Fashionably Late

Oh hello there! It's been forever, but here I am and I'm excited to share a new project! 

Back on April 28 my blog reading list was full of lovely ladies showing off their new pajamas for Karen's pajama party over on Did You Make That? Not wanting to miss out on the party fun, I got to work on my own pajama set. I would have joined in by making pajama pants, but didn't have enough fabric, so I made a tank and shorts instead. 

For the tank I used an old McCall's pattern that I bought secondhand some time ago, and for the shorts I used a pajama pattern from BurdaStyle. The fun cotton fabric I used was a great find by my mom. Someone in her neighborhood put some fabric out on the curb and she scooped it up for me. Nothing like free fabric!

My favorite part of these pajamas is the ric-rac trim! I've always been afraid to use it because I worried it would look tacky, but to my surprise, I quite like it! I think I'll have to try to use it more often.

 

  

June 12

Since all of my pajama photos so far have been based around a clothes line on the back porch, I thought it was time to let you guys see some shots of the pajamas in action.
So here I am in my turquoise and lilac tie dye pajamas with my teddy Natalie, who agreed to model with me.

As I said before, the tank top pattern is an alteration of Grainline's amazing Tiny Pocket Tank and the shorts are an alteration of BurdaStyle's Jane pajama shorts.

June 11

And now, presenting the after photos! Matching tie dye pajamas! I'm so pleased with how they turned out!

The colors are a bit more subdued than I expected, but I think this works well for the pajama sleepy time look. Or as my sister pointed out, if they were too bright you wouldn't be able to fall asleep while wearing them.

The final missing touch that I want to work on for this project is a label. I'm thinking of making a stencil and using some paint to stencil it directly onto the pajamas.
Does anyone out there have a good method for making handmade labels for handmade clothing? I would definitely appreciate some tips, tricks, and creative ideas!

June 7

Lately, most of my sewing time has been spent working on a big pajama project.
I'm going on a vacation with two of my best friends this month, so I thought it would be fun for us to have matching pajamas. And then I thought, why not make matching pajamas for my sister and cousin who both have birthdays coming up?
I have now made 5 pairs of matching tank tops and shorts. Phew!

For the tank tops I used Grainline's Tiny Pocket Tank pattern, but altered the back by adding a big cutout and crisscrossed straps.
The shorts were based on the Jane pattern from BurdaStyle. I altered the shorts pattern by rounding off the corners on the side seams, adding bias binding all around the leg openings, and using a few rows of encased elastic for the waistband.
I used french seams and a bunch of bias binding so that everything is nice and neat.

After playing around with a few ideas for the fabric, I decided to use plain white cotton so that I could tie dye the pajamas! I guess this means that the above photos are "before" photos.
This afternoon was spent soaking fabric, mixing dyes, tying up fabric in tons of rubber bands, and finally dying! So much fun! I wish I could have a full time job working on tie dye.
I have to wait a full 24 hours to unwrap the tie dyed pajamas, but I'm sure they turned out great! I'm sooo excited! Stay tuned for "after" photos!

If you want to see some tie dye in the meantime, you can look at my Tie Dye Inspiration board on Pinterest!