Archives for July 2013

Jul

The Cottage Mama Paper Patterns Now In-Stock

I just wanted to let you know that all the new paper patterns are now in-stock and available for sale in the shop. I decided to print in full-color booklet format this time and I think you all are going to really like it! All the instructions and step-by-step photos are nice and compact and easy to have right by your side as you are sewing any of the patterns. And of course, each printed pattern comes with the full-size pattern sheets as well.

Here is a little peek inside the Georgia Vintage Dress pattern, so you can get a better idea of the color printing.

You can find all the new patterns over in the shop (click HERE), just make sure you are purchasing the printed version, not the PDF. For pattern wholesale inquiries and for a list of The Cottage Mama distributors, please email Lindsay at [email protected].

By the way, even though you can’t tell yet, The Cottage Mama is getting a makeover behind the scenes as we speak with a brand new e-commerce shop and a freshened up and more organized blog. I’m pretty excited about it and I think it’s going to make your life easier regarding ordering patterns, kits (yes, there are fabric and trim kits coming), and finding past tutorials and recipes. It should be ready to launch at the end of the month. Yay……I can’t wait!

Jul

Mermaid Under the Sea 4th Birthday Party with Free Printable

Miss Matilda knew exactly what kind of birthday party she wanted this year……..Mermaid Under the Sea. She said the birthday was for all mermaids, not just Ariel (the Little Mermaid), but that she could come too. She said all mermaids and sea creatures were welcome. She’s an inclusive type of little girl.

Matilda’s birthdays are always so fun because she is a July birthday (just like me), so we can have her parties outside! As I shared with you yesterday, we used her mermaid birthday outfit as a jumping off point for the party decor, but tried to stick with pink and blue as per the birthday girl’s request.

The table decorations are my absolute favorite part! I love a good tablescape.

I had this old frame sitting in my studio that I bought for 25 cents at our local thrift shop. I used a piece of burlap that I already had around from when I made some Burlap Covered Lamp Shades a year or so ago. I taped the burlap to the back of the empty frame. Then I took a star fish that my mother-in-law had brought the kids back from the beach and hand sewed it around the center to the burlap. I love how this turned out. Rustic and beachy………and less than $1.00!

I found a lot of the party decor at the Dollar Tree store. I bought a bunch of bags of glass beads that are meant to go inside of vases for the table. My intention was that they would look like sea glass. I bought some bags in aqua blue and some in a mixture of blues and greens.

I have about a gazillion mason jars around the house, so I grabbed one of my favorite blue ones and filled it with sand and some seas shells.

I took a hurricane vase that usually has pinecones inside it and filled it will sand and put more seashells on top. I purchased the bags of seashells also from the Dollar Tree store. Who knew they had so much beachy decor?

For the ‘Welcome Mermaids’ sign, I took an old school house chalkboard that I purchased several months ago at our local flea market and simply wrote the words on there with a blue chalk marker. The flowers and beads around the sign are leis that I purchased again at Dollar Tree and gave them to the ladies to wear at the party.

I also purchased 10 grass hula skirts from the dollar store and put them around the bottom of the table and hung them from the top of the canopy.

I made a simple and easy pennate banner with fabric from Matilda’s birthday outfit. I didn’t even finish the edges on the triangles, I thought if it frayed that it would add to the rustic, beachy feel. I attached the triangles to some rickrack trim I already had. This took me about 20 minutes to make, but I love how it incorporates the fabric into the look of the party.

These were little striped favor boxes with a seashell foam sticker added to the front of them that I used to serve pirates booty for the kids. It seems like all the kids love that stuff!

You can’t have an under the sea party without fishies, right? For the food labels, I designed the main label on the computer, cut them out, backed them with some scrapbook paper and added a toothpick.

We called the pink lemonade ‘Mermaid Juice’. It was a big hit.

My husband gave me a hard time about these because he said they looked like jello shots. But I found these little cups and just thought they were the perfect size for kids jello at a party. I filled the blue cups with blue raspberry jello and set them on top of brown sugar (to look like sand).

