The Lady Beekeeper

Well this weekend started off promising, and then I came down with something that resembled a 24 hour bug.  I suspect it was just a pregnancy thing, but Saturday night through Sunday afternoon I felt downright awful.  Based on my symptoms I thought I might have food poisoning, but everyone else who ate the same meal with me had no ailments.  Oh well, chalking it up to the joys of pregnancy.

In other news, Will and I have finally settled on a color for the baby’s room!  I’ll save it as a surprise for now because I’m certain I’ll do several posts on the re-do of the guest room into the baby’s room.  And I found this super neat fabric that I want to use as curtains, but it is REALLY expensive.  I’m debating if I want to pay as much as they’re charging… But it really is cute…

On the subject of cute things, the tiny renaissance boots I made prompted a request for some Star Wars themed baby paraphernalia.  I’d been planning for a while to make an adorable ewok hat, so this was my chance.  Here’s the finished hat, being worn by an eggplant (I don’t have a baby around, and the eggplant was the only nearby thing that was fairly baby sized).  It was very quick to make (even while I was feeling awful this weekend)!  I made this for a newborn (13.5″ circumference head) but you could very easily scale up the design for an older child or an adult!  I’m taking requests for other adorable baby accessories!!

Eggplant in ewok hat – front view

Eggplant in ewok hat – side view

Baby Ewok Hat

• 1/4 yard of fleece in burnt orange
• 1 sq foot of light brown faux fur
• 1 yard of brown yarn
• Pattern – to be posted whenever Will or I can get the scanner to work.

All patterns have 1/2″ seam allowance unless indicated.

1. Cut out fleece and fur from pattern above.
   

   Cut out pattern pieces.

2. With fur right sides together, stitch 1/2″ from the edge of the fur, leaving an opening between two notches.
   

   Stitch ears, leaving gap at notches.

3. Turn ears right side out.
   

   Turn ears right side out.

4. Place fleece pieces, right sides together and sandwich the ears inside the hat.  Make sure the ears are placed on each curve and the open side of the ears lines up with the curve.
   

   Place ears on curves like so (but sandwiched between fabric.

5. Stitch between notches on hat.
   

   Pin and stitch from notch to notch, leaving flap opened.

6. Fold the bottom of each side of the hat under.  Pin and stitch.
   

   Pin and stitch bottom hems.

7. Fold the unfinished edge on each side of the flap in up to the notch.  Stitch in place from the notches on the hat to the finished seam in step 6.
   

   Finish unfinished edges of the flaps.

8. Folding only 1/4″ of the face portion of the hat under, sew in place.
   

   Fold unfinished edge of the face of the hat under and stitch.

9. Put a knot in the end of your yarn and thread other end through a yarn needle.
10. Stitch two x’s onto one side of the hat, just above the notches marking the flaps.
    

    Stitch x’s on the side of the hat above flap.

11. Tie another knot inside the hat to secure.  Repeat with second side.
    

    Tie a knot inside the hat.

12. Find an eggplant, or better yet a baby, to model your hat!
    

    Front of ewok hat.

    

    Side view of ewok hat.

This summer seems to have gone by too quickly.  Will has been getting up early for work to avoid traffic and I’ve been extra tired all the time, so we’ve been hitting the hay by 9:30 every night.  No jokes.  We’ve also been taking childbirth classes after work and on weekends, so it seems like our free time has really evaporated.  What little time we have left we’ve spent lounging around my parent’s summer house in RI doing absolutely nothing.  Which is exactly what I think summer should be used for.

Since we’ve been driving so much back and forth to RI for birth classes, doctor’s appointments, and hanging at the summer house, Will and I have been listening to books on cds that we got for a steal at Savers!  We found both Pillars of the Earth as well as World Without End by Ken Follett for $4 each!  Each volume is 45 hours of audio!  ‘Why read those books’, you ask?  Well there are two popular board games that we really enjoy based on each of the books, so we figured it was due time we gave the books a read.  I can tell you that Pillars of the Earth does not disappoint!  It has totally engrossed me.  It also makes me extremely thankful that I live in the 21st century.

In other news, I’ve started getting nervous that we haven’t done anything for the baby’s room yet, so Will agreed to paint the room this past weekend.  Except I didn’t get any paint swatches.  So he couldn’t buy any paint.  But I DID manage to finish the baby registry – so at least I have a list of all the things I think we’ll need when the baby arrives!  And I purchased a single adorable outfit off Amazon, so if nothing else, our baby will be looking dapper for about 30 seconds before destroying the outfit with its un-diapered bottom.  And on that subject, I have to tell you one last quick story.

