A year of sewing

This month marks the {approximate} one year anniversary of my sewing journey. Since I didn't start my blog until August, I thought I'd write a synopsis of my my sewing adventures up to that point.

My absolute first utter failure project was a simple tote bag from Sew Everything Workshop. My first mistake was to just "wing it" when it came to cutting my fabric.  My lining was a plaid & I decided I would just attempt to follow one of the lines in the pattern. I failed to do that correctly (in my defense, I had no proper tools-- not even a straight edge ruler--just a pair of scissors). Needless to say, my bag lining turned out completely wonky & somehow larger than the outer bag pieces.  I set it aside, and there it remains.


After that I moved on to a tie for my little fella, which turned out ok. It's not real functional, as it is made out of quilting cotton & tends to wrinkle terribly.  This project had me in tears (I blame it on the pregnancy hormones).  I was using a solid red fabric with no discernible right/wrong side, so as the Sew Everything Workshop suggests, I chose a right side & a wrong side & labeled my fabric accordingly. Except I labeled my pieces opposite--two of the pieces were identical & I labeled side one of the first pattern piece as the wrong side, but side one of the second pattern piece as the right side. And I could not figure out why they wouldn't fit together. :) Austin (my husband) kindly pointed it out to me & I was on my way.  Shawn still wears that red tie on occasion.

Next, I set out to make a  (supposedly) simple Pillowcase dress for my (soon-to-arrive) baby girl. We went on a trip to visit my sister-in-law & I brought my shopping list with me.  At the local Joann, I picked out a pink quilting cotton with white butterflies. And some single fold bias tape (which, I had never heard of & had no idea how or what it was used for).

When it came time to cut out my fabric, I measured a RTW dress for it's dimensions. But I forgot to account for the seam allowances.  We have no pictures of Laila in this dress because it was so utterly tiny. She did wear it once, but I have no idea how Austin managed to squeeze her into it.


Then I added ruffles to the back of a simple onesie, using scraps I had from the pillow-case dress. And, because baby girls simply cannot have enough ruffles, I tackled the Ruffle butt diaper cover. Looking back, I'm a little surprised that I didn't give up on it. Those teeny tiny leg holes! But by golly, my girl was going to have ruffles on her butt, and I was not spending more than $7 on them! I got the pattern from Etsy & the instructions were fabulous.

I also revisited my pillowcase dress tutorial. This time, I remembered to account for seam allowances, but didn't quite account for how fast babies grow ;)  I also  made big brother another tie using a coordinating fabric.

This picture just makes my heart pitter-patter. Laila was 6 weeks old & Shawn was

 20 months.

What a trip down memory lane! Those first few projects were such an emotional roller coaster! (Again-pregnancy hormones). But the feeling of pride that I felt when that last stitch was sewn & the final pressing done. It's the same feeling I get when I finish a project now. Sweet victory.

Ok, your turn. How'd you get started sewing? What were your first projects. How'd they turn out? I'd love to know!