Here is the fruit that we served. I just called it ‘Paradise Fruit Salad’ because that sounded beachy and mermaid-like to me. The shell of the pineapple was kept together to use it as kind of a boat for the fruit salad. My mom (Grandma Jane) who was visiting from Texas helped me with this one. Isn’t it pretty?

I was pretty excited about this little food project. We took two vanilla wafer cookies, spread strawberry frosting on each side and put a yogurt raisin in the middle to look like an oyster with a pearl inside. I just thought these were so cute. We also drew some lines with a blue frosting gel pen on top of the cookies to look kind of like a shell. So fun!

We served spinach dip and some different chips and called it ‘Seaweed Dip’.

I made some rice krispie treats and cut them out in the shape of fish. Our little guy, Caspian, could not get enough of these!

We picked up some wraps from Costco and called them ‘Seaweed Sprials’. You could definitely make these yourself, but sometimes I just like to make my life a little easier and go with a few store-bought items.

The girls picked out these chocolate gold coins at the party store. They chose pink and blue and one orange one for the birthday girl. I told them to count out 30 to put in their bag. When I gave them to the cashier and told him I didn’t know exactly how many they got……..it turns out 30 turned into 73. Oh well…….we are rich in chocolate around here!

And the most popular party food…….the Shark gummies! The kids went nuts over these and they were a fun addition to the Mermaid Under the Sea Party.

How about some salt water taffy to go with the ‘sea’ theme?

Here is the pretty Little Mermaid birthday cake and here is what happened right before Miss M. blew out the candles……

Little brother had to put is three fingers in the cake………do you see his finger marks in the picture above. That guys loves his sweets, so I guess he couldn’t wait for cake. Oh brother.

Here is the birthday girl blowing out the candles on her cake!

Matilda has been asking for a bounce house for about 4 months now, so we decided to surprise her with one for her birthday. It was a present from my mom (Grandma Jane) and Pepo. You should have seen the look on the girls face when the folks delivered this and started blowing it up. They could not even contain themselves. It was a lot of fun and even I (and Daddy, Grandma and Pepo) did quite a bit of jumping the day before the party. Talk about a fun workout! And it was ‘sea’ themed……..of course.

I made an easy appliqued shirt for Savannah to wear at the party as well. I didn’t want to make her a full outfit since this was Matilda’s special day, but she was really excited to have a little something mermaid to wear at the big party!

And in case you missed my other post about Matilda’s Birthday Outfit……..here is the big 4 year old on her birthday!

All and all it was such a great party and I had so much fun putting this together for little Matilda. Luckily my girls get just as into all of this as I do and love helping out! We gave the kids that came to the party a stuffed dolphin, a blue and silver hula hoop and a mermaid coloring / sticker book.

Here are some of the printable labels I made, if you want to download those for your own Mermaid Under the Sea party!

And here is a blank set if you want to add your own text for whatever fun party food you might have at your own child’s party.

Again, Happy Birthday to my sweet little girl!

I’m so blessed to have these children and it is such a pleasure to get to spend this time making their birthdays as special as can be!

Jul

Matilda’s Mermaid Birthday Outfit

So as I mentioned before, Miss Matilda wanted a ‘Mermaid Under the Sea’ birthday party this year for her 4th birthday. Sounded good to me! I love all things nautical and beachy, so I thought this party would be pretty easy to pull off and it turns out that it was just that. I’ll share the party details with you tomorrow, but for now, I wanted to share the little birthday party outfit I made for Matilda.

For me, every good party starts with fabric inspiration. Matilda wanted to focus on blue and pink since those are her two favorite colors. I have been so busy this summer that I did not have time to order any fabric for her dress, I had browsed around online, but hadn’t found anything that was just right. So one Saturday afternoon I headed over to our local Joann’s and just really hoped that they carried some type of mermaid fabric that I liked or that was the proper colors for the party. And low and behold, there was the perfect fabric……..’Merry Mermaids’! I was so darn excited. It had kind of a salmon pink, but I was pretty sure we could make it work. Most importantly, I knew Miss M. would love it and I just thought the mermaids were darling. Plus it was 40% off……can’t beat that!

