President's Day Weekend

It was wonderful to have a long weekend and to have Josh home for most of it so that we could really spend time as a family.

Our wonderful bonus grandma who lives across the street gave me a heap of fabric that she didn't need and the girls and I decided to put that fabric to good use. 

Aubrey has been interested in learning to sew of late, so we decided a long weekend was the perfect time to tackle the project.  I taught her to thread the machine and how to guide the fabric.  Then I stepped aside and let her take over. 

She did an amazing job, I am so proud of her.  She didn't get frustrated, she was patient and calm and she cut and pinned and stitched piece after piece for her skirt. 

Our only trouble came when it was time to gather our strips of fabric to create ruffles.  Gathering is not the easiest thing to do and Aubrey had trouble not breaking the tiny thread.  Eventually, I took over that part and pulled together the last few steps.  Below is our finished skirt, all ruffly and cute.  I think it turned out beautifully and Aubrey really did do the bulk of the work, I am so proud of her persistence and patience.  She did great. 

 After all that ruffly goodness I decided Ellie needed a new dress as well (actually, I didn't decide that, she really did need a new dress -- she has outgrown the ones she has and I don't have any in my hand-me-down stash for this size).  So I pulled out some complementing colors and found a cute pattern (on my favorite sewing blog).  Ellie is pretty thrilled with her new outfit (especially the ruffle skirt), she has been parading around the house in the skirt since we finished it.

And I didn't want to be left out, so I pulled out some semi-stretchy fabric and put together my own frilly frock.  I patterned my skirt off of this blog post but I am warning you ahead of time that these instructions are not my favorite and I had to create my own pattern pieces and had to make up my own way of doing things because this lady's way didn't work for me (and she left out some important bits like managing the waistband).  Still, I am pretty pleased with how it turned out.

I asked Josh to take some pictures for me but he started making things difficult, so eventually I gave up and got all weird...that he was willing to photograph.  Thanks honey.

Josh had some fun with the kids over the long weekend as well.  Here he is buried under the mob.  Ahhh, good times.