Will and I are planning to use cloth diapers.  Before you say anything, if you read this blog you know how big of a hippie I am and that two of my biggest hippie concerns are recycling and energy.  So it will come as no surprise to you that the thought of throwing away over 5000 diapers over my child’s diapering lifetime is enough to kill me.  Well I have gotten heckled by friends, co-workers, and even COMPLETE STRANGERS when I mention offhand I’m planning to cloth diaper.  I was with my mom in Babies R Us the other day looking for a suitable diaper pail for cloth diapers (spoilers, there are none) when a woman, trying to be friendly, starts offering us some free advice on her daughter’s favorite diaper bin.  My mom mentioned that my husband and I were planning to cloth diaper so that bin wouldn’t be suitable for us, and the woman’s reaction was something of horror.  Her response was a sarcastic, “good luck”!  My response to that was, “thanks, I’ll need it, but I’m an environmental hippie so I think I’ll be okay” which I hoped would stop her commentary.  Her reaction to that was to ignore me and look at my mom and say “well, we’ll see how long that lasts, won’t we?!”  To which my mom responded with, “I cloth diapered 2 of my children so I bet she’ll get through at least one.”  That shut her up.  I’ll let you know in another 6 months how much of a disaster cloth diapering is, but for now, let me live my flower child dreams.

And on that note, here’s a tutorial on how to make something else recycled!  For Dany’s water bowl we’ve been refilling the bowl over the course of each day using an old liter plastic Dasani water bottle.  It is much easier than picking the bowl up and dragging it over to the sink.  The one downside to the dasani water bottle method is that because it sits on our counter and looks like it should be in the recycling bin it confuses our guests.  Multiple times we have had to dig it out of the recycling bin after overly helpful guests try to help us tidy up.  (Honestly not a complaint just evidence that it looks like garbage!)  To solve this dilemma I took a clear mead bottle and etched the word “water” into it so guests would no longer think there was a piece of trash sitting in our counter.

Finished water bottle!

Glass Water Bottle

• clear wine bottle
• Armour etch cream
• plastic paint brush
• X-acto knife
• contact paper

1. Print out the word water (or whatever word you desire) in the font of your choice.
2. Place the print out over your contact paper on a piece of scrap cardboard.  Trace the letters using an X-acto knife.
   

   Trace letters with X-acto knife.

3. Remove the letters you cut with your X-acto knife, but be sure to save any letters that have negative space that you don’t want to etch such as “a” and “e” in water.
   

   Remove letters from your stencil, reserving any negative space inside letters.

4. Prepare your wine bottle by scraping the label and glue off with steel wool.
   

   Remove label with steel wool.

5. Let bottle dry completely.
6. Apply contact paper stencil to bottle.
   

   Apply contact paper to bottle.

7. Following the instructions on the bottle, paint etching cream over your stencil continuously for 3 minutes.
   

   Paint etching cream over stencil for 3 minutes.

8. After 3 minutes, rinse the stencil and bottle under cold water.
   

   Rinse stencil under water.

9. Remove the stencil from the bottle.
   

   Remove the stencil from the bottle.

Well I had a slightly ridiculous experience today.  It seems that this morning when I parked, I may have parked a bit too close to the white parking line.  The person next to me arrived after I was in the building and must have backed into the spot.  So when I came out to my car this afternoon I found that the person’s mirror was right where my door needed to open.  This meant I could only open my door about half way.  This would normally be no problem for non-pregnant Lexi, but for pregnant Lexi this presented a problem.  Turning sideways actually made it more difficult for me to get into the car… Luckily the top of my car door bows out a bit near the windows (apparently) so I was able to hoist myself up on the side of the car and swing my belly down into the car.  Do people still do hashtags?  If so #pregnancyproblems

Anyway I’m working on a baby renaissance outfit for the little bun in the oven.  I’m going to make it 3-6 month size just in case I have a large baby on my hips.  For starters I made some baby booties.  What do you think?  I sized them using a chart I found on pinterest, and the foot size claims to be for a baby 3-6 months.  We’ll see.  After I figured out the pattern, they didn’t take long to make!  And they were basically free to make since I used faux suede scraps that I had leftover from all the Robinhood hats I made for the renaissance faire.

Check out these wee li’l boots.

Baby Renaissance Boots

• 1/2 yard of thick faux suede
• Pattern here and here

Note the pattern above is for size 3-6 months.

1. Cut out all the pattern pieces from your scrap suede.  All pieces include 1/2″ seam allowance.  Make sure to transfer the markings on the sole of the boot and on the face of the boot.
   

   Cut out all pattern pieces.

2. Cut a straight line perpendicular to the face of the boot piece 1/4″ away from the point of the marking you transferred.  Trim 1/4″ inside the marking in the larger section of the marking.
   

   Cut out the space for the toe as specified.

3. Place the wrong side of the toe on top of the right side of the face of the boot, lining up with the markings you made.  Pin and stitch on the front side of the boot.  Note: to line the markings up with the toe piece, you will need to curve the toe piece in slightly.  
   

