A Growth Chart

A lot of years ago, I happened upon this book in the library (like maybe a decade ago or more). I liked it so much that I ordered a used copy from half.com. I think the book may have just gone out of print at that point. I have referred to it several times over the last few years. A lot of the projects are really sweet and I enjoy making them. A few baby gifts have even been born from it.


One of the projects in it is the one that I started sewing a couple of weeks ago and finished last night. If I ever put it down when I start it, it takes some motivating to get myself back to it -- mainly because of the state of my sewing stuff right now. I'm still looking for that shelving unit that will organize things for me.

The project is a growth chart for the Rugrat's room. I'm not sure why I wanted to make it so bad. One reason is because I want her room done in ladybugs and I apparently missed that trend last year or something. I finally gave up on finding bedding with actual ladybugs on it and went with a sort of flower thing. I figured the flowers can be the ladybug background. I've slowly been adding a ladybug this or that as I find or make them.

Now this will be there too:


The original pattern called for some gymnastically inclined bears but I wanted to go with the theme so I substituted ladybugs and flowers. Like the numbers and letters, I was going to make them out of felt and applique them on but I couldn't seem to get a ladybug cut-out that I liked. I tried a few and just got frustrated.

Then I hit on the idea of using t-shirt transfer sheets instead (you feed the sheets through your printer, cut around them, then iron them on to the fabric you're using). They worked like a charm. In fact, I was so pleased with the result that I decided to do the flowers too rather than using the felt flowers I had already prepared.

The tape is of course a standard sewing measuring tape. The idea for this is so simple yet I am really happy with how it turned out. Pretty much all the projects in her book are like that. If your library happens to have a copy, I highly recommend checking it out.