Another sling

I work with an animal shelter, and one of the technicians posted a picture of herself cleaning cages with a small dog in a makeshift sling (a towel tied around herself), because the dog wanted to be held close and cried until she picked her up.  I asked then, Do you need a baby sling?  The answer, of course, was YES!

Well, I don't have spare baby slings hanging around, but I do have fabric and skills.  I wanted this to be all stash, so I went digging and found this amusing license plate print from deep stash.  (Pretty sure it was from JAF many years ago.)  Since I was using a novelty cotton, I figured double layer would be best.  And I saw a tutorial for cutting one length WOF and the other 15-18 inches wide, then stitching long ends together.  You end up with a sling around 30 inches wide, but the seams are not on the edges, if that makes sense.

I wasn't going to use my good sling rings, but I couldn't find any welded steel rings bigger than 2" diameter, and that didn't work with the two layers of fabric.  So I gave in and used the ecru rings.  Hopefully I'll see some pics of this sling in action! 

Either way, I think sewing this jump started some sewing mojo....I'd been away from the machine for quite some time, and now I'm back in it - finishing some UFOs and planning more.

New baby sling

So a friend is having a baby, and we were having a surprise shower for her.  She's having a girl, and she likes to be very girly at times, so I thought it would be fun to make her a super girly sling.  Unfortunately, my only pair of sling rings* left were black.  I thought I could either go with a girly color and a black accent, or a black sling and a super bright accent.  Since I did not give myself much lead time, the decision was made when I couldn't find a really bright linen blend at JAF.  So I went with black linen blend and a bright pink print for bias tape.

I did the gathered shoulder instead of pleated for no real reason.  I think either way seems fine.  My friend was delighted to get the sling and loved the colors - so that was a win!

*I ordered new ring slings from www.slingrings.com - I decided to go with the neutrals and colors nylon samplers, just to check out more of the colors and have them on hand.  Basically, if you're buying more than 3 of the rings in the pack, it's worth buying the sampler.  Also, I discovered that an order over $35 gets free shipping.  My expectations were low for shipping time, since traditionally free shipping takes forever.  But I was surprised!  I ordered late on Friday night, got a shipping notification on Saturday, and my rings arrived Monday!  Great customer service.

New baby gifts

So I'm (as usual) catching up on blogging, in some cases long after the gifts have gone out.  That's okay, right? ;)  Two babies were born earlier in the summer, and these are baby gifts that I made for both.  The first was born to a friend who, along with her husband, practices martial arts.  So naturally I wanted to use that as a focus. First, I used scraps leftover from their wedding pillowcases to make a set of burp cloths.  Then, I pulled out the ninjabread appliques again.  This time, I used one on each onesie.  Add in a onesie with the baby's first initial, and the end!

This picture was taken before finishing each gift completely.  I had made a bunch of burp cloths and showed one of each print, plus the nursing pads I'd finished.

And a closer look at the nursing pads.  I'm now out of the microfleece that I had bought for this ages ago, so the next ones will use Cuddle Dry Microfleece that I bought through a coop.  I'm also now out of PUL, I think, so I'll have to buy some more.  These don't take much, but they turn out really nicely, especially with the lace overlay.  I've had great feedback from some of the people who have received these, so I'll continue to gift them.

This is from a book panel that I bought and stashed probably at least ten years ago.  The new mom loved Care Bears, so I was saving it for her first child.  I'm kind of impressed that I remembered and dug it out! :)

And then a baby sling!  This baby's gender wasn't known ahead of time, so I wanted to make something that could be gender neutral.  I purchased an olive linen blend from JAF and went to work.

I went with the black print for bias binding - both because I thought it'd be fun to have the music print, and because my remaining nylon sling rings were black.  I do think this really sets off the olive, so it was a good choice.  And I have a bunch of the bias tape remaining for future projects.

I sent this along with a print out of instructions and helpful websites for babywearing....I hope that she uses it and likes it.  My sister-in-law told me (much later) that she had LOVED her sling and used it almost daily.

Baby gifts

Two people I know just had their first babies, so it was time to pull out some onesies for embellishment!  The onesies in the left column are all long-sleeved 0-3 m size, and the others are all short-sleeved 3-6 m.  The blue shirt in the bottom is a 24m, for my niece.  I had some fun with these!  The red and green dinosaurs are for one friend's baby boy, and all the girl onesies are for the other friend's new baby girl.

I also made a baby sling for the baby girl.  Her mother's favorite color is blue, so I found a sky-blue linen look fabric at JAF and made a single layer sling, edging the sides with homemade bias tape from a tonal turquoise butterfly print.  I think it turned out super cute!  I hope that she likes it!  The sling rings were passed on by a member of my online sewing group, so this is my first time using real sling rings, as opposed to steel ones from the hardware store.