Baby's first jewelery

[norsegirl]

In preparation for Pennsic I picked up a necklace for my daughter yesterday. Any good norse woman needs some amber and my baby will be no exception. I also finished her first apron dress today. Add that to the two eura dresses I have already done and she has 2 whole outfits. And I suddenly realize why parents either don't attend Pennsic or leave their children at home. It's not the parties, or the weird people their children might be exposed to, or the drums keeping them up all night, it's having to make a week's worth of clothing that will be worn once.

When I make something for myself, I have a reasonable assurance that it will be worn at least a few times. Even if I realize it is horrible and I've done it all wrong (oh come on, we've all been there right?), I probably will have worn it a few times before I realize that. And if I did it well it will last me for years and be worn and loved for many events. But it's a whole different game with children. Outside of Pennsic, even the most active SCA family will probably only want one or two outfits for their children, because normally you just need enough for a weekend and then you go home to normal clothes and your washing machine. And we're not even really that active now! I go to maybe 3 or 4 events a year. Even assuming the stuff I'm making will fit for a whole year and I make only enough for a new outfit every other day I'll still have one or two outfits that never get worn outside of that one time at Pennsic!

rectangularcat suggested that I make the outfits but don't finish the seams. I don't really see the point in that. I have a serger, so finishing the seams takes no time at all. If I finish it, the garment can in theory last for years, even if I don't need it to. If I don't finish the seams it might fall apart while she's wearing it and it probably won't make it through the wash. Not finishing would essentially make it like a disposable item, and for the extra few minutes I might as well do it right.

While I had high hopes that I might be able to make her garments out of scraps I've encountered a problem... I now have a pattern so efficient for my dresses that I simply don't get scraps. I figured out a way to get an apron dress for me and one for her out of a yard and a half of fabric, but that's only going to work this year. By next year I'll have to re-think and re-design because the scraps resulting from my apron dress won't be enough to make anything for her.

It's annoying to think that this time next year, and every year thereafter, I'm going to be going through all the same pre-pennsic sewing crunch. And that I will probably have to buy fabric for it because I simply don't have any large enough scraps to work with and won't be coming up with any in the course of sewing my usual stuff.

I hope our second one (no I'm not pregnant, but I'm hoping that there will be a second one some time in the future) will be a girl because it will just kill me if I have to do this for two kids and can't pass any of it down.

The plan for this year is 9 days at Pennsic, so 4 dresses and 2 aprons and if everything gets dirty I'll do a bit of laundry for her in a wash basin. That makes me half-way done at this point, so that's good at least.

My stuff is coming along slowly but steadily. I also made myself an apron dress today, though I didn't finish mine. I'm hanging it for a few days before I hem it and I haven't applied the straps either. I might weave up some trim for it, but then again I might not. We'll see how motivated I get. Back to the machine to finish up the last dress I have cut out and then figure out where I'll go from here.

Comments

Hand-Me-Downs

[eliskimo.livejournal.com]

The phrase you are looking for is "hand-me-downs."

We just spent a week at Lilies. I didn't actually "make" Alexander any garb. He has one tunic his Auntie Gabe made for him before he was born that he has been wearing all winter (she based it on one of the Woven into the Earth child gowns). It was huge on him for his first demo last August and is still a little big, but a brooch at the neck and rolled up sleeves have made it work.

Then Gunner & Gabrielle passed on a bag of garb Anne had outgrown to Tormod for Cian. He went through it and pulled out the things Cian could wear and passed the rest on to me. I don't think Gabrielle actually made any of it; it had been hand-me-downs to here. I'll admit some of it was pretty awful. However, a bit of time with my serger cleaning up seams, then a bit more time adding some trim and I had two more tunics I'd let my son be seen in. There are three more in the bag that are still to large for him, but I'll probably take them to Pensic.

Duchess Marion suggested a "cheat" I didn't mind using (seeing as it's baby garb we're talking about): buy a couple cheap oversize T-shirts and put trim around the bottom. I did two of those and they actually look pretty good. So that brought me up to five tunics for a week of camping. I figured I could wash things out and leave it at that.

