Baby Onesies: The Maverick!

In early June of this year I officially added Bow Tie Onesies to my Etsy shop.  I also added a onesie inspired by the film Top Gun called "The Maverick" which was inspired by Tom Cruise's character's name in the film.

I've been thinking about some version of this onesie for, geez, at least 2 1/2 years now but never had it come to life until recently. I had originally envisioned a simple stencil of some aviators but when my hand went ever so slightly wackadoodle while painting and of course, I got the teensiest spot of black paint on the collar of the onesie. Most people probably would NEVER have noticed but it bothered me for 3 days straight until I came up with a solution!! I'd recently begun experimenting with making my own quilt binding so I thought I'd pick up some grey fabric and I could sew a binding or sorts around the top collars of the onesie giving it an ever so slight nod to the Navy flight suits they wear in the film.

The onesie ended up looking even better than I imagined so I added them to the shop. I've already sold a few of these!!

 Click here to buy The Maverick

With the new styles in the onesie section of my shop you can bundle up quite the shower gift!! These two onesies were sent out to a customer in Washington.

To purchase onesies and check out other items in my shop, visit: Lavender Paper Hearts Handmade

The (Mis)Adventures of Phoebe & Paige

The latest custom mobile I finished up is called: The (Mis)Adventures of Phoebe & Paige. This client wanted a mobile that captured the fun and silly personalities of her dogs Phoebe and Paige for her son's nursery and she presented me with some great ideas and information to start off with. Both of these lovely lady dogs seem to have very strong and yet lighthearted personalities. One of the greatests parts of working with this client was to read how playfully and lovingly she described her dogs personalities. It might sound silly, but it's these kinds of details that let me get a sense of perspective on the dogs themselves, but I also learn about the personalities of the client, their owner. 

First we have Paige, a dainty little Min Pin. My client described Paige as "shy and girly. She sits with her front paws crossed like a lady." Paige also sounds like she can get excitable as she spins around in circles a lot, but she also gets a bit nervous and skittish at times. So, I sort of envisioned her as an excitable yet proper Southern Belle who maybe gets the vapors from time to time. 

Here is a baby photo of Phoebe the Boston Terrier. Phoebe was described as, "is basically exactly like Elmyra Duff from Tiny Toons." She adores her owners and anyone who comes to visit. She also loves to take time to smell the roses (except she's too enthusiastic and she ends up sticking her face in the flowers and then sneezing her face off.) 

Just look at these ladies. How cute are they?!!

Here is Lady Paige as the uber-Southern Belle, complete with pearl necklace and lace gloves. 

Here, Paige is showing off her sort of spastic and constant movement in rollerskates. Paige is also partially blind so her sort of clumsy sort of excitable manner is only heightened because of this so I added a blind fold to play up the loving inside joke for her owners.

  

This piece features both ladies in a hot air balloon - but with all balloons. It's a play on a piece of art called Mr. Penguin Balloons Print by Showler & Showler that my client said served as an inspiration for decorating his room.  

Here Phoebe is taking time to smell the roses (and also sneeze because she does it 100%).  I made really small flowers and added some white cotton fabric to her other paw to give her a hanky. 

These flower details are in the early stages of drying. My long tweezers and sharp scissors definitely came in handy for these.  

Phoebe is apparently quite the adventurer. She apparently is so adventurous in fact that she's permanently injured her leg from being so carefree and jumping off of things more often than she should. 

As always, I like to add a few subtle extras to add layers and depth to the mobile.

The finished product is one I'm really proud of, and one I hope their baby boy loves looking at! This client was also a dream to work with. She had some great ideas to get me started in the right direction and she gave me so much fun backstory that I felt like I really got to know not only her, but her personality, and that helps me translate what she's looking for in the perfect mobile for her baby boy. 

xoxoxo

If you have an idea for a custom mobile, I'd love to hear it!! You can contact me through my Etsy shop Lavender Paper Hearts. 

Custom Baby Mobile: Family Fun

In July I was commissioned to make a super-duper custom mobile for a special little baby.  Baby's aunt asked me to make a mobile that reflected mom and dad, and their three dogs!

The specifics: Auntie requested that baby's parents be dressed in jerseys from their favorite college football teams - Oklahoma University and Louisiana State University. I was told mom loves to wear black eye liner and fierce eye lashes so I was sure to do them up, and I was told that dad loves to rock a goatee and has bright blue eyes!

*I usually throw in a toothpick to give a sense of the mobile figure's size. 

Look at this teeny tiny jersey!

This gives you a sense of how I built their faces. It takes a lot of layering to get the features just right. 

Here is a photo of two of the puppies in progress. I worked hard to make them as three dimensional as possible.

Here are the photos of the dogs that my buyer sent me: 

 

Bear is a Newfoundland and is a big boy at 200 lbs. 

Drake, a Clumber Spaniel, is actually the smallest at 65 lbs. 

Nancy Reagan is a Great Pyrenees and weighs 130 lbs. 

I did my best to incorporate each puppies specific spots, coat textures, and other details.  

I ended up adding a shopping bag above mom since she loves to shop, and a football above dad.  Did you know footballs have 8 laces? Google told me.  

I included some of my homemade dog treats to the package for the dogs and shipped it off. It's being given to the new parents at their family baby debut party and I hope they love it!! 

You can check out my other baby mobiles in my shop: HERE. Do you have a custom mobile idea you'd like to see come to life? Contact me on Etsy at Lavender Paper Hearts or you can drop me an email at LavenderPaperHearts at gmail dot com. 

