Mod Kid Skirt

This is my first attempt at the patterns from Patty Young's Sewing Mod Kid Style book.

I made yoga shorts and the gored skirt.

I have made the Mod Kid Kimono several times but this was my first attempt at other Mod Kid fashions. I love the use of the cotton knits that I use for some designs in my Leotots shop. Before I give my pro's and con's, here are the two creations:

My pro's on these two Patterns by Patty Young: 

1. These are very cute casual wear
2. The yoga pants flair is very true to yoga pants and I like it that she has this for kids. 
3. The gored skirt does look like a yoga skirt in person. The photo does not do justice to the yoga look of that skirt. I can't say enough about how cute that skirt looks in person.
4.  Patty Young has my vote on easy construction on the gored part of the skirt. The skirt sewed together quickly and easily until it was time for the awkward application of the waist band. 

The Con's on these two patterns 

1. The fold over waist band is a pain to apply. I don't like having one piece of fabric (the waist band) smaller than the other (the shorts) and trying to give tension to one piece of fabric  (the waist band) that evenly distributes stretch while not stretching the other piece of fabric (the shorts/ skirt). 
2. The fold over waist band is not too easy to work with when trying to get my daughter dressed. Getting the fold just right seems like more attention than I want to give to a waist band. I guess the bigger sizes, for older children, don't put the parent in this position. For the little kids, messing with that waist band isn't fun. 
3. The waist band calls for two pieces. WIth the shorts being made like leggings, I didn't understand why she calls for two pieces on the waist band. The seams on a two piece wast band should be on the sides of the body. The leggings style seams in these shorts create seamless sides. Why impose seams on the sides of the waist band when there are no seams on the sides of the pants/shorts? Also, with the skirt, the seaming on the side of the waist band would not match the skirt sides and intersects oddly with the gores. I used a single piece of fabric for the waist band. 
4. The book wasn't specific about the shorts needing stretch fabric. I use stretch fabric all the time but wanted to use french terry on these shorts. The first pair of shorts came out three sizes too small (using pattern size 6) because the patterns seems to be geared to only cotton spandex. The book doesn't say which type of fabric that the shorts/ yoga pants patterns is specifically geared toward. However, the book text does mention that yoga pants should be stretchy but this is a comment made in the introductory text rather than in the "you will need" section where I want specifics about fabric type. I guess I expect more specifics from a pattern when I get information from the photos show baggie shorts but not enough information about the shorts from the text that pairs evenly with the information I am getting from the photos. Since I have done copy editing for books in the past, I notice things like harmony between photos and text. In this case, the editorial staff could have made some suggestions along the way. 

Overall, Patty Young has cute stuff in the book and I'm going to attempt every pattern. These are just my experience with the skirt and yoga shorts. I did make the yoga shorts bigger and the are cute. I made the shorts without any seam allowance and one size bigger to get a loose fit for no-stretch french terry. I did use the fold-over waist band but I am going to modify the pattern and get rid of that waist band for the next pair of shorts. 

Corkscrew Hair Bow

I followed the tips on how to make cork screw hair bows on Cherished Hand Made Treasures today. My desire was not for a hair clip but a hair bow on a rubber band. So, I used my own approach in apply my cork screw ribbons to a rubber band.

I baked my ribbon, wrapped around my son's chop sticks, in the toaster oven at 250 degrees for approximately 25 minutes. This baking process set the ribbon.

Then I cut the ribbon into the lengths that would give me about 4 to 5 inches hand on either side of the center location where I attached the ribbon to the rubber band. When I was finished cutting the ribbon, I had 10 pieces of ribbon about 8 inches long.

I used needle and thread to bind all the pieces of ribbon together. Finally, I used the shortest piece of ribbon to bind all the other pieces to the rubber band by simply wrapping the short piece of ribbon around the rubber band and the center part of my corkscrew ribbon bunch. I added one final stitch to the bunch for security and I was done. The final result is this new hair bow that will coordinate with pink and black outfits.

I spent $4 on ribbon. Had I used a coupon on the ribbon, I could have spent less money. I have enough ribbon remaining to make one more hair bow. So, the cost of this hair bow was really $2.

Dalmatians Dance Costume

I created a Dalmatians Dance Costume for a custom order through my Leotots ETSY shop. I had to share. This is a two piece set with skirt and short sleeve leotard. This is only the second time I have worked with tule in a skirt. I am getting better.

The leotard is a straight forward short sleeve dance leotard. The skirt is actually a simple tier skirt. The bottom tier is made with two layers of tule.

The waistband on the skirt was cut at 2 inches but after the attachment to the tiers and the fold over pocket for elastic, the waist band ends up 3/4 of an inch. I pulled the waist in from 30 inches, unstretched, to 17 inches unstretched. With a flexible piece of elastic, this will fit the 19 inch petite waist perfectly for the dance recital this outfit was ordered for.