When I brought the fabric home, I knew we needed some other prints to go with it. You know I can’t just have one single print on an outfit. I started playing around in my fabric stash and found this great salmon pink from Art Gallery Fabrics to pull out the reddish pink in one of the mermaid’s hair and then this multi-sized dot from one of Sandi Henderson’s earlier lines pulled it all together.

I wanted to make a longer top for her party since we were surprising the girls with a bounce house. I thought jumping around in a dress might be a little difficult, but a top with leggings would work just great!

This top is a combination of two of my sewing patterns. The bodice is from the Charlotte Apron Dress and then I extended the strap piece to make it a knot style dress. The skirt is from the Miss Matilda Dress and Top cut at the top length, but with a 2″ band of fabric added at the bottom. The bodice on the Charlotte dress is shorter than the Miss Matilda, so that’s why I needed the extra added length.

As a side note, all the new patterns have arrived as printed patterns and are available in the shop.

I also used the side sash pieces (the shorter length for the top) from the Miss Matilda pattern, but cut them the same length, sewed them into the side of the bodice and had them tie in a bow in the back of the top.

The bodice is my favorite part since I got to play with trims and embellishing. Have I told you how much I love rickrack? Um……yeah, you already know. All the embellishing on the bodice was done prior to dress construction. I just drew out a curved pattern piece for the front. First I added the trim down the center, then added the outer rickrack and finally added the blue, tiny rickrack on top. So easy, but such a sweet detail.

I just absolutely love this little peanut! I can’t believe she is 4 years old. I’m looking forward to sharing the details from her birthday party. She had a ball!

Jul

Happy 4th Birthday, Matilda Jane!

Dear Matilda,

Today you are four years old…….how is that possible? It seems like only yesterday, your came into our lives to grace us with your beautiful presence. Today on your birthday there are some things I would like to remember about you and some things I think you might want to know about what you were like when you turned four years old.

1. You love mermaids. You had a mermaid birthday party.
2. Your favorite color is still blue, with pink following a close second.
3. You still take a long afternoon nap (thank you for that!).
4. When you wake up from your nap, you give me a big hug and wrap your legs around me. I call you my ‘Tilda Monkey’. And you call me your ‘Mama Monkey’. It still makes me feel like you are my baby girl.
5. Your favorite foods are hot dogs, french fries and all kinds of berries.
6. You sleep with your ‘Geo’ (Team Umizoomi) doll.
7. You really wanted a ‘Diamond Princess Tiara’ for your birthday. It is plastic and sparkly, but you think it is really diamonds. Mommy and Daddy got that for you.
8. You like to play dress up.
9. Your favorite TV shows are Dora, Team Umizoomi, Princess Sofia and Doc McStuffins.
10. You love playing with your brother and sister.
11. You will wear any clothes that mommy makes for you and are SO excited when I sew for you.
12. You love to color and paint.
13. You love your gymnastics class.
14. We saw ‘Seussical the Musical‘ and now you are trying to learn all the words to the songs from the show and love acting out the finale of the show.
15. You are sweet and very kind.
16. You love going canoeing and camping with Daddy.
17. When we go out to restaurants, you love to order chocolate milk.
18. You like ice cream more than cake.
19. You perform ‘Mr. Knickerbocker’ by singing and doing all the moves and it is truly one of the cutest things I have ever seen.
20. You are a such a bright light in our family and bring joy into every day.

Happy Birthday to my sweet, Matilda Jane!

Love,

Mama

Jul

Filming Sewing DVDs in Cincinnati and a Little Book Preview

I feel like the last three months, or rather the last year, have been a whirlwind of busy. It might not have seemed like it here on the blog, since I’ve definitely had to pull back online for work / life balance, but behind the scenes there has been so much going on.

