Birthday girl! (CKC Skyler)

Isn't this darling girl beautiful!?!  She just turned 3 years old!  And as you can probably guess she is infatuated with FROZEN and Elsa & Anna, so ofcourse she had a Frozen themed party with a Frozen themed dress!  The Frozen fabric was a pre-order from Sew it Seams, you will have to ask to join the group, but I have gotten some great fabric from them without the crazy mad dash to a fabric store hoping to catch it before it sells out!  The coordinating fabric came from Mama Made and Beautiful another of my favorite fabric groups!  It is more of a green shade, but after it was all together I loved it, it has little snowflakes on it if you can't tell!

The pattern I used for this dress was CKC Skyler's .  It's so pretty, there is also an option for a patchwork skirt as well!

And then the BEST part, the BOWS!  Oh My Goodness, if they aren't just divine!  In this dress you will need to choose very wisely based on measurements since the bodice is fitted.  I made Miss Gracie a 3 and I had to pull those bows just as tight as I could, BUT I did it on purpose since it should start to cool off soon and I want it to fit her next spring and summer.  I'm usually pretty good with tying a pretty bow, I learned how from some random tutorial I found on Pinterest, but with these little bows it didn't work out.  CKC saved the day though with their wonderful tutorial, they are perfectly straight everytime now, even if you don't make THIS dress, be sure to go and read that!

There was no issues with this pattern really so I have no special tips, the only thing I did any differently was to make the ruffle a little wider then called for!  

Isn't her necklace pretty too?!?  I special ordered that from Jax & Jewels...I sent her photos of the fabric and she matched it perfectly.  She has beautiful necklaces!

Just wanted to share this pretty dress with you all, thanks for spending a few minutes with me!  And I would definitely advise adding this one to your collection!

CREATE KIDS COUTURE SKYLER'S

Isabella Pleated Dress....Squirrelalicious (Ollie and Annie Collection)

Wow, how has everyone been?  Today we celebrated my little girl's 3rd birthday!  Everyone is in bed and the house is quiet, I have a few posts I need to take the time to make to show you the new backpack, the dance bag and the birthday dress, but not today!  Back to school has worn this Momma out, I'm actually up cutting out the pieces for an Elsa dress so I can give it to her at her party this weekend, but I wanted to take the time to share with you this awesome new pattern I was given the opportunity to test!

This is the Isabella pleated dress by Ollie and Annie Collection.  Isn't it adorable?  I will go ahead and tell you upfront the dress version is supposed to be longer then this, atleast to your knees and your waist line will probably be a bit lower, but that was my bad during testing :) As I have already mentioned BTS is beating me up, but when I make commitments to do these things I follow through, and I've found I need sewing a little bit for my sanity so I managed to fit this in!  When I told Ms. Stephanie Gracie Bug's measurements she gave us a 2 so I just said ok!  We most definitely needed a 3 in length for this girl!  It's all good though because this dress also comes in a tunic length and I just love it with these tights...I may get her some that are thicker and not see through for this dress, but she looks just divine!

If any of you follow Zulily you may remember seeing the little a-line jumper a while back with the squirrels on it!  I immediately fell in love, but I don't think I liked the price a lot so it went on my list of to-dos!  I've known this jumper was coming for a while and had kept the squirrel idea in the back of my mind the whole time....it won!  I found the embroidery design at Sweet Peas Place...I actually bought like 6 designs from her just a couple of weeks ago and I have used all of them except for 2...she has some pretty awesome stuff! My machine was acting up a little bit so I couldn't complete the flowers on our little girl squirrel, but I have enough on there that no one will ever know unless I tell so I decided the other squirrel could just be a boy since they are in fact with a heart...it by the way was a freebie from Original Stitches, how awesome is that?!?

And do you recognize the top...it's our High Low Tide Top by Patterns For Pirates! I loved the print so I thought why not, it worked out wonderfully! 

Anyway back to our Isabella!  The back of this one is done with button and loop closures, very simple to do and super cute!  Covered buttons would be awesome I think, but for the simplicity of our dress I just went with plain gold buttons, they actually match her boots pretty well...I scored those at Davis Country Store for 1/2 off the other day!

