Grandfatherly Subversion

  I get complaints from customers that their parents or in-laws just aren’t into cloth nappies, and want them to use disposables. I’m nearly thirty, and disposables were available when I was a baby, so I suppose it’s not surprising-many of today’s grandparents didn’t use cloth. Or if they did, they may have been looking longingly at the ‘easier’ option, and splurging on disposables for holidays and special occasions.

  The intended recipient of this pack can’t say that though-because her father bought it for her! A long-time devotee of alternative living, when he asked her whether she was using cloth and she said no, he was horrified. Then he met me, found out about modern cloth, and bought these. I’m still waiting to see him and hear back about how they were received……

1. “Geez Dad, these are great! I want more-thanks for finding them for me!”

2. “Dad, it’s my baby, and I wish you’d just butt out-I don’t want to use those icky things".

  Incidentally, this is the third time a prospective grandfather has bought from me-the other two were from markets. Which is a lesson to me, as when the first approached my stall I was polite as always, but never thought he’d buy! Ten minutes and $150 later I ate my hat. And always remembered afterwards that customers can turn up in unlikely disguises.

October Orders

  Well, luckily I had three very lovely customers who were quite understanding of the delay caused by my son breaking his leg, then falling prey to every germ going around! I had only listed two packs, thinking that would keep me busy enough, but agreed to a third thinking I had plenty of time-then of course, Murphy’s Law kicked in and they took me over three weeks to complete.

  First up, there was a pack for a mum-to-be, who wanted the basics to begin with and will add to this when she has her babe and can see whether she can buy pink……….a dozen Easyflats, four OSFM covers and a pack of mini wipes.

  Next up, a pack for a terry flats user (who has apparently heard that Pepper covers are the best ones to use over flats-flattered!) Eight covers should do it for her little boy.

  And lastly, extreme girliness-five OSFM pockets with trifolds.

  More custom order slots will be available during my November sale, which will run from the 12th-19th of November. And hopefully this month things will run a little smoother!

Sneaking in an order

  Because all study and no work makes me go crazy! It was strangely comforting to work on an order again-I suppose habits of six years die hard.

  I’ve got my future trading plans all done now-expect an announcement soon!

Custom Pants

    Not nappies, I know, but I am slowly diversifying here! These are for two sisters in our homeschool group, who have the same problem as my girls-long legs and small waists. And they’re exactly the same as the ones I made my three girls this winter! The girls chose their fabrics, so I hope it leads to total adoration and lots of wears.

 

When you don’t suit the ‘most’ in OSFM!

   Well, I used to be able to say that my nappies fit every child who’d tried them-not any more! After coming over to my place and trying on pockets (wouldn’t do up) and covers (would do up, but not with anything in them!) it was obvious that this little girl needed bigger nappies. I grabbed one of my sons night-time covers off the line and we tried that-luckily, that one was comfortable! Like most kids she should only get taller from here on in, so hopefully these will fit her as long as she needs them, both night and day. I also made some extra-big trifolds to fit.

Busyness.

   I realised the other day it has been over a month since I posted here. That’s somewhat intentional, for the last few months i’ve been sewing as much as I can, and blogging about it has taken second place to actually doing it. And as I keep packaging up and posting off orders triumphantly, and completely forgetting to photograph them to prove that something is actually happening in my workspace, here is my busy room.  Two orders waiting for topstitching and labels.

The neglected scraps pile-sorting and tidying has also taken second place to working.

The fantastic cupboard, my pride and joy-this used to be my shelf for outer fabrics. Note there are none anymore-all of this is cut, reinforced and snapped, and the bottom halves of the piles just need elastic and topstitching. Hundreds of nappies, all at least half done, yay for us! I still have a few metres of random fleeces and minkys, but virtually everything is on it’s way to being something rather than sitting gathering dust.

The last of the order rack-this had eight bags on it last week. Now that was a juggling act, and I did drop a few balls in the organisational sense. Nothing major, but phew, i’m glad it’s manageable again!

Girl-ing up the stash

   A previous customer had hedged her bets, buying a unisex stash until she had her baby. Now the little girl is here it was time to add some pink. There’s another 6 Easyflats, two pockets, three covers, five wipes and six shaped boosters.

  My seven year old daughter also solved a small problem i’ve always had with packaging-namely, that I find it incredibly silly and refuse to buy packaging for my products as I believe it just creates more waste (not to mention upping the price for customers). What could be sillier around a cloth nappy?!?! However, my daughter came up with the idea of tying up items like wipes, and the shaped boosters below, with strips cut from my scrap fabric. Now that I can do, happily. I used to just tuck smaller items inside a pocket or cover to stop them sloshing around in the Postpaks, but this is much nicer. Thanks daughter!

Another wee one all set up

  No pun intended, honestly!

30 Easyflats, 7 OSFM covers, and 2 raw silk liners. And my cutting table really is spotlessly clean-just very well used.

As well as doing the orders that come in i’ve been stocking up my boxes, obsessively clearing my cupboards of fabrics and stacking up lots of finished product. This means I can do any size market at the drop of a hat, and it turns orders like this from a big job to a small one-I already had four of these covers and 16 Easyflats all completed. This has made such a difference in stress levels-now it’s ‘what stress?!’

