Semi-Handmade Spring Wardrobe Series: Part 1 - Introduction

Savannah Rose has been growing like a weed.  It's like overnight she grew 1"-2" and the poor girl was in serious need of some new clothes.  Now, it is impossible (or just not feasible) for me to hand-make all of my children's clothes.  With my etsy shop taking a lot of my sewing energy and projects for the blog, sometimes the girls get the short end of the stick.........but not this Spring!  I've taken a little time away from the etsy shop to focus more on my girls.

I was inspired by Jessica from Me Sew Crazy when she came up with a spring wardrobe for her girls.  Granted, she handmade all of her collection, but it was the inspiration I needed to get sewing for Miss Savannah.  I decided I wanted to give her a boutique style wardrobe, but wanted to re-use and re-purpose a lot of her old clothing that would otherwise be discarded.

So here are some of the old clothing pieces I started out with for the spring wardrobe.  Most of these shirts have been so badly stained that I wouldn't consider saving them for Matilda to wear - they were headed to the trash.  Now most of these clothes are from Gymboree, which I love, and the thought of throwing them away made me really sad.  Not to mention the fact that they were so cute.

As you can tell, I was obviously a naive new mom when I bought this clothing - who puts a 2-3 year old in white?  I won't be making that mistake again.....especially now that I'm expecting a boy!

So to accomplish the task of creating a semi-handmade boutique wardrobe, I did what I usually do when I have a lot of sewing to get done.  I cut all of my pieces for each of the different items.  That includes trim, bias tape, elastic and fabric.  If I'm going to use buttons or zippers, I pull those at this time as well.  I group all of the pieces that go together and fold them all in a neat pile.  I stack them on top of each other and I work from the top of the pile down to the bottom.

Designing and choosing fabrics is a tedious task for me.  It is my favorite part, by far, but I definitely take my time picking the right fabrics and coordinates.  I find if I do all of the planning and cutting work ahead of time, then the sewing part is really a piece of cake.

So, what do you think?  Have any ideas what that pile of fabric, old clothes and trim might turn into?  I cannot wait to show you.  So dig out some of those old shirts that have been stained or the clothing that got all funny in the wash and let's make it into something new and fabulous.

This is going to be a week long series with a post each day and I'm looking forward to sharing my creations with you.  I hope I inspire you to create a semi-handmade wardrobe of your very own.  And who knows, if you like it, maybe I'll have to redo Matilda's wardrobe too!