As most of you know I signed with a publisher (F & W Media) last June and wrote my first sewing book. The book is now complete (though it’s been out of my hands for quite awhile) and will be sent print any day now. My book, Sew Classic Clothes for Girls: 20 Dresses, Outfits and Accessories from The Cottage Mama (Size 12 month – 10 Years) will be released October 7, 2013. And let me tell you……..I cannot wait!

My publisher, F & W Media, owns the Martha Pullen Company which has led to many new and exciting opportunities, one of which was filming two sewing DVD’s in Cincinnati last week. The DVDs will be available at the same time as my book releases. Each one will be approximately 1 hour and 20 minutes and they will be available as regular stand-alone DVDs or available to watch through Martha Pullen Television (MPTV) or downloaded from the Martha Pullen website.

The first DVD is a companion to my book, Sew Classic Clothes for Girls. In the picture above, you are getting a tiny sneak peek as to what’s in the book. All the pieces in the picture are patterns found in the book, but there are many more that aren’t shown here…….we need a little element of surprise, right? The book is 95% garments in size 12 month – 10 years and let me tell you that there is not another children’s sewing book on the market that contains this many full garment patterns for girls with so many different variations. I really wanted to give you a lot of content and patterns that you could mix and match to create many different, truly one-of-a-kind pieces. I hope you really like it!

The book companion DVD is where I walk you through step-by-step through many of the techniques shown in the book. The techniques are illustrated really beautifully within the book, but if you are a visual learner, you are going to love being able to see these techniques done right before your eyes. It’s kind of like having a private, one-on-one sewing lesson! I take you through gathering, how to make your own bias binding, how to apply bias binding, how to make your own custom piping, how to insert piping into seams, lined garment construction techniques and the list goes on and on. Let’s just say I didn’t have a hard time talking for well over an hour.

The second DVD is all about pairing pattern fabrics and trims…….my favorite! Also, I show you how to transform my Charlotte Apron Dress pattern into this darling embellished knot dress. I walk you through constructing the entire garment as well as how to apply and make your own trims, how to use bias binding and so much more.

I thought you might like to see what the set looks like from a little farther back where you can see the cameras. There were three different cameras filming and moving at all different angles.

Here you can see how the three cameras are filming different angles. Kathy McMakin from Martha Pullen Company watched these screens as I filmed to make sure all the details of the instructions were caught on film. If something was missed during filming, the crew would go back and film it again without me saying anything to have the proper footage for editing. I don’t know what I would have done with Kathy (and her side-kick Charlotte), they truly made this such a lovely, stress-free experience.

Here is a trim board where I talked about the different types of trims and how to use them.

Here is a super-cheesy picture of me with the lovely Baby Lock Ellisimo Gold Sewing and Embroidery Machine that I got to use during the show. This machine is such a dream. And I adore the folks over at Baby Lock……such a great company!

I had a truly wonderful time filming. I use to be a musical theatre major (singing, acting and dancing) and actually attended school at the College Conservatory of Music in Cincinnati, so it was strange to head back to the same city to be in front of the camera again. I finished my degree in Chicago as a finance major, but theatre, acting and stage will always have a big part of my heart.

I can’t say I wasn’t nervous to film these DVDs…….I was nervous, for sure. I wondered if I would choke under pressure or would stumble over my words? I tend to be a worrier and can get myself so worked up over things that are out of my control. So I tried to take a very relaxed approach. I had an outline for each one of my DVDs, but didn’t have a script or use the teleprompter that was provided. I simply pictured myself in the classroom teaching a sewing class and told the camera everything I wanted the students to learn. It felt natural and organic and not at all rehearsed or forced……..let’s just hope it comes across that way on screen. I haven’t seen any of the footage yet, so fingers crossed!

Martha Pullen herself flew in to film with Joan Hinds (author ‘All Dolled Up‘ and many other doll clothing books) who was filming right after me and Kari Mecca (Sewing with Whimsy) flew in the day before I left too. It was a special time to get to visit with all these women who share the same passion and love for sewing as I do. To even be considered as part of their circle was just such an honor. I found myself at dinner the night before I left taking a moment to take it all in and be truly present in the moment. I thought, wow, I want to remember this night and experience forever.