More handmade customised dice...and another birthday present.

It has been a couple of weeks since my last post, and I've been busy with a variety of projects.

I had a couple of orders for some customised fluoro dice. So far I've only made dice using 6 lettered names - Murphy, George, Maisie...but this time as well as an Oliver I had an Anna! Names with less than 6 letters are no problem, I just added a couple of fun shapes on the other faces. Not sure that I can think of a solution for longers names though!

We had another birthday party to go to, and I decided to make a pair of Racer Shorts from a plaid mickey mouse cotton. Mickey is one of the birthday boy's favourites and the shorts should be perfect attire for a week in Cornwall (fingers crossed!) I'm afraid that I left making them until the very last minute which meant that as soon as they were finished they were wrapped and taken to the party. No photo! Oops.

With these projects completed I am finally able to start on my man-sized challenge! You may remember that I made some shorts for the Celebrate the Boy Summer event?

Well, they were not only a hit with Wiss but a colleague at work fancied some for himself too. The challenge: to make one pair of tailored shorts to fit a 28 year old man using the Life Preserver fabric in the Snorkel range from Cosmo Cricket.  Hmmm, no elasticated waist then?! I've bought the pattern and all the fabric I need. Now all I need to do is concentrate. Very hard!

I know what I'll be doing this bank holiday weekend...hope you enjoy yours too!

A birthday present and a fancy dress outfit - handmade!

This weekend saw the brilliant birthday party of a very special little girl. Happy 3rd Birthday E! The sun was shining and we all had a fabulous time.

I decided to make E a Warhol Dress for her birthday. The free tutorial on the made website was so easy to follow and the whole dress was finished within two hours. Not bad for a first attempt! I made it using a grey polo shirt from Primark (the pocket is made from one of the sleeves) and some super-soft orange fabric for the neck. Here it is, just before it got wrapped!

As well as a picnic, donkey rides, a tattoo parlour, swimming, ice cream, and birthday cake there was a fancy dress parade. I am not afraid to admit that I got very excited by this and spent quite some time planning Wiss's outfit - handmade of course! We decided that a mini Elvis would be pretty cool and so I got sewing a version of the famous white jumpsuit.

I thought that trousers and a top would be more practical than a jumpsuit for an 18 month old, so I made the flares using Dana's kid pants tutorial with an insert to make them 'flare'. I made my own pattern for the shirt based on one of Wiss's t-shirts. It wasn't perfect but it was good enough (the straining poppers only added to the authenticity!) A simple red jersey scarf, some sunglasses and some fabric paint for jewels were the finishing touch.

I give you, Elvis Presley......

Elvis has now left the building, thank you and good night!