Then AT Lilies, I meet a woman with two kids, one about 18 months older than mine. She also gave me two tunics hers had outgrown. She said that they had been through both her kids and at least one before that. That gave me seven tunics for a week of camping, which is perfect!

And, of course, once my kids are done with them, I will pass this largess on to someone else.

I still want to make another tunic for him, on the pattern Gabe used, just because I bought enough of a nice blue cotton-linen to make a set of garb for all three of us.

Re: Hand-Me-Downs

[eve-the-just.livejournal.com]

I get the concept, but it really only works if you have friends with children just slightly older than your own. All of my friends either have children the same age (within less than 6 months) or so much older that they could (and do) borrow things out of my wardrobe and babysit for me.

I'm not good asking for charity and no one knows me or my needs well enough to offer assistance here. You are active, well known and very visible, so I imagine you wouldn't have to *ask* for assistance, people would just think of you and your child when they have things they no longer need. I'm on my own and I'm relatively okay with that. I just like to complain about the effort is all.

As for the t-shirt + trim suggestion. Interesting idea and I'm glad it worked for you. I refuse to work with commercial trim though ever since I earned myself a $100 repair on my sewing machine the last time I tried to sew with it (my machine got caught and a piece snapped off and nearly killed me). It's simply not worth the risk that I might have to go through that expense and hassle (being without a machine for a week while it was in the shop) again. And if I'm weaving the trim I'm thinking I'd be better off spending my time making something I love out of linen rather than adapting things I don't love.

As she gets older I'll probably just use her as an opportunity to use up some of the crappier cotton fabrics I've picked up over the years but don't want to use on myself any more. I've got an awful lot of fabric to use up here. It's just finding the time to sew it all up that is hard.

Re: Hand-Me-Downs

[eliskimo.livejournal.com]

Not all trims are created equal! I hate using the ones that have a bit of a plasticy feel to the edges and always sew SLOWLY when using them. However, I've also got a bunch that are really soft.

As Marion pointed out, "what else are you going to do with *this much* trim?" (*this much* being her holding her hands about 18" apart). I had about that much left over from a tunic I made for Hector's Callum several years ago with heraldic shields on it. I used that one of the shirts. Also have have a TONNE of a red, black & white trim. I bought 25 yards for $5 from a woman going out of business my first Pennsic and I've been looking for ways to use it up - probably the way you feel about those "crappier cottons."

I don't think parents passing on kids' garb think of it as "charity" so much as "get this out of my house!" Kind of like the way Freecycle works :) Maybe the charity is that I took it off their hands.

Re: Hand-Me-Downs

[eve-the-just.livejournal.com]

I think any time you give something to someone else who needs it more than you that is charity. Whether your motivations are charitable in the traditional sense of showing compassion for the poor, or the much more modern sense of de-cluttering.

However, if you've got issue with me using the term that way, let me put it another way; I have trouble asking for people to give me stuff for free. If people offer me stuff I'll gladly accept it, but I'm just not comfortable asking. And right now, no one here knows me well enough to know that I need stuff. If I was still in Edmonton I'd have lots of stuff being offered to me. Same if I was in Perth. And I might even get lucky up in Ontario (though that's where I've got the bulk of the friends with kids the same age or no kids at all). But down here I've been relatively inactive and have only made friends with people who happen to have kids the exact same age or no kids at all. People give hand-me-downs to people who come out regularly because they want to see it get used. I totally get that. And I'm just not one of those people right now.

Strangely I can think of all kinds of uses for "this much" trim. Dog collars, trim for wrists, bookmarks for largesse, samples to keep in my portfolio. Oddly I don't have any lengths like that because I do use it up, on the rare occasion that I use trim at all.

And yes, my hate is for the plasticy stuff. There are no words for how much I loathe that stuff. Ever since a piece tried to kill me via sewing machine explosion I've refused to even touch the stuff much less use it for anything. Anyway, I don't buy trim any more. It would be wrong. I'm primarily known for my weaving, and I so rarely take the time to actually use even the stuff I weave (I hate handsewing) so if I'm going to go to the effort I might as well make something custom for the project or use up some of the stash.