Elephant Baby Mobile: Elephants in Dreamland

Goodness - why oh why are elephants just SO CUTE??  Whenever I see baby elephant videos I like to post them to my husband's Facebook wall in a bid to convince him we should get a baby elephant. I get it, I know they'll get bigger, but wouldn't it be fun to snuggle one for just a minute?? Just look at the cute little guy below!!

I was recently contacted to make a gender neutral elephant themed mobile for my friends Lauren and Andrew. I posted about the No Hablo onesie I made for baby Darko a few weeks ago.  Their baby shower was elephant themed and Lauren was interested in continuing this in Darko's room.  

Darko's room is yellow and grey - gender neutral colors until he or she arrives!! (Fun fact: Pastel yellow felt is actually quilt literally impossible to find around these parts. I called 5+ different stores in an attempt to find some. Luckily, Lauren liked the primary yellow color - phew!) 

I'm calling this mobile Elephants in Dreamland and it's been listed up on my Etsy shop already. (You can find it here!) The elephants are cute and cuddly and they colors are easily customizable. 

Gender Neutral Elephant Baby Mobile 

Here are some of the mobile's elements up close: 

Lastly, for my mobiles I usually like to add extras to break up and expand the visual line of the mobile - give baby something more to look at!!  I thought clouds was a sweet touch since the mobile is meant to lull the baby into sleep, but then I added the ice cream cone.  See, Lauren has a serious OBSESSION with Golden Spoon. To be fair, Golden Spoon has amazing frozen yogurt so really, what's not to love?! I've taken my husband there when we were visiting home and he was overwhelmed by all the topping flavors. (Seriously, the girls behind the counter started giggling because he was just staring at all of the choices!!)  He's now a Golden Spoon convert. Pft, as if he needed convincing!  For the mobile I thought the ice cream cone could be a fun twist on the idea of sweet dreams or dreamland. Plus, it's cute damn it!!

Baby Darko is almost here and I can't wait to meet him or her!! 

Elephants in Dreamland, by Lavender Paper Hearts on Etsy

UPDATE: 

Baby Darko is a BOY! He arrived 7.14.2013, just one day after Baby Nessie arrived on 7.13.2013. So many new babies in this family!!  :) 

Custom Ordered Quilt

Over Father's Day we were hanging out with my FIL, and while we were there his partner Sue asked me to make a quilt for her nephew's new little one.  She wanted to make a quilt that incorporated pieces from her nephew's old football jersey.  Jersey quilts are a super sweet and sentimental way to be a bit nostalgic about a previous sports career at any level. Athletes tend to have many jerseys throughout their careers.  My sister played sports from a very young age all the way from high school and I bet we could have made a great big quilt if we'd thought to save them!!  Jersey quilts are also a great and fun way to continue to use the jerseys, and in a way that seems much better keeping them stashed away taking up space in a drawer or a box in the basement.  Since I had the one jersey to work with, it seemed like the perfect size for a baby blanket.  I was also really honored that Sue trusted me to take on such a project!!  I only had the one jersey to work with so there was very little room for error. (Trust me, I tried really hard NOT to think about this part!)   

When I was really little my Abuela taught me some basic sewing. I've sewn quite a few free-form projects over the years - everything from baby doll clothes, aprons for friends, clutches for my bridesmaids and so on, but I've never actually tackled something like a quilt.  As a weird coincidence, my SIL and I had just taken a basic quilting class over at Jo-Ann's Fabrics a week before so I had a feeling I could successfully tackle (hee hee get it?) this project.  I also emailed and chatted with my bffs on the west coast whenever I had a question!  There have been a lot of babies popping up in their family and they've whipped out some beautiful quilts recently.  (Thanks Ali & Jen!!)  Luckily, it worked out and I was pretty happy with the end results.  And even better, Sue was very pleased with the quilt!! Now I'm hoping to hear how it was received by the family it was sent to, too!!  

I thought I'd share some of the photos I took as I was working through some of the major steps in the quilt. Here's what I started with: 

These are the sections of the quilts that I decided to use as the central focus of the quilt.  It's the nameplate, the jersey numbers, and the bottom section is actually cut from the jersey's sleeve!!

Here I added some sweet and playful polka-dot material to help make the quilt a bit more youthful feeling. I also saved as much of the jersey as I could when I was cutting it apart so that I could incorporate more of the jersey into the quilt which you can see here.

I was working on this quilt during the massive heatwave we were having here in New England. It was SO hot. SO SO SO HOT. I was having to do a lot of ironing, like you do with a quilt, and man, it was hot in my craft room. Turns out my sewing table wasn't big enough to work with the quilt when it was laid out so I had to move it to my kitchen table when I started to add the batting and back fabric to the quilt. 

Here's a photo of me stitching in the ditch!! You can see the back fabric we choose on the right side of the photo.  Sue and I figured if you're going with a theme you should go all out, so bright green football fabric is what I found and we ultimately decided to go with. 

The only part I had a few problems with was the satin binding. It again was just, SO HOT, and to be honest I think I was tired and melting so my brain was, well, melting and tired. I also didn't have enough space so the satin was not cooperating with me during this step. My husband helped me drag in the kitchen table to my craft room and while it was nearly impossible to get in and out of the room, it was SO HELPFUL to have that extra table and, you know, more SPACE to work with the quilt.  I actually took 2 days off from the project and went back and finished it one morning with no problems. Go figure.

Here's the finished quilt! It measures about 33 inches by 46 inches tall and is a perfect little-one size. I hope it'll be a treasured item for the new baby.