ECing a 4 month old baby

The ECing is not progressing as well as I had hoped.....perhaps I was setting the bar too high. In my mind I was hoping that my 4 month old would continue to only poo during a pottytunity and starting to pee mostly during a pottytunity as well. The fact is that she had pooed in the diaper 3 times in the last 2 weeks. I'm a bit discouraged. The first 2 times she pooed in the diaper, someone else was holding her and I was busy cooking or doing some other house chores. So I wasn't paying attention to her 'tells'. The 3rd time she did it, she gave me lots of tells by fussing and crying but I was clueless. Afterall, she just pooed a big one only 30 minutes ago! So I tried to feed her, she refused the boob. I tried to rock her to sleep, she was screaming and crying but eventually calmed down. That was when I discovered she had another big poo in her diaper. Sigh!

I know my baby is going through some sort of developmental stage. Her feeding, sleeping, pooing is all out of sorts right now. So I guess I just have to be patient and figure out what her new patterns are. I guess I'll never really truly have it figured out since she will continue to grow and her needs will continue to change!

Vogue 7933 waistband converted

I have converted the Vogue 7933 waistband to a pull-on style, comfort waistband (see previous post). Yay! It's not perfect but it's now much more wearable than before. There is still a little gaping at the back but tolerable. It's probably because I have a flat seat and I'm short-waisted. I will have to re-draft the waistband piece of this pattern later for a better fit.

I was rushing to finish this after the kids had gone to bed and forgot to take pictures along the way. After removing the original waistband and sewing the original zipper fly shut, these are the steps:

1. Find the original fabric for this pair of pants. Cut out the contour waistband on the stretchy grain of the fabric, using the Vogue 7933 pattern as a guide, but omit the overlapping tab part so that the waistband will form circle.

2. I sewed the waistband into a circle, and did the same with the facing. Then I sewed the top of the waistband and the facing together.

3. I cut a piece of 1 inch non-roll elastic which is about 1.5 inch shorter than the circumference of the waistband. I zig-zagged it into the top seam allowance of the waistband facing piece. I tried with a 1/4 inch elastic but I like the 1 inch elastic better because makes the waistband more sturdy. I stretch the elastic slightly when I sewed it to the fabric. I stretched it a lot when sewing it to the back where it originally gaped horribly.

4. I sewed the waistband to the pants and top-stitched it with contracting threads.

Front:

Back:
I rarely tuck my tops into my pants these days. So this is how I am wearing it. The waistband gently holds back my mommy tummy a bit which is nice.

I'm quite happy with this conversion. These pants are wearable now! I am going to look at the other pants I made and see if I still have the original fabric to do this conversion again. Thanks Myrna for your post!

Self-stitched Sept'11 Challenge

Yep, I've signed up for 'So, Zo...,'s Self-stitched Sept'11 Challenge. I already wear at least 1 piece of self-made clothing every day so this should be fine. The challenge for me is to remember to take a picture of each outfit every day for the month of Sept!

This challenge will also help me figure out if I'm wearing the same small portion of self-made clothes day in and day out. I'm sure I'll have fun doing it. Here is my pledge:

'I, Lovenicky, sign up as a participant of Self-Stitched-Sept '11. I endeavour to wear at least 1 self-stitched or self-refashioned piece of clothing each day for the duration of September 2011'.

Converting pants' waistband - Vogue 7933

I made a lot of clothes, especially pant/jeans before I had kids. Now that I have 2 kids, my body shape has changed a lot and some of the pants I made just don't fit properly. The waistband is a particular issue. I want to make them wearable again.

I have been seeing these 'comfort waist pants' sold in Reitmans (a Canadian clothing chain). I have never tried them on but they are pull-on style and do look comfortable and polished at the same time. I noticed that the waistband were cut on the stretchy grain just like the pants were. However, it seemed like there was something else underneath the waistband. Since I didn't own a pair, I wasn't able to find out.
I googled 'comfort waist pants' and found Myrna's blog (http://blog.myrnagiesbrecht.com/2010_03_01_archive.html). She owns a pair of these pants and actually took the waistband seam apart to find out what was in there. Apparently it has some sort of hard clear elastic sewn into the top of the waistband. I don't know where to find these elastics so I'm just going to wing it by sewing some non-roll elastic in my stash into a pair of pants that I made to see if that would work.

The pants that I will be experimenting on is this one (http://lovenicky.typepad.com/blog/2009/11/last-top-finished.html ) - Vogue 7933. It gapes horribly at the back if I don't wear a belt with it. I'm going to convert the waistband and see if it will improve the fit. Wish me luck!

ECing a 3 month old baby

I can't believe my baby is 3 months old already! I'm still ECing her, although I noticed that she poos less now than before. Previously, she would poo after every feed. Now she has a big poo in the morning when she wakes up, and then perhaps a couple of poos during the day. I know it sounds weird, but the changes in her elimination frequencies is quite interesting to me as her mom! LOL

I still offer her 'pottytunities' after each feed, even though she doesn't always poo/pee during these instances. I have also added 'pottytunities' when she wakes from a nap, especially when I am able to catch her right after she wakes up. She would poo/pee and give me this big smile afterwards!

Knit skirt to dress refashion

I found this linen/cotton knit skirt at a thrift store. I didn't know that you could make knit out of linen! I liked the colour and the stripes. The skirt is too long for me so I thought I could make a dress out of it.Steps:

1. Rip out the side seams a few inches down from the top. It's better to rip more than less because you can always resew the seams back. Take out the waist elastic. Also, rip out the stitching on the waistband a couple of inches from the side seams towards the middle part of the skirt.

