Disney Potty - It's Magic!

We went to Disneyland on Monday and I just want to tell you all one story that I don't want to forget, and I didn't capture it in pictures. I will catch up with the rest of the day's events some other time. I did post all of my pictures on picasa, so if you browse through them all, you know what we did.

Anyway....

Libby decided she was not going to go potty at Disneyland. Not at all, not all day. Nope. Not happening.

I don't know how these kids hold it for so long. I drag them into the bathroom every couple of hours because I have to go!  Now, I don't know about anyone else, but if my bladder is full, I cannot go into a restroom and ignore the impulse. My children can.

After several trips to various bathrooms, Libby still refused to go potty. I'm baffled, but what can you do. You can put a kid on the pot, but you can't make her pee.

She isn't a fan of public potties because so many of them have the automatic flusher. Those darn things just flush whenever they want to and it scares the poor kid to pieces! She's figured out that if she doesn't go, that solves that problem. Logical.

Just after sunset, Gracie wanted to ride the one ride in Disneyland with a long line. The wait time was 50 minutes and I told the kids everyone has to go potty before we invest that much time standing in line, including Libby!  Plus, we had been there for 6 hours already. She must have to go by now!

I had to give her the ultimatum, "Go potty or we're not going on the ride, we'll just go home."  She responded with, "Let's go home. I will go potty at home."  Rats. That wasn't the desired response at all. I tried again, "Go potty. I'll protect you from the flusher." She says, "Ok. I'll try."  Whew!  Got her up on the toilet and she must have released a gallon, but she wouldn't get up.

"I'm gonna do a poop."  Oh no. I wanted this to be quick. Well, hurry up for goodness sake!  "Mom, this might take a while."  She sat there forever!

Gracie was done and had her hands washed and was ready to go. But, I was still in the stall with Libby and I was starting to really get worried about having my 6 yr old unsupervised in the restroom. It was fine when she was in the next stall, but now she's running free. Panic was starting to set in, so I kept peeking out of the stall.

Libby was just taking her time.  "I can't hurry. I'm pooping!"  Suddenly, my quiet child becomes loud with her updates. "It's coming out.  Mom! It's coming out!"  "Shhhhh!"

"Libby, are you done yet?"  "No. It's half out. I'm telling the kids to push."  Oh, yes, "the kids". She thinks there are little kids in her body that push and pull and move things around in her body; they take care of all the internal operations.

Gracie is twirling around in the middle of the bathroom and people are looking at her like, "Where on earth is this child's mother." Well, whatever, she's fine. "Libby, are you done yet?"  The kid who doesn't have to go potty all day long and then takes forever says, "Almost".

Oh, Libby. We've been in this stall for a good long 20 minutes! Then my loud pooper exclaims, "Did you hear my poop splash?"  Good! She's done! "I think I have another poop" Nooooooo! She's sitting there just a grunting and a groaning trying to help the kids push out another one. Oh dear. I want outa here so bad!

"Libby, you done yet?"  "No."  "How about if you save the rest for when we get home?"  "Ok."  Yay!  I got her cleaned up and put back together, or rather, she did, because she is independent like that and then we left that stall!  The auto flusher didn't work and I had to press the button so that was nice that it didn't traumatize her.

She decided to only wash one hand, and by then I just wanted to get out of there so I chose not to fight that battle. Potty success! The child finally went potty, didn't have an accident and wasn't frightened by the auto-flush! It doesn't get much better than that! Disney potty magic!

I really could have done without the extra slow pooping though, and the grunting and groaning, and the loud graphic updates.

Charlie Brown is a Blockhead

I was asked to make a Charlie Brown dress for a little girl who loves Charlie Brown. Of course I said "yes"! She wants a simple sleeveless shift dress, just yellow with the stripe. What? No frills? Sounds easy!

I asked Libby if she wants a Charlie Brown dress too; how could she resist? It's her favorite color! Without hesitation she said, "No. I do not want a boy dress."

