Turning Fail into Fabulous...with a Giveaway!

I had some really, really good intentions for a bit of selfish sewing.  I was going to make myself a super cute skirt with flair.  Two colors of tulle flair with shimmery fabric and Heather Ross Far Far Away scrumptiousness to be exact.

"Pattern?" I chuckled.  "I don't need a pattern - I've been on a clothing roll and how hard can a simple elastic waist skirt with tulle be?"  I think we all know where this is headed...

Looks innocent and cute enough while it's lying on the ground...but people, this was NOT a cute skirt on my body. I cut the topskirt layer too big so that it gathered way too much.  As if that wasn't bad enough, I cut the 4 layers of tulle and the shimmery blue underskirt not large enough so that the amount of gathering on those layers was just...weird.  Volume was not my friend here.  But honestly, I don't really know what I was thinking to begin with.  My bottom half doesn't really need any extra volume, so even if I had executed this properly, it still probably would not have had me looking my best.

This skirt was NOT leaving my house on my person.  But all that fabric waste made my heart (and wallet) hurt.  It was just too pretty to let sit rolled into a sad ball in the bottom of my closet.  After seeing some very cute clutches and bags at our SMQG Yankee Swap this past weekend, I went searching for During Quiet Time's Ruched Happy Bag pattern and went to work.

Fabric saved and a fail turned Far Far Away fabulous!!  Even the shimmery fabric got saved as a nice decorative detail.

I was so excited about the ability to make lemonade from my lemon skirt (plus I had a TON of skirt that needed to be chopped up) that I pulled a few more colors from my stash and started a clutch factory.

And hey...did you know that today is Sew Mama Sew's Giveaway Day??  How fabulously convenient!  I've made a few and I'd like to giveaway more than one clutch - just means more chances for you to win :)  

So here are the rules:  Leave a comment and tell me one of your fabric fails - or if you've been lucky enough to not have one!  Don't forget to tell me your favorite colored clutch :)  Leave a second comment if you follow my blog AND leave a third comment if you follow me on Instagram (@simplesewendipity).  I will ship internationally, so don't be shy if you're not in the United States - the more, the merrier!

The comments will close on December 12th at 8pm EST and winners will be notified on December 14th.  These would make a really cute gift for someone or (even better) a gift for yourself!  Can't wait to hear from you all and enjoy the giveaway here and at all the other link ups :)

Linking up:

Crazy Mom Quilts - Finish it up Friday!

Pixie Stix and Strawberries...

With summer approaching (hypothetically) and a dress-up holiday behind us, I have seen post after post of adorable kids clothing in the past few weeks.  The last time I attempted garment sewing was the two Frozen costumes I made at the beginning of this year, and regular clothing was quite a while before that.  With some perfect fabric burning a hole in my stash, I'm throwing my hat in the ring using a go-to favorite pattern and a brand new one (new to me, anyhow!).

This fabric with all the falling rainbow Pixie Stix just screams "make me into a cute dress" - I love fabrics that have great details you can place along a bottom hemline! I bought two yards of this and was shockingly able to make it stretch into two dresses.  

For my oldest daughter, I used my favorite Carla C Simply Sweet dress pattern in a size 6.  I used some scraps of eyelet to make the ruffled straps, and more stash finds for the pink sash and the petticoat with the orange and pink bottom ruffle.

Even though the dress for little sis was going to be the same focus fabric, I still wanted her dress to be unique, so I bought the Tye Die Diva's Daydreamer dress pattern and made it in a 3T size with difference colors for the sash and bottom ruffle.  

Similar but different enough to stand out!  

I've also had the strawberry prints from Heather Ross's Briar Rose line for ages and had bought them specifically for kids clothing.  I made another Daydreamer dress in a 6/7 size with a few alterations.  I added a lining to the skirt and the bodice and omitted the bottom ruffle to let the strawberries shine. 

All of these dresses tie in the back and the bodices are generously sized, so I might even get two summers of wear out of each!  I forgot how satisfying it is to begin and end a project in a single day.  Maybe all the practice I'm getting out of these children's clothing pieces means that I should get back onto finishing something for myself?

Linking up: 

Crazy Mom Quilts - Finish it up Friday!

A Tale of Two Name Tags...

In the past month, both the BMQG and the SMQG asked members to make name tags so that we could get to know each other and new members better.  As usual, I trolled Flickr and Google images to find some cute inspiration but I also pawed through my growing scrap bag and pulled out the few scraps I had left from Heather Ross’ Far Far Away “Princess & the Pea” fabric.  I had originally made this skirt for my oldest and only had a few wide strips left, but the print is so cute that I wanted to keep any extra. 

Typically, I don’t love working with orange, but the love of the print outweighed the tangerine hesitation.  It’s a fairly small scale print, so I thought it would be cute to use for a name tag!  I fussy cut the little princess close to my embroidered name and added borders to each side that featured all those stacks of mattresses. 

It seemed a little bare after that, so I also appliqued on tiny swatches of a crown and shoes.  Cute! 

Slap on a binding and all looks good! 

 

Until…I stopped for a millisecond to consider the size.  This is supposed to be a name tag.  My finished size turned out to be more like a huge stinking pocket.  Sigh.  I considered just adding on a ribbon lanyard and slinging it around my neck, but to be totally honest, I didn’t love the whole look as much as I thought I would when I was putting it all together.  It was cute, it just wasn’t totally ME. 

Hmph.  Back to the drawing board.

I still had one tiny scrap with a Princess on it, so I kept her and the white background and decided to make things a little more colorful. 

 

 

I love a rainbow theme, so I found the tiniest 1” swatches of my favorite scraps in each major color and ROYGBIVed it with tiny white sashing. 

 

 

Instead of a binding, I just sewed all the way around and then topstitched.  And yes, I know that my corners stink - I'm always afraid that I'll poke holes in my fabric, so I went more for the rounded corner look.  I was a little paranoid that it would still be too big, but I think the size is perfect at 3 x 4.5 inches. 

 

 

I loved this finish so much more - it feels much more like my usual style, so it's coming with me to meet Alyssa Haight Carlton today. Hope to see you there!