one of my oldest, dearest blogging friends, mary frances from this is marzipan, has just had a baby girl and has the great joy of bringing a bit of estrogen into her otherwise all-testosterone world (like me, she has two boys). I’m a little jealous to be honest. unfortunately, some of the joy has a little dark cloud shadow hovering over it because the baby was born with a heart condition and her teeny tiny, beautiful heart has already met with knives and highly skilled doctors. as they say in my family, uff da. it’s more than a grown-up heart can handle.
of course, mary frances and her family are taking it in stride and with great strength and grace…an amazing feat given what they must soldier through.
for my part, I had to find a way to hug that teeny, tiny hard-working heart so I made two little kimono shirts.
the pattern is from the heather ross book weekend sewing. this kimono style wraps twice around the front, that is the hug. but, also, the fact that it is easy to open up in the front will hopefully be helpful during her recovery.
I love this simple easy pattern and there really isn’t anything more satisfying than making clothes for little babies. especially since I rarely get to create for girls.
the fabric’s are from my stash, of course. one is a soft, loose-weave japanese print and the other is a soft flannel. I’m really fond of how the japanese print decorates the chest.
my only gripe with this pattern is that it always seems to leave a little pucker and extra bulk at the armpit. I think it might be the technique: the sleeves are sewn in before the body side seams are sewn. the final stitch sews together both the bottom arm seam as well as the side of the body (essentially sewing a 90 degree angle from arm down to body) and I think it might be inevitable that this technique is not as smooth as actually inserting a sleeve properly. anyone else have this problem? the shirt is not tight so I doubt it will bother baby girl, it’s simply a sewist investigation.
kristin says
oh these are so sweet. mary frances is one of my oldest flickr contacts/blog friends too and i think of she and her family often these days. what beautiful little kimono tops you sewed! i’ve heard the same thing about the armpits on that pattern; guess babies don’t really care though. 😉
ahappystitch says
Thanks kristin! I knew there was a reason we clicked! Mary Frances is the best. Glad to hear you have hear the ‘armpit rumor’ as I am now dubbing it. I’m not alone!
Shanti Sethi says
I’m so glad you said this…I have about 30 minutes a day to sew and picked this pattern for a friend’s (soon to be) newborn. I finished the seams last night, turned the shirt right side out and spent the next several hours trying to figure out what I’d done wrong.