More Tea Towels

It's funny because last year right around this time, I posted about some tea towels that I embellished for my Aunt Patti. And today I just wanted to share some more tea towels. These are a couple of dish towels that I got at Savers or Goodwill a while back, and I finally got inspired to decorate them with patchwork made from my scrap collection. A quick project with a cute result! And they really brighten up the kitchen. Another prototype for my someday Etsy shop...

Thanks for stopping by!

Popover Sundress

 

I absolutely adore Oliver + S! Their blog, which you can find here, has amazing free patterns and fantastic sewing tutorials. They also sell patterns and have a line of fabric. And, they have a new book "Little Things to Sew," which I cannot wait to read.

I made these sundresses with the Popover Sundress pattern--it was free on the Oliver + S blog--just look at the right hand side of the blog. These dresses were pretty easy to make and came together so beautifully. I can't wait to try more of their patterns. I made the dresses a little big so that the girls can wear them next year, too. The pattern for the doll dress was free, too, so I made matching dresses for our favorite dolls.

 

Robes

Ellie had been asking me for a bathrobe for a long time. I couldn't find one at the children's consignment shop or even at Target, so I decided to make robes for both Ellie and Robin. I took the girls to Joann and let them each pick out their own fabric. Ellie picked flannel with purple butterflies, and Robin picked pink flannel with sparkly stars. I used Simplicity pattern 2826, which, thankfully, was on sale for $1.99. I had to buy two patterns--one for each size. I haven't sewn clothing in a long time. The hardest parts were pinning the sleeves to the armholes and turning the belt. Otherwise, not too hard, and the whole process didn't take very long.

Thrift Shop Finds

I've scaled back on my thrift shopping these days. One because I don't need anything (we are trying to be minimal) and two, because we're on a tight budget. However, I did have a couple of affordable finds on a recent trip to Goodwill with my friend Marian. I got this atomic coffee pot (I don't drink coffee, so it's decorative) for $3 and this red vintage fabric for $2.There were at least four yards of fabric! Some of it has been transformed, and I'll share the project with you in an upcoming post.

Fairy Dolls

I am always inspired by Joel Henriques' blog Made by Joel. You can find the post for his wonderful clothespin fairy dolls here. Ellie, Robin, and I had a lot of fun making these. The girls picked out the fabric and hair, etc., and I manned the hot glue gun. They came out so cute and didn't take long to make. It's hard to see in my photo, but some of the dolls have wings made from clear plastic. I cut out the wings from containers in our recycle bin. I'm hoping we can make a forest for the fairies to play in next.