I am T-Rex Girl, Hear Me RRROOOAAARRR!

I came up with my first dino dress last summer and have been meaning to make a T-Rex dress ever since, but things just keep coming along to distract me. Anyway, I finally just got the kick in the pants that I needed when a custom order came in last week through my Etsy shop for a pink T-Rex dress. Aha!

So, the early stage of sketching has been documented (below). I'm often asked if I use clip art for my appliques, and the answer is, "Nope." My handbag is loaded with pieces of paper on which I have sketched out designs and everything is always done in freehand by moi. After scoping out books, signage, the zoo, and wherever, I have an idea of how I want something to look. With the T-Rex, a fierce stance was needed that I could soften up by going with a super-girlie print. I use tracing paper so that I can keep parts of an image that I like and edit by sketching in new areas on the parts that don't work.

This T-Rex image was a little tricky for me because the tail was hard to get right, considering it had to be positioned on an A-line dress. Should the tail be up? Down made it look too droopy. As you can can see from the finished applique below, I went with a happy medium!

Here she is in all of her hot pink glory. Photographing the dress was a whole other challenge that I will save for another post. Getting my little model to tolerate a thousand different angles, backgrounds, etc. is not easy, but she kept at it for me. Just don't ask me to reveal how many gummy bears I owed her when we were done!

Biker Chick

Every year I make the girls each a dress for their birthdays; this tradition began with Kate's first birthday. Since Caroline is in love with bikes right now, I thought that it would be fun to incorporate a bike somehow into her birthday dress. I had been keeping a look out for a cute bike print but wasn't seeing anything that seemed right for her. While reading the Etsy Merchandising Notes for June, I saw the mention of the Tour de France--aha! I decided to combine Caroline's dress with a little shop merchandising and make a yellow dress in honor of the Tour leader's yellow jersey. I should have made a trike applique since Caroline loves her little Kettler but decided to go with a girl's bike, complete with banana seat. I used Amy Butler's Love print for the bike applique. After lots of different sketches and putting it together initially with little rick rack handle streamers, I discarded that detail for a simple outline. I'm really pleased with how it came out and was delighted to see how excited Caroline was this morning when she tried it on for pictures. Unfortunately the photos came out pretty dark, but with a better forecast on the horizon for this weekend's weather, my fingers are crossed for a better photoshoot within the next few days.

I'm continuing my sporting theme, and will have a new dress to show in the next couple of days...

A Dress Just Right For the Pacific Northwest

I really wanted to create a whale dress for this summer and spent a lot of time thinking about different designs, but never really settled on something...until the grandmother of one of our little friends ordered a special custom dress. I met with my little 6-year old client and ended up with an orca whale dress concept. This was absolutely perfect because orcas are frequently spotted off the beach a few minutes away from us here in West Seattle. In fact, a few years ago, I dropped Kate off at preschool and took the dog for a walk along Beach Drive. As we were walking, I absent-mindedly looked offshore toward the water and instantly saw the tall black dorsal fins that are distinctive of orca whales. It was so exciting to see a pod so close to home and I was thrilled to have serendipitously seen such an iconic example of Pacific Northwest wildlife.


So anyway, back to the dress. My client really wanted a blue dress, and I immediately remembered having seen this Michael Miller print at Fabric Crush in Wallingford. It seemed just right for this orca whale dress because it was geometric print that reminded me of sunlight refracting through the water. I then studied images of orca whales, sketched some out, simplified the coloring on the whales a little, and designed the applique for the whale. After some sewing, voila, the dress was complete but it seemed like it needed a little something else. Hmmm. A few years back, I bought some really cute sailboat ribbon ago at Esther's on Bainbridge Island and I thought would look cute with this little marine-inspired dress, so I used it to create a coordinating handbag. So, now here is a Pacific Northwest-inspired ensemble!

Blogosphere...here I come!

I confess that as I've been working on getting organized for the launch of my Etsy shop, I've been reluctant (gulp, scared?) to dip my toe into the sea of blogs that have flooded the cybersphere recently. After all, where was I supposed to start? Well, today I had a little bump with reality that I thought deserved mentioning.

My friend Denise was here helping me take some pictures of products that I have been whipping up for my shop. I was feeling confident with our girls in good moods (yes, I had bribed them into being models with a promise of cupcakes), some fun products to photographs, and a break in the sun and heat that we've been experiencing for the last week. All was going swimmingly until...THUNK...Caroline took a dive into the wall and came up screaming with a nasty knot on her head.

She was actually fine after a few minutes and had a grand time tearing apart a box of Kleenex, but I now have a reminder every time I look at her cute little noggin not to forget about my what I'm really trying to accomplish here. I know that accidents happen all of the time with little ones, but this one was just what I needed to put down the camera, turn off the sewing machine, close the laptop and play with my girls. It's just so darn hard to do everything...at the same time.

On a similar note, I just got a good laugh out of this Storque article about being an Etsy widower and read parts aloud to my husband. Note to self: slow down and admire my best creations (my kids!).