A New Old Apron

I have a fun little apron collection from over the years. Beauties that have been given to me by my sisters like this sweet ruffled one from baby sister in which I am stylishly serving up a platter of Thanksgiving turkey ...

and this adorable craft apron from middle sister with a hand-painted sunflower -- I've been using this one a lot while scrapbooking lately ...

Here are two my mom made me - the cross-stitched Coca Cola apron is from my Coke-aholic days (beverage only) and the appliqued goose or duck (obviously I am lacking in animal husbandry training since I can't tell the difference) is just so cute and country ...

and some I've gotten for myself like this cute Christmas apron that has a matching mini for the granddaughter -- which she's now outgrown {sigh} ...

And I use all of these aprons at various times throughout the year because I'm messy like that. But when I'm gonna do some serious down and dirty baking with white stuff coating every possible surface like a high school party with the parents away, I go for my oldest apron, one my mom made for me that I absolutely treasure because it provides coverage. Styled like a painter's smock, it covers shoulder to shoulder and neck to waist. It's simply made for those accidental poofs of flour or powdered sugar or wild sprays when I'm not paying attention to the hand mixer and it shoots out the side of the bowl.

This is my favorite apron and whenever my youngest daughter comes over to bake with me, she says "I want that apron." Not in a completely scary way, but still it gives me pause. Just what would she do to get this apron? Unwilling to take any chances, I decided it was time to break out the sewing machine, create a pattern from the original and make her her own. As you can see, this apron needs a good washing, but it is fraying to the point that I'm afraid it may disintegrate in the washer and I don't want to lose it.

I spent some time wandering the fabric section at Jo-Ann looking for fabric with sunflowers on it. Nothing appealed, though, so I ended up in the Debbie Mumm section and fell in love with this orange, brown and green floral print called Tuscany Flowers. Those are YD's favorite colors plus the fabric has a little bit of an old fashioned look to it, which is perfect for this apron.

After washing and ironing the fabric (it's cotton so there was some shrinkage), I pinned the original apron within an inch of its life, making sure just the portion I needed to copy was shown. Then I laid it on the fabric and started cutting, leaving seam allowances on the sides and shoulders and cutting close to the original where I'd be using seam binding to cover the raw edges.

Since I had a good 7" of fabric below the original apron, I decided to go ahead and make this one longer. More coverage is a good thing when it comes to aprons -- at least if you cook and bake like I do, with wild abandon. And I did make paper patterns for the top of the apron so I could make more if this actually worked.

One accidental design element that I really liked was the pocket. After I cut the neck piece out and looked at it laying there, it just seemed like the perfect little cute pocket ...

There were a few choice and colorful words hollered as I struggled with the seam binding. It wanted to jam in my sewing machine as I started each new piece. Here are Louie and Miles peeking around the corner at me, ready to bolt out the doggie door if it appears that I'm yelling in their direction ...

But after all was said and done, I was pretty pleased with the way it turned out.

When I presented it to my daughter, as much as she loved it, it was a little voluminous on her slender frame so we decided it needed ties. Isn't there some saying about apron strings??? I had enough fabric left to make some nice long ties, opened up the side seams and stitched them right in.

And she ended up liking it with the strings even better because she can wrap it around and tie it in front. After all this, she can now quit coveting my original apron and there better be some baked goods in my future!!!

What's goin' on ...

We are now on the downhill slide of home improvement ... thank God. The tile is being laid in our home office and master bedroom this week. We cozied up in the guest room last night -- cozy being the operative word. It's amazing how small a full-size bed feels in comparison to a king. And the puppies would not be denied. They are used to sleeping up on the bed with us and proceeded to carry on until we picked them up. Is this where the term dog pile came from?

Here are a couple of shots of rooms with completed tile. The grout still needs to be sealed and then a good cleaning and everything can go back where it belongs.

dining room

family room

We took a field trip to Ikea Sunday. Hubby and I had never been to the store they opened in Tempe a few years ago. Youngest daughter had shopped there previously and went along. What a veritable wonderland of shopping. First of all, it's huge -- 2 stories of everything from complete room layouts of furniture and appliances to holiday decorations to linens and rugs and silk plants and dishes. There is a restaurant and a children's play area and a little cafe where you can buy amazing cinnamon rolls for $1.00. It's a good thing we don't live anywhere near this store because I would put my car on auto-pilot for the cinnamon rolls alone.

In addition to the cinnamon rolls, we bought a very nice hanging rack to go behind the door in the laundry room for my aprons. I love aprons and I use them constantly. The granddaughter also has a number of kid-size aprons. We bought very cute matching Christmas aprons a few years ago. Got home from Ikea and, while we were still high from our sugar buzz, hubby put the rack up.

apron rack

I am throwing a baby shower for a friend in December. This is her first baby -- they're having a boy. They live in a mountain town a few hours outside of Phoenix and love the outdoor life, especially fishing. I decided to hand-make her invitations scrapbook-style and found the cutest little stick-on bears to embellish with. I scanned all the bears and printed the one that looks like a little pregnant mama on the front of the envelopes. I think they turned out really cute and I can't wait for the shower.

baby shower invitation