Duck Butt Designs

Hello there friends! This post is part of the Celebrate the Holidays: December Sewing by Ti Blog Tour. Say that 5 times fast! 😉 I’m so happy to be a part of another Sewing by Ti Blog Tour and hope you’ll enjoy reading this and all the other posts this month. See the bottom of this page for a full listing of all the awesome blogs on this tour.

I had this vision. I wanted to make special family Christmas PJs. We’d be all adorable and matchy and my hair would be perfect and we’d have a picture with all of us looking at the camera and smiling – like a Pinterest Christmas card! Now if this were Pinterest, I’d have lovely pictures for you of a charming, happy, smiling family in pajamas made of organic wool that I harvested and spun myself, and then sewed together in my immaculate and organized sewing room on my machine that never skips a stitch.

I had such good intentions, but this is Sew Like a Sloth, you know that’s not how it goes! 😂 Here’s how it worked in real life:

*pause to comfort my crying baby who just fell on her face for the millionth time because she has decided at not-quite-8-months-old, crawling is for chumps and she wants to walk*

Look at us. Totally Pinterest worthy, right? (Incidentally, I am wearing my first ever Greenstyle (affil link) tester creation – when I was just a little baby brand new sewist and tester – the one button cardigan. I wear this fleece cardigan All. The. Time. around the house when I’m cold. Which is all the time right now in Michigan.)

Confession: Last year I also had grand plans of sewing for the holidays. Last year I was pretty darn pregnant, and having complications, and totally burned out. Last year I gave my husband a bag of fabric and called it the gift of good intentions.

My internship ended December 15th. I planned to work furiously on the PJs after that to be ready for Pinterest perfection December 25th. Great. Good plan.

…But I didn’t have the fabric I wanted…and I couldn’t get it in time. Bad planning and indecisiveness on my part.

…also, my family wanted to enjoy this unique opportunity to spend time with me.

…and, to be honest, I had a case of the Christmas blues. 2017 has been such a hard year. Money is really tight and I couldn’t do the things I wanted to do for my family. I know the holiday isn’t about presents, but I love my family so much, I just wanted to do some nice things for them. I couldn’t do that this year.

…and then this strange thing happened, my body gave up on me. I was exhausted. I had been pushing and pushing myself and telling myself that I just had to make it until break. Apparently, my body took me at my word. I just could not get the gumption to sit down and sew a family’s worth of pajamas.

What to do with all these good intentions and no energy to conjure them into actual creations? I did not want to give another bag of fabric! I did not want to give up on my cute PJ pictures!

They’re plotting something here, right?

I took Tim Gunn’s advice. We could still have handmade touches to our holiday! The kids could still look cute in Christmas PJs together. I could “make it work”.

I made Wholiday tops for the kids earlier in the year because I’m a nerd and I’m raising my kids right. And, because sometimes I’m smart, I sized up for the baby in the hope that the shirt would fit her properly at Christmas. It did! Go me! I used the Brindille & Twig free ringer tee pattern for the baby. It’s a good, quick and dirty sew. I wouldn’t say it’s amazing, but it’s free and it does the job.

I used the Duck Butt Designs Treasure Pocket Tee (sans pocket) for my son. I really like DBD for panels and kid patterns. The fit on this is very slim, be aware. He’s a bean pole and it’s definitely snug on him, and I sized up. I find that with DBD patterns, it’s best to just go with the RTW (ready-to-wear) size for your kid.

The fabric from Moon Beam Textile Company (affil link) is glorious (solids from Purple Seamstress). I particularly love the panels. (I probably have a couple stashed away in Caroline size for next year.) I’m not sure that there is any left for retail, but if you’re a Who fan, it’s worth checking when the shop reopens!

We enjoy presents in our own way – opening them or eating them!

The baby also loved the taggie blanket that her brother made her (fabric also from Moon Beam Textile Company). She tried to eat all the wrapping paper anyway, alas. Not quite as distracting as I’d hoped.

It wasn’t family PJs and the pictures may not be Pinterest worthy, but the kids had a fun Christmas. And I did get some pictures of my babies together, in their matching geeky tops, that I will treasure…and that I can embarrass them with when they’re older. 🙂 Let’s be honest, the best Christmas present for me wasn’t under the tree. It was the present arrived in May, that completes our family, that made me a mom again, and made my son a big brother. Seeing my children together this Christmas was the best gift I could have hoped for. And I technically made them, so…I’m putting this holiday down as a win in the handmade holiday column. 😉