Small Things (Knit and Sewn)

My expected bit of time for sewing this past weekend sort of disappeared--that's life, you know--so I ended up sewing a few evenings. This isn't my favorite or best time to sew, since I'm tired by then and it seems everything takes longer than it should. As a result, I'm not done with my son's robot jammmie pants (casing and hemming to go), but I did finish my daughter's pants.

I used the MADE tutorial for kid pants instead of a bought pattern, and I probably should have just used a toddler jammie pants pattern. Dana says in the post that her son is a skinny three-year-old, and since my daughter is a thin not-quite-three-year-old, I figured we'd be okay. I measured the pattern pieces against a pair of her pants and decided to cut. Well, I'm not crazy about the fit. I gave these a very narrow hem--I guess I have a tall and skinny not-quite-three-year-old--and I don't like how the back fit her. They seem too short between the crotch and the waist back there, and they don't quite stay up enough. Supposedly there's room for a diaper in there (which she hasn't worn in months and months), but I don't think so. But again, this is on me--the (free) tutorial doesn't come with a schematic, and I was too lazy to sketch one out for myself from the pattern pieces and seam allowance. So we end up with sort-of-good-enough pants that will fit this year.

All that said, I think this fabric makes really cute pants! It's left over from our first set of mother-daughter skirts, and I think it looks quite mod as pants. My husband says they remind him of the Scooby-Doo van. There's definitely a 60s-70s vibe with these pants! And even though she keeps hitching up the waist in the back (sigh), my daughter likes them too.

She was also the surprise recipient of my most recent knitted thing, a kerchief for my long, curly, out of control hair. I'm totally fine with using the pirate-patterned bandanas I find in the dress-up basket, but I thought knitting a nicer one would be a good use of some beautifully soft sock yarn that would just get ruined on my feet. So I wound the skein of Ewe Give me the Knits merino/silk yarn that Kate sent me--after she dyed it herself--and knit the Purl Bee Summer Kerchief. It came out exactly the size the pattern said it would, and I tried it on and decided it was smaller than what I wanted. (Again, would it kill me to use a tape measure BEFORE I begin a project?)

However, it is the perfect size for my tall, thin, almost-three-year-old:

(Those pants she's wearing? Size 12-18 months. They still fit her waist. She won't give 'em up. I know they're short.)

The kerchief is ridiculously soft and a beautiful purple and there's enough yarn for me to make a larger one for myself, and really, all I did was knit these in reverse, because she'd already asked me if I was knitting this for her, so if I was happy with mine, I'd just be downsizing it for her. Now I'm upsizing for me. It's all the same in the end--except she gets the kerchief first.

No sewing for me tonight--last night I was so tired I almost drank the iron instead of my coffee. I will, though, be casting on for another kerchief. I've even done some measuring first this time!