The "Awesome As" sweatshirt

I hope she's always this easy to please! I wasn't sure what Georgia would think of this fabric with skulls all over it, so I was prepared to use it for her brother. Fortunately she is still pretty suggestible, so when I said I thought it'd be a cool sweatshirt she pretty readily agreed. It's very hard to tell from this photo, but the zip has green teeth on one side and red on the other. I bought a big bag of zips from the Tamahine (manufacturer) closing down (sob!) sale last year, and Georgia and I had fun switching some around.

The pattern is from Topkids 45, #22 with cuffs and waistband added to give it a bit more growing room. Georgia is pretty slender, so this skimmed in shape really suits her. The pattern is darted, and called a shirt, but I measured it and decided it'd do fine as a sweatshirt for her. I'm tempted to make it as a T shirt for her though by making a smaller size with the darts, and just adding length to sleeves and possibly the body.

Her verdict? Awesome As!

Here's Isabella in the tunic I made her last week. It's Ottobre 06/08, #6 in size 74. It fits her perfectly, and I really love it. I didn't have quite enough fabric to cut the sleeves long enough for the elastic casing (believe me, I tried!) so I cut them with no seam allowance, gathered the ends and bound them. Same look, little more effort.

Mean picture, but the best way to get a photo of her standing up facing the camera!

Exhaustion+sewing=dodgy measuring

She really doesn't look like the kind of baby who demands to be nursed four or five times a night does she? (After sleeping through the night for several months!)


Between her, and Nicholas waking a couple of times as well, sleep is not going well for me at the moment. So I should know better than to tackle anything that requires Any Mental Effort Whatsoever.

I figured this pinafore should be fine - even a half asleep zombie could make this, right? It's from Topkids 44, #9. It's a size 74, which I figured should fit Isabella pretty well. The photo in the magazine looked very short, so I compared the pattern pieces to the last dress I made her. This one was WAY shorter. This is where the mental effort comes in. I didn't allow for the fact that the pinafore has straps - DUH! I also didn't take note of how much wider it is than her existing dress, which fits her beautifully. End result: a very cute pinafore, which I really like, which will fit her till she's about three. It's not a disaster, but not what I was hoping for!

Lesson learnt - don't sew if you can't think.

Why I will never throw away my Topkids magazines.

I started buying Topkids magazines before I even had kids. (I made some things for my bosses' grandkids). Then when I did have kids, I bought them regularly. I have used those magazines so much over the last 15 years! Their styles were fashion forward, but quick and easy to sew. (I believe they were largely a reprint of Knipmode). Several years ago they stopped publishing. But I will never throw the old magazines away. Despite some of the styles looking SERIOUSLY outdated now there are still some gems to be had. Like this dress:

I first made it for my now nine year old daughter when she was about two. The magazine is issue 21, which I am fairly sure is one I bought before I had my first child (and he's now 15!) I loved this dress, and had to wait years to make it, and it's still a wearable design now.

One drawback to Topkids, in particular the older issues, is that they had much more limited sizes available. This dress was only available in sizes 74 and 86. It's not hard to use those sizes to grade if they're printed together as these were, but in some issues the sizes were printed totally separately on the pattern sheets, making a simple size grade a much harder proposition. Ottobre has a MUCH wider range of sizes, and they go in 6cm height increments, not the 12cm that this pattern has. Later issues of Topkids usually had each pattern in three sizes, and the smaller sizes were more often only 6cm apart.

The good thing about having made this dress before is that I knew from past experience that it's short and wide (as a lot of styles were at that time) so I graded this to a 62 (Isabella is about 68cm tall) and added length to bodice, sleeves and skirt, judged by comparing the pattern to clothes and patterns that fit her well. The fabric is yet another piece from Keely's stash. I'm sure I'm reducing her stash faster than she is! Thanks Keely :-) Nicholas has jeans made from it too. I think they might look a bit too "twinny" if they wear them at the same time, so I'll have to watch out for that.

Here it is on her. I hadn't realised till I saw it on her how well it brings out her beautiful blue eyes. Lets just pretend I planned that shall we? Thanks

And here she is refusing to sit down. Which at least shows the length and proportions of the dress quite well!

So that is why I will never throw away my old Topkids magazines. They're stored in a box in our roof, with the "all styles at a glance" pages photocopied and kept in a binder near my sewing desk. By the time I have grandkids these patterns will hopefully be highly sought after vintage items!