Under Bed Tent

LINK TO MY PINSPIRATION

MY OWN PINSPIRED CREATION
I made the Under Bed Tent for Little Prince's 9th Birthday

After seeing all the super creative "Card Table Houses" on Pinterest I decided I would give it a go. We don't have room for any more furniture, and Little Prince has a "Cabin Bed" so that's where I decided to make the tent. Bearing in mind Little Prince's special needs, I opted to use "stick and sew velcro" to attach the tent sides to the bed, rather than curtain wire. This way if he gets angry or clumsy the sides will just detach, rather than be damaged. And it can also be easily removed for washing. I bought some white rope lights, and cable clips to fasten them to the underside of the bed, as Little Prince hates the dark and would probably refuse to use the tent if he decided it was too dark.  The cable clips didn't work very well so I ended up using cable ties, to fasten the rope lights to the underside of the bed slats.  This solution works well and the lights are still secure some time later :-)

I made the tent walls from some heavy cream coloured cotton canvas I already had in my stash. I cut the pieces to cover only the front and foot of the bed, as the other two sides are next to the wall. I made two walls, leaving a space between them for the door. I sewed wide 3 inch seams on all the edges, to give them more stability, and 3 inch hems to give weight to the bottom of the pieces. Depending on how it goes I may add curtain hem weights to the bottom hem too, but so far it doesn't seem to need it. To avoid too much thickness at the top edge I used the fabric's own selvedge unhemmed.

I made a window in the door panel, with a piece of mesh from a laundry bag acting as the "glass" to stop Little Prince being tempted to climb through and hurt himself or rip his tent! I appliqued felt "Star Wars" shapes onto the outside for decoration. I made these by printing out pictures of the ships/characters/symbols from the internet to use as inspiration. Then I spent a whole afternoon freehand drawing the shapes much larger on lining paper (and using a large dinner plate for the curves and circles). I used these drawings as a pattern to cut out all the pieces I needed in felt, and then sewed them together, before sewing the completed decorations to the tent.

LITTLE PRINCE'S VERDICT:

"Its just some cloths on my bed"!! Note to self - remember how autism affects the imagination :-)  This was when he saw the bed as it is in the first picture, with no door window or Star Wars decorations.  When I finally added the Star Wars decorations he told me "You are the best sewing person I know" YES :-)  He has taken some cushions from the sofa bed in his room and put them inside the tent to make a little reading, calming down area for himself too.  I think he likes it :-)

WHAT I'D DO DIFFERENTLY NEXT TIME
I'd fully complete it before unveiling it to Little Prince, I ran out of time before his birthday (due to family issues and my own procrastination) and gave it to him partly finished, which contributed to his not so thrilled verdict.

A Scratchy Toy for Princess Lollipop

This idea wasn't Pinspired, it was born out of trying to ease Princess Lollipop out of co-sleeping in gentle baby-steps. She now consistently falls asleep in her own bed (at a reasonable 7pm-7.30pm), and stays there until about 3am-4am most nights. However, the next step will be for her to get herself to sleep, without needing me or Daddy to lay next to her bed, as she soothes herself to sleep by sticking her hand inside our sleeves and "scratching" our skin. I keep her nails very short, so it doesn't really hurt, unless she finds a tender spot!! While thinking of how to help her transition to this next step, I started to wonder how she could "scratch" without needing me or Daddy. I came up with the idea of a Scratchy Toy and thought that a Sausage Dog would be the perfect shape :-)  


I searched Pinterest for a pattern and didn't find one I liked, but after a search of the internet came up with the above (free) pattern and Pinned it to my Crafts board.

MY OWN CREATION

I downloaded the pattern to make the Scratchy Sausage Dog Toy, however, when I took it to my local photocopying place to get the pattern enlarged, they made a mistake and its not as big as it should be.  On reflection I decided to carry on and make the smaller size  Sausage Dog (and reduce the size of the seam allowance) as it will be much easier for 3 year old hands to carry around, and if Princess Lollipop does become attached to it, it won't take up too much space in a bag when we are out and about.  


I made the Sausage Dog from soft fleece fabric and cotton (instead of the wool and cotton suggested by the pattern). At the last minute I also decided to make a "spare" as we all know the heartache if a child loses their precious toy!!  Once I had cut the body and inner body pieces, I sewed french knots randomly all over the pieces, before finishing constructing the toy. I sewed buttons on for the eyes, making sure they were very firmly attached. 

PRINCESS LOLLIPOP'S VERDICT
She has been involved in every step of the Scratchy Toy construction, and was fascinated watching me sew, especially when  I used the sewing machine.  She has named her Scratchy, and will sometimes ask for her at bedtime and at others is adamant that she doesn't need her and will throw her out of her bed!  She is managing to get herself to sleep without scratching me, whether or not  she has Scratchy in bed with her or not.

MY VERDICT
I don't like how Scratchy has turned out at all.  Her ears mostly stick up and out (like a pair of aeroplane wings!) due to the difference in scale of the pieces to how they are supposed to be.  Also I can see all my mistakes and it seems to glare out at me where I've had to make last minute repairs.

WHAT I'D DO DIFFERENTLY NEXT TIME
I wouldn't try to cut out four pieces of fleece at the same time, it might be a lovely soft fabric but it isn't easy to cut through that many thicknesses!!  It was extremely fiddly to sew too, so I'd probably get the pattern enlarged to the correct size and not try to use such small seam allowances either.

Ribbon Storage

LINK TO MY PINSPIRATION

MY OWN PINSPIRED CREATION
At the moment my ribbon is all stuffed in a tin higgeldy piggeldy and I have no idea what is in there!  So I was poking around on Pinterest looking for a better way of storing ribbon most of the Pins I found were for storing spools of ribbon, not lots of different lengths like I've got, so when I found the above Pin it was perfect :-)  Even down to the idea of fastening the ribbons with hair grips instead of pins :-)

After a LOT of trial and error I found that the flat bobbins I wanted were called "floss bobbins" and ordered them.  Once everything arrived I set off sorting and winding my ribbons, and hanging all the similar colours on the same book rings.  Then all I had to do was hang them on the wall.  I didn't want to have them hanging from plain picture hooks, so I used the same idea as in my Pinspiration and used plastic headed drawing pins.

MY VERDICT
A great way to store and display ribbons.  I can see exactly what I have and hopefully this will stop me buying more of the same ribbons over again!

WHAT I'D DO DIFFERENTLY NEXT TIME
I'd try to find larger plastic floss bobbins, as the cardboard ones I bought were quite flimsy and I have to use two together to make them sturdy enough, and the ones I bought are only about 1 1/2" long and they are too small really.