3.01.2011

another unskinny bop

another person's account of layla's birth story is coming soon. i didn't have time to post it yesterday because i got a custom sewing order from a long lost high school friend. she is an interior designer in DC and got in touch with me on facebook over christmas break when her current seamstress starting charging stupidly high rates for custom work. she had seen my carseat cover before and after pictures on FB (hells, yeah i posted them there too, i will brag about that project at the drop of a hat...best believe dat.) and wanted to see if i could make a tablecloth for one of her clients. well i did. it was a huge beast of an endeavor. you'll have to take my word for it because i only took one quick cell phone pic which i now can't find.

well my friend wanted a baby gift for her friend's new little boy. she asked if i could make a boppy cover. can. i. make. a. boppy. cover!?!?! come on! clearly she's not a blog devotee. i sent her a pic of the one i made for lay-lay and asked if she wanted hers to be two-toned as well. she actually wanted two toned and personalized.

i have used my friend tami's embroidery machine for two projects thus far: my mother in law's christmas gift and an order of jewelry rolls for a bride who wanted plain black bags with aninitial on them. both undertakings nearly killed me. i am not gifted with the embroidery robot. plus i think machine embroidery sometimes looks too overworked and finished on some projects. so we went with a hand stitched fabric-letter cutout approach instead for this personalization. i LOVE how it turned out.

maega picked out the fabrics from my meager supply of boy-friendly yardage (layla has straight taken over up in here!) and here are the results. the bleached out-looking splotches of the fabric are there because my pillow insert actually has a pattern of white bubble all over it and they show through in this lighting. and i decided that fabric background is wee-slightly cuter for picture-taking and showing off sewie-goodness than is my crusty coffee table or crumby countertop. and by "decided" i mean "stole the idea from my friend merran."

the fabrics together are making my eyes cross when i try to read the name here. i don't think it does that in real life.

i hand-stitched around each letter with embroidery floss for extra charm (hello, time-consumer!). i made the letters a little smaller than i could have because i got nervous that they'd all be crammed in there with a 7-letter name, two of whom are the fatties W and M. i'll go big next time. or go home.

this was a new feature that i did not include on layla's: the zipper cover. sometimes when i want to flip mine over and have the zipper-side fabric up, i feel bad because her little head is laying (haha, her head is always LAY-ing) on the rough zipper. so little matthew will benefit from our experience

my favorite part: you wont always find these on home-made boppy covers, but they are the real deal, my people. i believe this is a called a yoke or a saddle in the sewing world (or perhaps i am thinking of livestock terminology, who knows?). this middle panel is just like the official boppy ones and makes a flat surface to rest flush against your waist rather than a tapered one that you'd get with just two big pieces of fabrics sewn together. this is a high-class operation i am running here, y'all folks.

i might just have to make layla another cover with her name on it because i love this idea so much. plus about 2 hours after she was born, my IV ripped out and i bled a little bit on hers. it was okay at first because the red matched the 2 fabrics, but now all the red cells have died and it's just murder-trial-evidence-brown. not the best for baby couture. bum out.

6 comments:

  1. AWESOME. seriously. i am so impressed. (love the fabric background, too. wink, wink!) the yokie thingie is AMAZING and i know how real-deal that is. love the hand stitching, too. LOVE LOVE LOVE!!
    keight is greight.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I really think I need one of these if you are selling them...very impressed! I didn't see it in your etsy shop. How much are they and how do I order?
    thanks-christine

    ReplyDelete
  3. you amaze me. all the time. i mean for real that is incredible. will you make one for me....someday...far away??

    ReplyDelete
  4. I think I'm starting to dislike you since you are becoming a real live seamstress! Can't you just hang back with the rest of us sewing dabblers? I mean girl, that is AWESOME! Do you think I could get a Boppy for my 5 or 10 year old just so I could have a cover like that? I mean really! So impressed.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Agree on all of the above. Never had a boppy for my kids, but if I had, I would have wanted you to make it (which creates a lot of problems, I know!)

    ReplyDelete
  6. OMG! I just saw your boppy on facebook on the new owner's profile picture! I was all, wait a minute, I know who made that!!!! Crazy! Just wanted to say that it is beautiful & looks so cute with a baby in it! Great job!!!

    ReplyDelete