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Welcome to my Blog

I am a grandmother to 4 little girls. I blog about the things I make for them, review patterns, provide tutorials on how I've dealt with techniques or problems, which I hope may help others, and give links to the (mostly) free patterns I use. Every so often, I do a 'Best of..' post listing the best free patterns I've found under specific headings - babies, girls, boys etc. Enjoy the Blog!

Thursday 28 September 2017

Quick Quilts

I needed to knock up a couple of extra child size quilts for the visiting grand-children, with limited time available. I came up with two quick solutions. For the real thing, (i.e. proper home made quilts) see my posts on children's quilts here and here. But for a quick make, how about these two ideas?



This has to be one of the fastest quilts I've ever made. It's super lightweight, more of a blanket, really, but May and June were exceptionally hot here. 

You can read about how to make this, and another simple quilt, below.

Monday 18 September 2017

Swing Top for Child with Back Wrap Feature

I promised I would give some ideas for how the wrap top I made for Fleur could be made if you don't happen to have a convenient wrap beach skirt of the right length hanging around (or any other bit of fabric you can recycle). 



Back view
Find out how to make this top below. 


Friday 15 September 2017

Another Skirt and Top

In my last post, I wrote about Fleur's new skirt and top. Fleur's little sister Rose couldn't be left out, so I made her a new skirt and top this summer as well. She's 2 and a half, but the top pattern was age 4, so it was nice and loose for summer. 



Again, the skirt was a simple gathered skirt. It looks a bit long in these pictures, in fact both the skirts do. This is mainly due to the fact that these two little girls had not had lunch yet, and so their waists were a little skinnier than normal! So the skirts had slid down a bit below their waists. I offered to tighten the elastic, but their Mummy said no, just wait till they've eaten!

For details of the free pattern I used, and how I went about making these, read on.

Summer Skirts and Tops

I've recently posted about one of my grand-daughters who only wants to wear dresses, and my attempts to persuade her into shorts. One of her cousins, Fleur, is the complete opposite, and will only just be persuaded to wear a dress for church. The rest of the time, she wants to wear trousers or shorts. But her Mum thought she might consider a skirt and top. So I set out to make her a skirt and top (and of course, eventually, one for her sister).




The top was a recycled adult beach skirt, with a nice wrap around feature at the back, and the skirt was this nice whales and sailing boats thin knit fabric, which was an on-line purchase. You can find out how to make similar clothes after the jump.

Free Pattern for Baby Dining Harness

Assuming you have come to this page from my other pages on dining harnesses, go ahead and click on THIS LINK to see the pattern, and download to your computer. If not, please go to THIS PAGE for the tutorial, and THIS PAGE for more information on Baby dining harnesses generally.



Now read on for how to use the pattern.