  More order pics are coming, i’ve been too busy manically sewing to keep up with the housekeeping.

More?!

  And with the awesome generosity of her friends, we were able to add these to this order

To bring the total up to nine OSFM pockets with trifold inserts. Cool present, huh?

They should have been opened by now today-I hope she adores them and gets many hundreds of uses from them.

Preparing for nighttime

  This is the first time i’ve made night covers for a long time. It was a request from a regular customer, who i’m always happy to accommodate. Three covers to go over the three Mandy Mac Purple Nights purchased on crazy-sale. These are minky or fleece outers, with an inner of Malden Mills 200wt fleece-so not waterproof but water resistant. I’ve always found this preferable to PUL overnight-the fleece breathes much better, and i’d rather it compression leak if sodden than have my child wearing the equivalent of a water balloon on their bum.   

Rear view on my two year old, with the MMPN underneath (and yes, of course he had undies on, and is completely toilet-trained!)

  

And to show just how big they go, the side view on my 17kg six year old. Yes, 17kg-I have petite girls!

  

I imagine these would easily fit from at least 6kgs until five years of age-and I may just have to test them to find out. If you have a child of about 5kgs and you’re interested, or a child of 20kgs+ please get in contact with me!

Baby shower time

  It’s times like this I think maybe I should have had at least one baby shower-look at the presents!

I haven’t posted much lately-orders have generally only been smaller ones, and standard print nappies lately so there hasn’t been much to put up. But that seems to be a’changing so I should have a bit more action now!

Fairy time

I had this fabric given to me to make these two. My six year old fell in love with it. I have extra pocket half-made in it, if anyone else loves it as much as my daughter.Apologies on the poor colour quality, I think my camera is going to die soon. It’s actually a medium, candy sort of pink.

And yes, the labels are on the wrong side (for those of you playing at home). I couldn’t whack it on her face, or on her magic kitty, could I?

Boy + Girl

For someone who gets to have one of each in nappies at once. I had two girls and one boy in nappies at once, but seeing as there was no bamboo, no minky and virtually no patterned PUL at the time it wasn’t this exciting!

I love these two-i’m a fan of paisleys.

Next stash, done

24 Easyflats, four pockets, four covers, and a bonus pack of wipes. And possibly another order i’ll have to drop off late, if the Mary River keeps on rising!

Rumble in the Jungle

Well, the cow wouldn’t last long and the zebra looks like it’s been hanging around a nuclear fallout zone, but other than that it’s sort of jungle-ish!
 
I was told ‘She’s weird like you, so you choose the prints” (they were a present for a pregnant daughter). Luckily I take that as a compliment! But then she gained access to my FB albums and chose these four. Hopefully they’re well-used and loved once the baby arrives.

Full stash, done.

7 covers, 2 pockets, 15 wipes, 24 Easyflats. Phew. For a baby due to make their debut right about now………who may have already arrived!

These two are limited fabrics-I have one cut left of the Volkswagons after a cancelled order.

And after two days of basking in my relatively low-work state (only seven pockets/trifolds on order? Easy!) I received the next full-stash order. Time to break out the scissors again………

More girliness

And another three pockets and trifolds are now off to this little girl-even I’M jealous. Darn my last boy-child, shaved heads and trucks just do not match up to pigtails and twirly dresses.

Gloriously girly

I virtually never remember to take photos of orders. As I finish I triumphantly pack them up, ready to be sent or picked up, and it’s only after they’ve gone that I remember that I really should photograph them-especially the ones using custom fabrics.
But I remembered to do this one.

It’s so nice to finally do something completely and utterly girly!

Nappying a mini baby

****I hope to develop and test this pattern more to cater for the rather specialised group of babies born -however it can be hard to find testers of this size in time to get the cover to them! If you may be able to help (for example you’re pregnant with multiples or have a history or a high likelihood of small or premature babies) contact me to discuss testing this pattern for me.****
I have trouble getting my head around just how small some babies can be-after all, the smallest of my five was 6lb 2oz, and she’s a twin!
When Skye was born, weighing in the low 5lbs range (full-term and single, just petite), it was obvious she didn’t qualify in the ‘most’, in my one-size-fits-most sizing. They didn’t come close to fitting snugly around her little chicken legs!
So first up I made a cover using a pattern i’d drafted for my newborn son. With him being  what we called an ‘instant toddler’ at 9lb 6ozs even this was too big for her.

So this one was even smaller-the sort of thing I look at and think would never fit a real child, surely they don’t come that small?!
But they do-it fitted her beautifully until she reached about 6kgs.
Gorgeousness.
If you have a child this small and want to cloth them, it’s still doable. And can actually be much better than disposables, based on discussions i’ve had with parents of premmie and multiple babies who have found extra small disposables almost impossible to come across, prone to leakage and extremely expensive. Flannelette flats can be folded trimly and are bought very cheaply, to get you through the first few months. And hopefully in the near future i’ll have a dependable, fully tested cover ready to go over them.

Funkadelic!

I couldn’t really think of anything more suitable to call this velvet lycra PUL-i’m a fan of bright colours and anything remotely hippy-ish so I adore it. I bought it specially for this order but made sure I got a bit extra, luckily too as i’ve already had an order for another one!