2. Try the skirt on as a dress. Mark where the side seams to close (the arm hole).

3. I hand-sewn the seams up to where my arm hole was to be (hand sewing because the sides seams were slightly damaged). Then I turn the seam allowance under all the way up the folded-over waistband.

4. I had some double fold denim bias tape in my stash. I fold them and sew it together to make a long denim tie for the neckline.

5. Push the denim tie through the waist band using a safety pin.
6. Try on the dress again and adjust where the you want to knot the tie.

7. The dress is loose fitting so you can put a belt on or just leave it loose and airy!
Another easy peasy refashioning! One note of caution: if the knit is not stretchy enough then you may need to actually cut out the armhole curves of the dress instead.

I am nursing my baby right now so I'm leaving the dress quite loose as is. Once I finished nursing I'll need to adjust the whole dress and put some shape into it.

Refashion inspirations

I just borrowed this book from the library: '1000 Ideas for Creative Reuse'. Really inspirational book. Lots of creative ideas. I of course like the 'Coutures + soft goods' section for refashioning ideas for myself. But the pictures in the other sections also inspire creative fashion ideas.

This book is all just pictures. There are no instructions on how to make the items. If you just like to look at pictures to get your own creative juices going, this is the book for you. Borrow it from the library first before you decide to buy it.

Swimsuit refashioned

Remember the teal swimsuit that I was thinking of refashioning? Well, it's done! Thanks very much to hubby who single-handedly put 2 kids to sleep. I was able to have some sewing/refashioning fun for an hour (it has been really really difficult to steal an hour for myself when having a raging toddler and a 2 month old baby!).

I had been doing a lot of planning and thinking before I took out the scissors for this project. It was a bit of trial and error: cutting some, sewing some, trying the suit on, cut some more, sew some more, etc. That's why I didn't take any 'during' pictures because I didn't know how I was going to do it and how it would turn out.

So a too-long one piece swimsuit:
Became a faux tankini suit!


Steps:
1. Try on swimsuit. Make a rough mark on where to cut the across the suit.
2. Turn the suit inside out. Mark the line to cut and cut it.
3. Try on the tankini top and the cut bottom. Note where else needs cutting. In this case, because I have a flat bum, I found the bum portion of the suit had too much fabric. So I decided to shorten the front by 1.5cm, and the back by 3cm.
4. Sew the tankini top and the bottom together again.
5. Try on the suit again to check the fit.
6. Topstitch the tankini bottom edge to make it look more like a real tankini.


The new suit feels more snug which I hope will not droop after being in the water. Now I just have to go swimming to see if it will perform as I wish!

One EC benefit - no more diaper rash!

I continue to EC my 2 month old baby during the day after each feed. I notice that she doesn't poo at night anymore when I don't EC her. Her diapers at night only has some pee in it. I help her to go to the toilet at night before 11pm, and then she doesn't poo again until I help her with it in the morning. This means that she is not lying in her poo at night. I just realized yesterday that she hasn't had a diaper rash for at least 1.5 weeks now, possibly because she doesn't poo in her diaper anymore. Very interesting development!

I still don't have a clue on when she pees. I'm still only helping her to the toilet after each feed, or when she is really really fussy. I could check her diaper every half hour during the day, but she really hates when I fuss with her diaper. She is really annoyed when I have to change her too.

ECing a 1.5 month old baby

I'm continuing to EC (daytime only) my 1.5 month old daughter. I would nurse her and then put her over the toilet and cue her. Most of the time she would pee/poo or both. Sometimes she doesn't but she would grunt and let out a wet fart. I think she is starting to understand my cues. I'm not quite sure of her timing for the pees/poos for the rest of the day. Sometimes I would take her to the toilet when it's between feeds and she is squirming but nothing comes out.

She is in diapers at night because I don't want to wake her. She does poo a lot during night time as well. I have looked up some websites that talk about nighttime ECing and it just doesn't seem to work for my daughter at this point. She wakes easily and it takes a while to get her to fall asleep again. Even a gentle quick diaper change wakes her up. Perhaps she will be a more sound sleeper when she is older.

So far I'm happy with the progress. She understands my cue and I'm saving a small amount of diapers. Plus she is not always lying in a dirty diaper (except at night). I'm not being too stressed about this ECing either. If I was determined to do it full time including nighttime I think I would be really stressed out. Let see where this EC journey takes us!

Refashioning a swimsuit?

I have had this teal swimsuit for a while. I love the colour and the fit when it's dry. However, when it was wet, the body drooped and it became way too long for my torso. I would dearly like to do something with it so that I can wear it.

So what do you think? Should I make it into a tankini top or should I try to somehow shorten the torso? Does anyone have any suggestions on how to go about doing this? Are there any websites/blog I should visit before I cut into the garment?

Infant potty training

Well, really it's training mama to recognize the timing and the cues for the infant to go potty. However, I'm not doing too well in the cues. My 1 month old really don't give any consistent cues. She poos while nursing and then kinda randomly peeing/pooing during the day. The only consistent timing I have is right after a feed. I don't even have time to burb her. I have to put her on the toilet right away, otherwise I will miss the poo/pee.

I read somewhere that the infant's poo/pee will be more consistent by week 12 (2.5 months) so perhaps I'll have better luck with the timing/cues then. In the meantime, I'll continue to put her on the toilet right after a feed when I have the chance.