And on to the most difficult, NOT DIFFICULT at all part of this dress...the pleats!  This is only the second time I've ever made pleats and with the Isabella Stephanie has a chart for the back and the front that makes it incredibly simple...no measuring and marking, no eyeballing, you just match your fabric to your chart and mark it!  I marked this one on the right side and after I got started I realized it would've been a lot easier had I marked the wrong side, BUT, I still managed.  Her directions were simple for me to follow...even when I made the super huge mistake of cutting my fabric a few inches too long or actually probably NOT unchecking the FIT TO PAGE option when printing so my pleating chart was OFF (not sure which was the problem) BUT ALWAYS MAKE SURE YOU UNCHECK THAT OPTION WITH ANY PDF, it's very important...I was able to just use her directions and add an extra pleat to each side on the front and back and solve the dilemma :) All in all I'm super pleased with my first major pleating project, a lot simpler then pulling strings and making ruffles and you have a super pretty result.  

Thank you all for spending a few minutes with me today!  I'm about to have to run and pick-up m big ol' Pre-K boy, yes, I did start this last night and then decided sleep was a little bit more important!  

Make sure that you keep an eye out on Friday for the grand release of the Isabella Pleated Dress by Ollie and Annie if you use code ISABELLA20 you can save 20%...FRIDAY ONLY and make sure to go over and join the Pattern Group as well!  I think Stephanie has a blog post about this dress so make sure you check that out too! I can see this done in plaids for Christmas and VELVET...so many ideas, I think it's an absolute must have for any collection and as always it's an easy to follow very well written pattern!

Happy Sewing!

Oh Mickey CHEERLEADING Uniform! (Cole's Creations~ Oh Mickey)

Hi, today I am absolutely, completely and totally excited to share one of the most amazing outfits I think I have ever made my daughter :) I think I am just super excited because it's a CHEER LEADING uniform, and it's not like a cheap little costume like thing either, it's the REAL deal!  My son is playing in the pee-wee football league right now, he's 8 so he's on the Junior team and this is actually only the second year I knew anything about it, he just really wasn't into it last year but I talked him into it for my very own personal reasons this year (so I could make sister a uniform) and OMG if he's not the CUTEST thing ever! Ofcourse when they saw Miss Cutie bouncing along behind me they said "Oh MOM, we have cheer leading!"  Don't think I didn't already consider it, but baby girl is not quiet 3 yet and $110 to cheer on a younger team that my LITTLE boy isn't even old enough to play on...NO THANK YOU!  But, a cheer leading uniform she WAS getting.  Now I had looked though all my patterns several times...I had checked through several blogs trying to learn how to do the various pleats and I had just about narrowed it down WHEN there was a tester call for Oh Mickey Cheer Leading Uniform by Cole's Creations!

I told you this one is for real!  I never would've really known what sort of fabric to use and I am sure that trim would've just been ribbon had I not stumbled onto this...even if I hadn't been chosen to test I know I would have been first in line to BUY!  I've had a hard time finding out the little teams actual colors and he hasn't gotten his jersey yet...first game is next Saturday...YAY...but I am positive that they are Lightning and in the past they have been Black and White and I have sorta been eavesdropping on the cheer practice and have heard BLACK and seen black and white poms so I hope I'm safe, if not she will still be the cutest wrong color cheer leader EVER!

I used PONTE to make this found online at Hancock's on sale for $5.99 a yard so I lucked out! The ponteroma she said doesn't hang just right so only use it for the contrast if you have to. This is a size 3 so I bought one yard of black and 1 of white...obviously I barely used any white but that's one of the icky things to me about ordering online is that I usually almost have to order the full yard, on Fabric.com you don't have to, but sometimes it's pricier then other places and while most of the time their shipping is fast sometimes it's NOT, so I skipped them this time and just ordered the full yard!  I also had a lot of the black left over as well so that tells you that this one is def not a fabric hog by any means!  The trim I found at Malouf's Fabric.  Their shipping was super fast as well!  I believe you can also find your trim on E-bay and grosgrain ribbon and striped knit are perfectly fine to use as well and Nicole outlines all of that in the pattern with great detail!