I found exactly the right color fabric. Awesome! Hobby Lobby didn't have any yellow or gold zippers, or anything remotely resembling these colors, luckily I have a large zipper collection at home. I bought extra fabric just in case I screw something up and  have to recut a piece, or if Libby decide she wants a Charlie Brown dress too, or if someone else asks for one after seeing it. Always good to have more than you need. I also picked up some black flannel for the stripe.

The yellow dress is easy enough, so I quickly whipped up two of them (leaving the sides open to add the stripe). I had two 7" zippers of just the right shade of yellow/gold, score! I made a pattern for the chevron stripe and cut out a few of those. I thought it would be best to applique the stripe to the dress. Before affixing the stripe, I wanted to finish the edges of the flannel with a 3-thread rolled hem.

This is when I decided that Charlie Brown is a blockhead. The chevron stripe was HARD to edge! I started at each peak and serged through the troughs to the next peak. It is impossible to pivot on a serger because of the knife; I have seen some tutorials and sewing shows where the sewist pivots at the peak of a corner, but I couldn't do it for the life of me. It looked awful, so I began and ended at each peak. Beginning to feed a peak into the feeddogs is tricky. The point wants to buckle and crumple. Not pretty. But, the peaks were a cinch compared to the troughs.

Serging in the trough is like performing a magic trick. I couldn't find much in the way of instructions online. I did find some tips to serge the inside of a corner, and a trough is just a super tight corner so that is the advice I followed. The trick to it is to straighten out the line, pinching the fabric up where the trough is. Then, serge right through it. It's not as easy as it sounds. Supposedly when  you straighten it out, it's just perfect, well, not always. Sometimes it looks like you chewed on it.  I figured out that it also helps a great deal to move the knife as far away from the edge as possible so that it doesn't cut quite as close. After three days of serging chevron stripe edges, I was feeling some angst with Charlie Brown's fashion choice.

Got it done though, the stripes looked good enough to use on the dress! I think they do anyway, or else my standards were drastically lowered in the attempt to finish the striping.

I applied the stripes to the dress front and back and then sewed the sides of the dress together. ARG! The stripes do not match up! Darn chevrons! I contemplated making a third dress. It really sounded like a great idea.

I cut more chevron stripes, this time I cut them twice as long so that it could wrap around and only have one joining seam rather than two. Why didn't I think of this before?  Back to edging the chevron.

The first trough I edged didn't go well, which means I have to cut another entire stripe from the flannel. At this point, I was running out of flannel, and I started to question my sanity. I made another decision that a third attempt was crazy and I will just fix the other dresses or learn to like them with the stripes not perfectly lined up.

My husband looked at them and said the stripes were ugly. His sound advice was, "you should put a rolled hem on the stripe". I did! The flannel is a little fuzzy though, and there are minute bits of fuzz on the edges, as any flannel will give you. But, I thought it looked pretty clean. He rethinks and advices that I should add them in like a star quilt, or hem the chevron stripe instead of putting a rolled edge on it, and make the dress more fitted instead of the A-line shape and gather the skirt under the stripe. He's full of grand ideas.

His ideas went nowhere fast. 

The dresses need that finishing touch, a ruffle at the hem. Charlie Brown wears black shorts so I added a black ruffle to give it the same underlined look. I also added sleeves to the spare dress and made a bias tape to finish the necklines and armholes of the sleeveless dress. Hey, they don't look too bad!

I had Libby try it on to check the size. Too long. Oh Lordy. I cut off the ruffle, trimmed the dresses up about and inch and a half, put the ruffles back on, and yes, they look much better. The stripe is lower now, but I like it there. 

I hope the person who ordered this dress will be happy with it. I am not charging her much since it is far from perfect and it was a good learning experience for me. I would have had to pay tuition to learn how to put a rolled edge on a chevron stripe. I think the dress will photograph well, and that's all that matters, right?

I cannot wait to get rid of this dress. But, that's not likely to happen. Libby loved it and claimed the spare as her own!  Good thing I made two!

