Behind the scenes

My good friend and fellow blogging mommy Rachel asked about my smocking - if I have a special machine that does it and if I made the baskets by hand. And the answer is yes! Maybe you'd like to start smocking, too, Rachel?

I start by cutting out the pattern. Here I'm using a lovely lavender scrap. Wonder what that's from? ;-)

Once the pattern is cut out, there are a couple of different options for pleating the material. There are iron-on transfer dots or the dots can be carefully drawn on with a fabric marker. Then the material is gathered by using a running stitch. Or the material is run through a pleater. I'm lucky enough to have the use of my mom's pleater. Some fabric stores offer pleating for a fee. That's the pleater on the left and spools of thread on the right. My dad built this board to hold both the machine and the thread. It really makes this process very smooth.

This is a Sally Stanley pleater. Those are the needles on the left. I didn't get a picture of those, but they have a crook and fit between two of the rods. You insert as many needles as you want rows of smocking. I want 5 rows of smocking, so I've inserted 5 needles.

Thread the needles.

Pull plenty of thread through the needles. That's where the fabric winds up.

The fabric gets wrapped around a wooden dowel.

Here's the knob that turns the rods.

The material feeds into the pleater...

...and onto the needles.

Gently pull the pleated material off of the needles and onto the thread.

See how the machine makes the running stitch that gathers the material?

Here's a pleated piece of material.

Cut the threads, leaving plenty on either side of the material and stretch/shape to whatever you are making.

Now the fabric is ready to be smocked. The green threads are called gathering stitches. Smocking is done on top of the pleats, using the gathering threads as guides. It's very much like learning to write on ruled paper. There are some websites that outline the basic stitches.

Stitches Link 1

Stitches Link 2

I have a couple of books that serve as inspiration and instruction for patterns (like the baskets). Sometimes I just do my own thing. Luckily, it's easily pulled out and redone if you make a mistake (as I am prone to do!) or don't like the way it looks. There are also smocking plates.

Are you thoroughly bored now? I think smocking is great fun and I love to talk about it. In fact, I think it's time to start a new project!

A tisket, a tasket

Yellow flowers in Caroline's baskets!

Ta-da! Caroline's Easter dress is finished! You can't really tell from this horrible picture, but the dress is lavender with brown baskets - 11 to be exact. Each of those baskets has 5 flowers (the center one has 6) and I really thought I'd be doing lazy-daisy stitches until the end of time. Pictures of our girl in her dress are coming soon.

Trip to Mayfield

Trip to Mimi and Papa's house

Be sure to watch the jumping on the bed video. It's fun and silliness that can only come from two girls.

Monkey

Caroline is starting to learn things more and more quickly. One of her newest baby signs is "monkey". Look closely - about 10 seconds into the video she places her left hand on her chest. That's her version of monkey. Well, she actually puts both hands on her chest, but she wasn't about to drop her milk just to entertain Mommy

It's a napkin - no, it's a dress!

I got a special treat this weekend. My dear sweet awesome husband watched Caroline almost all day on Saturday and let me play with 2 very good friends. We did yoga in the morning, had lunch together, then went shopping at the Pottery Barn and Williams-Sonoma Outlets. I could spend all day in those stores! I was drooling over over the delicious selection of napkins that Williams-Sonoma had on sale and wondering what I could make out of them. So after talking strategy with my friends, I decided I would try to make a dress for Caroline. A quick Google search yielded a tutorial and I whipped this out in about an hour.



It's pretty much a mumu, but we live in Midtown and people probably expect to see both of us in mumus at the grocery store. It was fun (and easy) to make and will be a cute little summer play dress for Caroline. And, hey, after she finishes her chicken nuggets, we can just wipe her off with her dress!

The zoo

Look!

Baby giraffe - so cute! (But not as cute as our baby!)

Caroline loved the bird house.

This bird was absolutely beautiful! (We already forgot what it was called...)

{...sigh...}

Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Darcy... Sweet... Subtle... Refreshing... This is now one of my favorites.

I stumbled on this really interesting website: Library Thing. If you amass and love books like we do, this is a pretty neat online book catalog. Check it out.

And, lastly, a photo of my two very favorite people...

Evening entertainment

Birthday fun

Click on the picture to see the whole album...

First Birthday

Happy Birthday, Caroline!

Sweet girl,
We love you so so so much! This has been the best year of our lives. We go to bed each night thinking, "This was the greatest day yet. How can tomorrow be any better?" And, somehow, it always is. We love watching you grow and learn and explore. We have so much to look forward to! Thank you for making us parents!
Hugs and kisses, Mama and Dada

Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.

James 1:17

My new happy place

This used to be my old spot for sewing, pleating, crafting, gluing, etc. - a TV tray and the dining room table. Pretty sad.

So here it is - my new creative corner! It's upstairs, out of the way. My dear husband put the shelves up. We found the adjustable folding table at SAM's (thanks for the tip, Mom!). I put a baker's rack up there to catch some spill-over. I still have some work to do. I'm a project-a-holic and have a ton of "stuff" to organize and put in the storage bins. I am so excited to have a place to create! And I'm sure Kevin is glad that the crafts won't be encroaching our dining space any longer. It's not as fancy as some of the spaces I've seen out there on the internet. But it works for me!

I finished this dress before I moved upstairs, but this is the latest smocked dress for Caroline. It's unfinished in this picture, but you get the idea. So sweet... I've started her Easter dress in my new happy place.

And because no post is complete without pictures of our little sweetie...

Walking

Warm weather at last

Ready to go

My entourage

"You alone are the LORD. You made the heavens, even the highest heavens, and all their starry host, the earth and all that is on it, the seas and all that is in them. You give life to everything, and the multitudes of heaven worship you."
Nehemiah 9:6

A day at our house

Play, read, (nap) eat, enjoy nature, swing, (nap) snack

The girls

For you, Mom...

Valentine's Day

Our Valentine


Whee! Tissue paper and ribbons from Mommy's gift


A sweet treat for my honey

Bubbles

Dancing

Kevin is a great dad. He comes home, sheds his coat and tie, and gets down on the floor with Caroline while I make dinner. This was one of their activities - listening and dancing to all the music on Kevin's cell phone. It was hard not to laugh while I videoed this!

Waiting for spring

My sweet little helper and I had an indoor project today. We saved our egg cartons and poked a few holes in the bottom of the cups. We used the lids for saucers. Then we filled the cups with some damp potting soil and planted our morning glories and moon flowers. We put them in a sunny window and by the time spring gets here we'll be ready to plant them in the backyard!

Caroline's favorite hangout

Tigger's nest is warm and soft and fun and he shouldn't have it all to himself.

So he gets some company.

But Caroline ultimately evicts him and has the nest all to herself!