Toddler Tuesday: pants from bunny rug

I enlisted the Tiny Tyrant's help in making him some new PJ pants (which he needed desperately, since the past month's growth spurt has added an extra two inches to his legs, seemingly).
Digging through my stash of flannelette material lead to the discovery of the rug we wrapped him in for his first Mama-Baby photos, the first day we were home from the hospital. Since he was in the NICU for a week he was already eight days old. I remember asking my partner to take the two photos, so I'd have something to send to the family; apart from a fuzzy, long distance view of the plastic crib he was in, all our photos so far had included wires, heat lamps and machines that went PING.
Finding that blanket made me feel very nostalgic, and I remembered how exhausted, relieved and overjoyed I was that I finally had him home with my partner and I, and we had the opportunity to begin enjoying being the new family that we all were, together.

Tyrant seemed to be drawn to it too, because it was the material he chose to have his new pants made from.
I've been getting him a bit more involved in my sewing, lately; he likes to sit on my lap when I'm not sewing fiddly things, and watch the fabric move through the machine (thank goodness he's such a careful child). He works the presser foot for me, and I pause to let him pull pins out and stick them on my magnetic mushroom, which he loves to do.
So we sewed up his new pants in around fifteen minutes, and for the first night in some time he wanted to get into his pyjamas early!

Just Pants

The toddler has had a growth spurt and the pants that fit my miniature manling last winter are now just as tight round the waist, but sit ridiculously high on his ankles and shins. So has begun the great pants-making effort of Winter '10.

Red pants with contrast fabric at cuff and on/in the side pockets of green with daisies:



Same but in blue, with blue, red and yellow birds and a back pocket too:



Up close the red pair looks homemade, the blue handmade with an unfortunate seam. I'm still wokring on streamlining this pattern/sewing process. Because my goodness, aren't these cute?

"E" is for Elephant

My girlfriend fell pregnant very shortly after my own son was conceived. Since she lives West of Sydney and I'm south, we're both in kind of black holes so far as the transport situation is concerned. So I was really excited to get to meet her and her beautiful little boy in the city, today!

I made him a little present that I whipped up in the last two or three nights.
First is a pair of wide-legged yoga pants - the outside is made from a delicious dark green up-cycled old sheet that my Mother Outlaw donated to me a while back (I'm so plotting a pixie outfit for my boy sometime soon!). I'm also starting to get into the swing of the rib-knit I used for the waistband. It's fun stuff and not as hard as I thought.

But because the recipient is a delicate little petal and needs 100% cotton clothes for his poor chafed skin, I rummaged through my stash for a lining and came up with pale yellow cotton flannel. It's made the pants thicker and warmer than I originally envisioned, but hopefully it will mean they can be winter and autumn pants rather than the spring I was going for! My little boy decided that second shot needed to be helped by his doll. Since photographic styling is not my strong suit, I took his suggestion.

The second part of his project is this sweet little door hanger - I spotted the "E" at a local shop - they only had Es! Which was serendipitous, since my gift is for an Elliott.
I almost cried, cutting up the rainbow ribbon - I pounced on it months back and haven't had the heart to open it till now. And then I cut my pieces too generously and have all these tag-ends I don't want to get rid of.
The elephant was inspired by the beautiful layette decor Tecelinha keeps posting to one of my flickr groups, and this fabulous Ganesha image at Wikipedia.

Just fiddling

I've been dabbling with a few projects in the last week or two. The first of these was a grown-up variant of my rainbow toddler pants - I saw the fabric and immediately thought of my recipient, who happens to currently be 6 months pregnant and thus in need of comfy pants (I don't know a pregnant woman who isn't).

The second project is kind of a recon mixed with some bits and pieces - a gorgeous little card we got from the BIL for Christmas, a wooden photo frame, some mounting paper and white paint (plus the enamel spray I've been hoarding in my cupboards for almost eight years now, and finally got the chance to break open and use).

You know how you pop over to a blog like Soulemama and marvel at the serene, beautiful spaces which the blogger inhabits?
My spaces are not at all like that.
As you can see.

My spaces are more a welter of baby toys, car keys, mobile phones, fabric scraps, tea mugs, letters half-written and letters unfiled, safety pins, jewellery I took off wherever I was and random items that I swear, have a purpose! Sometimes.
(For instance; right now, in front of me at my computer desk is a spare USB cable, a six-sided die, a pin, some nail scissors, two pens, a bracelet, my digicam, a tea mug, a wheat pack, a paid creditcard bill and some leaflets from the Stampin' Up! card party I was at last weekend.)

Anyway, this is the finished project. Very shabby chic.
I think it's going to be a present for my MIL. But I can't decide - random just because, or birthday present?

Rainbow Pants of Dooom, Toddler edition

(Note the green and gold cupcake in hand. Both were hits with this particular little boy.)