Small World and Sleeping Beauty Bags

I wanted to make something to keep some of my girl's toys organized. Instead of reinventing the wheel I went to the always-inspiring Dana of MADE. She has a great tutorial for her Hobo Sacks, with some fun variations. I figured if I was making one for Ivory's new Sleeping Beauty toys I might as well make another for her Small World little people.

This Small World fabric from Alexander Henry is one of my favorites. You've seen it on some bibs I've made, and eventually you'll see it on Ivory's Small World quilt, if I ever remember finish the binding! (She's been sleeping with it for a year without the finishing touches. I just ever remember to finish it and take some pictures!) The striped and polka-dot fabrics are leftovers from the quilt.

 I got the Small World toys from Disneyland. They are adorable! I bought them when I was pregnant with my Girly-o. There are 3 more little characters... somewhere. I need to search her closet! If only we had had this handy sack from the beginning.

Ivory likes opening and closing the drawstring ribbons of the sacks. 

I love her little tongue sticking out as she concentrates on putting her toys away.

Next up (and the reason I started this project in the first place)... a bag for the Sleeping Beauty toys Ivory recently got for her 2nd birthday. I had this small panel of Sleeping Beauty fabric that I got years ago for some unknown future endeavor. It was perfect for this project! I love that it's a still from the actually Sleeping Beauty Disney movie: none of this Let's-put-all-the-princesses-together-and-make-Aurora-pink business. Flora the fairy may disagree, but to me Aurora's dress has to be blue.

I don't remember where I got the green paisley fabric, but the flowery blue fabric is actually from some cloth napkins I bought at Target years ago. (Yes, I do hang on to stuff.)

Here are the characters toys. I also love that this set came with Aurora in her Briar Rose clothing (Who I was sort of named after, by the way). Now where have Flora and Sampson the Horse gone too? They were missing BEFORE I made the sacks. I'd just like to point out that we haven't misplaced any more since. You may have guessed it, but I got this character set before I had a girl, and possibly even before I was pregnant with one! I had been saving it.

The square Sleeping Beauty panel prevented me from turning down the drawstring casing any further. It ended up fairly narrow so I could only fit one drawstring through. But check this out: I made the drawstrings from the hem of the cloth napkin. I just twice-folded the raw edge and stitched it down. No turning required! There's even a right angle on the drawstring where the napkin had a corner!

Ivory thinks this bag makes a good hat, too. I love 2-year-olds.

Leonardo da Vinci Costume

I was just going through my blog drafts and saw that I had never published the rest of our Halloween costumes. Here's the second one. One more to come!

My four-year-old wanted to be Leonardo da Vinci for Halloween and he wanted his little sister to be the Mona Lisa. Here's how his costume turned out. It's based on the sculpture of Leonardo da Vinci in Florence, Italy.

The sleeved cape is vintage--it belonged to my grandmother.

The hat is a large felt circle with stretched elastic zig-zagged to it. If fit just perfectly, but I would have liked it bigger since it shrank in the wash.

For the beard and hair I took a length of fleece long enough to go all the way around the cap (and a little extra, just in case). It's about 8 inches wide (the length of the hair/beard). I left one of the long edges intact and cut strips to about 1 1/2 inches from the edge for the hair portion. For the beard I cut a mouth whole about half and inch from the edge and cut the beard hairs up to about another half inch from the mouth hole. The I sewed the wig to the hat from one ear to the other, leaving the front unattached. It fit snugly to his face, but was a bit stretched out by the end of the night (and covered in candy-yuck!). A few more stitches will fix that when it's needed.

I tied a paintbrush into the hair over one ear.

And here's my handsome Leo. The name tag helped with recognition.

Soon to come: Mona Lisa!

Toddler Shoes Makeover

I have a fairly strict no-characters-on-shoes rule. I got these shoes on clearance a few months ago with the intention of covering them with SOMETHING. Paint? Felt flower? My baby girl really liked the Dora on them (though she's never seen the show), but I never let her wear them outside the house.

I used a couple samples from my extensive supply of vinyl to make the flowers and leaves to cover the obnoxious cartoon on these shoes. I used regular hot glue, but I plan to use E-6000 if the flowers start to come off.

I must admit I was nervous at first that she'd be upset about covering Dora, and I was greatly relieved when she was excited about the flower. SCORE!

There are a few little parts of the design underneath that show around the edge. I could have been more careful and covered them up, but I'm okay with the way they turned out. And so is my daughter, which is what matters. 

Leonardo Tees

I made these Vitruvian Man t-shirts for the kids for Christmas since we studied Leonardo da Vinci in homeschool. He became somewhat of an icon for us.

I used freezer paper stencils (tutorial on MADE) cut out by my SIL & BIL's handy-dandy Silhouette machine (I think I need one of those... Oh, the possibilities!).

I used the same cut twice - once each for the image and reverse of the image. I like the way both of them turned out. This also helps the kids keep track of their shirts.

I made a few sets of these for cousins, too. I tried doing a few with spray paint instead of fabric medium paint, but it turned out so badly I had to start over. I tried fabric spray paint, too, but I was not pleased with the results. I guess I need more practice. For now I'll stick to the traditional method.

If only we had these shirts when we went to the Leonardo Museum a few months ago!