I chose to find and purchase the lightning applique from Big Dreams Embroidery on Etsy to match Aiden's team, but the great thing about Oh Mickey is that you don't have to have an embroidery machine to get a super cute look for your uniform.  In the pattern she includes a star, megaphone and a paw print with instructions on how to applique them with your regular old sewing machine!  You wouldn't even have to use her templates, you could find any old thing you wanted, trace it off your computer screen or print it out, and then use the instructions provided!

The back of Miss Gracie's uniform is closed with a zipper, however if you aren't comfortable with installing a zipper, she has included instructions for snaps as well as velcro.  Zippers are also not a thing to fear.  This is my 5th one I think so I am fairly new to them and this is perhaps the prettiest one I have done so far, her instructions for installing it are GREAT and they gave me a very neat and pretty finished product.  Silly me didn't even think about closures when I was scrambling to order materials so I didn't even have a black one here, but I did have a brown one which happened to be an invisible zipper so all you can see is the little brown pull tab, which even with her hair in a pony tail is covered...I think a black permanent marker might fix that problem ;) 

Another thing that may be useful for you all to know is getting this pretty little outfit on!  It's been I guess 11 years now since this Mommy has squeezed herself into a cheer leading uniform and I forgot how hard they can be to get on and off.  I finished the bodice up on this pretty and ran to put it on her and just about broke her neck, lol, not really, but we had a HARD time over the head...I think the back opening has been adjusted to make on and off a little bit easier, but I figured out that my problem was that I was going about putting it on the WRONG WAY!  NOW, with the original zipper length still in place I have her step into it and slip her arms in the holes as soon as they are high enough she can do so and the outfit slips on like butter.

In high school I was a tiny little thing, my mom had to take up my uniform every year so it would fit me but after the fight I had squeezing it over her head I remembered how much trouble I used to have getting mine on alone...I didn't have the option to step in as we had 2 pieces with a side zipper and tiny as I was I have always been blessed with hips so over the head it went and it was a dance if I had no help, lol, that's just how cheer fabric is, I can even recall getting stuck sometimes...but with this one being one piece have your girly's step in and get those arms through just as soon as you can and you will be fine!

I really wish I had better photos to share with you, but sometimes when your 2 it's just not super fun to have to take pictures ;)  and then there are camera problems...like not charging the battery...who does that...ME!  But anyway, I LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE...should I say it again LOVE Oh Mickey,I love this uniform, I just love everything about it.  It has made me happy as well as to go  cheer leading crazy again...I just put her in tumble and cheer, lol!  She also announced to us after seeing the Dallas Cowboy cheer leader commercials that she wants to be a cheer leader like that...so that is now our goal...not really, but...you know, if she says she wants it I will support her, however I'm pretty sure a not even 3 year old totally know's exactly what her life goals are already ;) But as long as she's saying it I'm all for it!

Oh, I think I forgot to talk about the awesome cheer bow!  There is a free tutorial for that listed on Craftsy today so make sure when your getting the uniform you get that as well!  It's super easy and I just used some of the trim I had left!  There is also a matching Dollie Outfit and free poms for dollie! You can totally use them on your darlings shoes as well!  Also, I haven't gotten around to making it yet, but it just hit my cart ;) is the Spirit Jacket! With a cheer leading uniform it is now a MUST!

So most definitely go over to Cole's Creations  and give this awesome mother - daughter team some love and check out Oh Mickey Cheer Leading Uniform and get it while it's 40% off...as a matter of fact I think the whole shop is 40% off so make sure to check it out!

You definitely won't regret having the Oh Mickey Cheerleading Uniform  in your collection, it's great for cheering on big brothers...going to those Friday night games we can all get so wrapped up in, in Texas anyway, or just watching and supporting Daddy's fav pro or college team (we like the Texas Longhorns).   It's also great for a Halloween costume.  Nicole did mention that she thinks made from corduroy that it would make a super cute jumper as well!  The placement of your trim is totally left up to you with a few helpful photos and hints from her too...you will honestly LOVE this pattern!

Also don't forget to head on over and join Cole's Corner and Creations Patterns Group!

Happy Sewing and Happy Labor Day!!!