   Line the toe of the boot on top of the face of the boot. Pin & sew.

4. Flip the face of the boot inside out (right sides facing) and line up the back seam.  Pin and stitch.
   

   Stitch center back of the boot face.

5. Take the inside face of the boot and with right sides facing line up the back seam.  Pin and stitch.
   

   Stitch center back of inside boot facing.

6. Turn the face of the boot right side out.  With the inside face of the boot still inside out, fit the inside face of the boot over the face of the boot, lining up the center back seam.  Pin and stitch along the top edge.
   

   With inside boot facing inside out, fit inside of boot over outside of boot. Stitch and pin along top of boot.

7. Flip inside face to inside of boot.
   

   Flip face to inside of boot.

8. Turn boot right side in.  Pin the sole of the boot (right side in) to the face of the boot.  Make sure to line the points of the toe insert up with the markings on the pattern.
   

   With both pieces right side in, pin the sole of the boot to the rest of the boot.

9. Flip the patterns over and cut out all the pattern pieces again for the other boot.  Repeat steps 2-8 for second boot.
   

   Now we just need a baby to rock these wee boots!

This weekend we visited Will’s grandparents outside Knoxville to celebrate their 60th wedding anniversary.  Will’s family on his mom’s side is huge and every single person came into town to celebrate for a total of 28 people!  We had a lot of fun with all Will’s cousins hanging out, playing board games and singing along to piano renditions of Disney songs.

A tradition at all of these anniversary/birthday milestones is to dress up for a huge family picture.  This year the family picture was held at Grandmother’s childhood home, which is this huge historical house that really could be a museum.  The color theme for the photo was blue and white so everyone wore solid blues and whites with the exception of blue and white striped seersucker, which was allowed because it photographs as light blue.  Given seersucker was called out specially, Will & I felt we HAD to wear seersucker.  Will has lots of seersucker, but I didn’t have any shirts that would fit my pregnant belly so I decided to make one!

I got the shirt idea from my co-worker.  A few weeks ago, after I wore my maternity shower curtain dress to work, one of my co-workers was complimenting the dress.  She remarked that it looked like the “old style” maternity dresses and shirts that they used to wear (I guess before the days where it was appropriate to wear so much spandex).  Then she gave me the great idea to make the dress pattern into a shirt pattern!  I used the same pattern Kwik Sew K3486 as my dress and tweaked the pattern slightly.  My modifications are below for your reference!

Will and I in our seersucker

Lined Seersucker Maternity Shirt

• Kwik Sew K3486 – pattern pieces 7,8,9,10,11,12,14,
• 2.25 yards seersucker fabric 43″ wide
• 2 yards cotton lining
• 13″ zipper

Lining

The seersucker I purchased was extremely lightweight and sheer, so I lined the dress.  This meant that I cut 2 of 8*,10*,11,12* and one of 7 and 9* from seersucker material and two of 10*,11,14*, and one of 9* from lining material.  In addition I cut piece 7 and 8 so that the stripes would be horizontal to the waistband instead of vertical.

Back modification (piece 12, back bodice and 14, back facing)

I modified the back of the dress to come down into a v neck in the back.  I thought this looked a bit more summery.  This is why my zipper was slightly shorter than what they recommended.  To modify the back, I took pattern piece 12 for the back bodice and measured down the center back from the neckline 6.5″.  Then I drew a line from the point where the neckline and shoulder meet, down to the marking I made on the center back.

Adding line from shoulder seam to marking on center back for v-neck back.

Because of my changes to piece 12, the back, I had to modify piece 14, the back facing.  To adjust the facing, I left the shoulder and armscye portion alone and traced along the new v-neck back pattern from above.  I extended the pattern 2 inches below the point of the v-neck and then used my curves to keep the width of this new “arm” of the pattern about 3″ wide.  See the picture below for what it looked like.

Adjusted back facing. The right side was adjusted for the v-neck.

Bodice front

Everywhere that called for piece 13 of the pattern in the instructions, I used lining piece 11 instead.  The only issue with this was in step 6 I sewed the waist of the lining to the bodice front, which meant I was unable to perform step 8 properly.  Instead of flipping up the lining and stitching all the way down from lining to fabric just stitched the sideseams together, lining and all.

This shows the back lining (right) attached to the front lining (left) then attached to front and back neckline

Modifications to the ties

In addition to cutting the ties so the stripes were horizontal along the ties/waistband, I also made the ties a lot longer.  I wanted to be able to wrap around the back of the shirt and tie it in the front, to give the illusion of a wrap shirt.  I changed the length of my ties to 43″each.

