• Visit Santa Claus.
• Take a family Christmas photo.
• Call a family member.
• Look at old Christmas pictures together.
• Borrow Christmas books from the library.
• Make green and red play dough.
• Play a Christmas game.
• Give a surprise gift to someone.
• Do Christmas shopping.

Before we started, I planned out the activities with some strategy. We had visitors from Germany for most of December, so I knew we would be busy. I also knew that on my work days we would be short of time. For busy days, I kept the simple activities. Of course we went away a few times too, so we had to play catch up when we got home. I also thought ahead for activities like carols by candlelight and found out when our local ones would be held.

It ended up being the most fun I had ever had at Christmas. It made us do just a little bit everyday to keep the Christmas spirit going and the usual big pressure that December 25th holds wasn't there for us as we had been celebrating the whole month. It was lovely, and so very sad on the 26th when it was all over.

Our activities list will evolve as the kids get bigger to include more community type activities and we will get input from them on the kinds of activities they would like to do.

Sewing Tutorial: Putting together your Quiet Book pages to make a book

You've spent hours cutting out little felt shapes, positioning them on pages, sewing, stitching on faces and finishing touches and now you have the pages all made for your Quiet Book. Well done! It's no easy task. No doubt plenty of patience, glasses of wine and cups of tea have passed between you and your Quiet Book pages. So let's take a look at one way to put it all together and make a book out of what you've got in front of you.

Work out the order of your pages and then pair them up in front to back pairs. Put them right sides together. Sew around with approximately 1cm/0.5 inch seam, leaving a gap wide enough for turning out the right way. Trim the corners as in the picture below.

Turn out the right way and push the corners out to neaten. It should look something like this:

Then sew a top-stitch a few millimetres from the edge to neaten it off and close off the opening.

Covers can be made in the same way (you'll need front and back covers):

• right sides together
• sew around, leaving an opening
• trim corners
• turn out the right way
• topstitch edges

I like to add a button tab to my cover. The length and width depend on the thickness and size of your book. Cut two rectangles, allowing a 0.5cm/0.25 inch seam and follow the same steps as above.

Of course there are loads of options for putting your pages together, but my favourite way is to use binder rings. I then sew two buttonholes on each page where I want to place them. Easy! Especially if your sewing machine does automatic buttonholes as mine does :-)