Length Modifications

Since I wanted a shirt instead of a dress, I took pattern pieces 9 and 10 up considerably.  The total length of each piece was 16″ and that includes 1″ for a bottom hem.  I hemmed the shirt using a blind hem.

*pattern piece has some modification to it.

Finished shirt – note how the tie wraps around to the front.

Side view – note the horizontal stripes on the waistband and ties.

Back view – note the v-neck back.

Our favorite picture of us from the Pryor family photoshoot from Thelen Wright Photography!

During the last couple of weeks, in addition to all my normal tasks, Will and I were preparing for my birthday party at home and I was preparing for the Maker Faire at work.  For my birthday we’ve been getting the yard ready which includes pulling weeds and spreading 8 yards of mulch.  Will didn’t let me do any mulching (thankfully) so the poor guy spread 7 yards of it himself.  For the Maker Faire I shopped for supplies, prizes, and food and helped Amy with the logistics.

On top of all that I decided that it would be nice to wear a renaissance dress while displaying Whimsical Brims at the Maker Faire to give folks the full effect.  Unfortunately none of my renaissance dresses currently fit.  Since inevitably I’m going to go to KRF dressed in costume while 8 month pregnant, I’ll need a costume anyway.  I didn’t find any pregnancy renaissance patterns, so I was forced to make my own pattern.  The dress consists of an empire waist overdress with lace bodice on top of a long underdress.  In this post I’ll show you how I made the underdress.

I started by measuring out bust and hip measurements as well as current “waist” measurements.  I factored in a lot of extra fabric for the waist size to be on the safe side.  The underdress is extremely blousey to accomodate lots of belly and a variable chest size.  Then I measured around the neck where I wanted the “collar” to sit.  The collar has elastic in it, so it will either sit around your collarbone comfortably or you can push it down off your shoulders.  Finally I measured the length of my arms from collar to knuckle and the length of the dress from shoulder to floor.  There’s a bit of fudge factor here, and bigger is better for this blousey underdress.

Modeling the blousey underdress while 6 months pregnant. (With help from Dany.)

Blousey Underdress

You’ll need:

• 3 yards of 57″ linen (I buy my linen from here)
• 1.5 yards of 1/4″ elastic
• Pattern template – Make sure to add 5/8″ seam allowance to pattern.

1. Obtain measurements for waist (belly), bust, arm length, armscye, shoulder to floor length, circumference around shoulders and finally desired collar length as described above.
2. Following the templates above, create patterns for body and arms, plugging in your own measurements.
3. Cut out fabric as indicated by the patterns above.
   

   Cut out pattern pieces

4. Pin and stitch arms to body at back and front, matching the notches.  Repeat for second side.
   

   Pin arms to body along 6″ edges.

5. Pin side seams of body from bottom of skirt to armpit.  Pin arm seam from armpit to wrist.  Stitch along this entire length.  Repeat for second side.
   

   Pin and stitch side body and arm seam.

6.  Fold neckline under an inch, right side out.  Pin and stitch, leaving 1/2″ seam allowance and a 1″ gap to insert the elastic.
   

   Fold neckline under an inch. Stitch.

7. Cut elastic down to circumference around shoulders + 2 inches.
8. Using a tapestry needle, thread the elastic through the neckline casing.  When it gets to the other end, tie off the elastic with the 2 inches of allowance and trim.
   

   Thread elastic through casing.

9. Stitch the 1″ gap used to insert the elastic closed.
   

   Stitch gap used to insert elastic in casing closed.

10. Hem the sleeves.
    

    Hem sleeves. (I used a rolled hem.)

11. Hem the skirt.
    

    Hem skirt (I used a blind hem).

Well, preparations for the Maker Faire delayed last night’s post.  I apologize to not give you any Tuesday morning reading material.  I actually wrote an entire post, but realized I didn’t have any pictures available and gave up.  So I’ll post about that next week.  In the meantime I’ll show you a quick activity that Amy and I came up with for the Maker Faire at work.

Our company has recently been pushing badge wearing pretty heavily.  It was always a policy that you were required to wear your badge at all times, but now they’ve taken things to extremes.  The women’s bathrooms even have signs reminding you to wear your badge at all times and showing women wearing them in different “fashionable” ways.  I can’t comment on the men’s room.  On top of that there are announcements every week stressing the importance of wearing your badge at all times.  This is what lead Amy to the brilliant idea of a DIY badge reel decoration activity.  We needed a quick, easy craft that would also voice the party line.

This is what I came up with to make it very simple, quick and mess free.  Each badge cost around 75 cents to make.  Employees seemed to really enjoy the activity and we got a lot of compliments on it.  Hopefully you can use the same technique at your company!

Large Scale Badge Reel Activity

What you need:

• Retractable Badge Reels
• Craft bottle caps
• 1″ white circular labels
• 1″ crystal epoxy stickers
• Advanced Strength Glue Dots