Rapunzel, Rapunzel, Let Down Your Golden Hair

"She did, and then the prince climbed up."  That's how I remember the story, this doesn't exactly happen in the Disney movie. But, the Disney Rapunzel has a beautiful dress!

This dress is adorable, lovely colors and has lots of pretty ribbons and frills.  Plus, it's comfortable and Rapunzel proves that it is perfect for playing hard in this dress. She does all sorts of things while wearing it: swinging from trees, running, jumping, swimming, what doesn't she do in this dress?

She doesn't scratch and itch, so this dress has to be itch free in accordance with the wishes of the princesses in this house. They help with design. Libby likes to make sure she can put on her dress by herself, and take it off independently too. She is a do-it-by-myself kinda girl. Gracie was more interested in making sure lots of just the right ribbons and lace were on the dress. She came shopping with me to choose the appropriate Rapunzel trims.

I've been wanting to make a Rapunzel dress for quite some time, but had other projects. Finally got to it! And it was worth the wait! So pretty! I'm amazed at how well it turned out. I am making five Rapunzel dresses, and have three done. All a little bit different so far.

The first dress, I finished it twice so maybe it counts as two? I love it and I hope the little girl who gets to wear it will love it too. I made it for a sweet little girl named Leah. She's three and had a rough year. I wanted to give her a gift and help keep her smiling. Her mom does a great job of keeping her happy, so she didn't really need my help, but it made me feel good to make a dress for her. I can't wait to see pictures of her wearing her dress!

I made this dress with a peasant style top (a pull-over with an elastic neckline). I opted not to add the neckline lace to avoid the itch-factor. I lined this skirt with an eyelet cotton underskirt with a scalloped hem. It peeks out from under the purple skirt. It looks just like Rapunzel's dress in the movie in that regard. She has a petticoat that peeks out too.

There isn't a waist sash to tie, so there isn't any room to grow in width, but it seems to be a pretty forgiving style so it should fit. I topstitched the ribbon lace-up on the front of the dress so that it wouldn't be a problem with coming undone every few minutes. After I stitched the lacing down, I wasn't sure if I liked that idea or not. It will be better than lacing and relacing it repeatedly though.

I made her dress and finished it before Christmas. It was ready to ship and I laid it on the side table stacked on top of some things, where nobody would notice, and it was handy for me to take to the post office. It wasn't in a box yet, but it was folded and out of the way for the day. I took the girls to Disneyland and when I came home, I found the dress in a wad under the dining table and smudged with ketchup! This is what I get for leaving it out, but I honestly thought it was out of sight and wouldn't be bothered. I live and I learn, every day.

The ketchup was isolated to the outer skirt, the rest of the dress was still in perfect condition as far as I could see, so I took the dress apart and made a new skirt for it. I didn't want to wash it and lose the newness of the fabric. There is always a sheen when it's new that is gone after the first washing. I will laundry test the dresses I made for my girls, but this one was done and I just wanted to finish it again and not have to worry about the detail work on the bodice falling apart in the wash. It can fall apart after Leah wears it to DisneyWorld and spills chocolate ice cream on it, falls down and puts a hole in it, or gets marker on it when she's getting an autograph, after the fun! Just like Libby does. I'm fairly confident that it'll be fine in the laundry on a regular wash and dry, the other dresses I make go through the laundry without incident, but since it is for someone else, I wanted it to be nice, very nice.

You heard me right, the dress is going to Disney World in Florida! Super Fun!

The next dress, I made exactly the same way with the peasant style top. Libby loves this style since there are no buttons nor zippers to challenge her independence. I made the bodice and used the washed skirt from the first dress. It fit perfectly and you cannot tell the difference between the laundered skirt fabric and the new bodice fabric. Score!

I didn't have enough eyelet lace for the underskirt and so I added a white lace trim to the purple skirt for that petticoat look without the lining. It looks pretty good. And now that I study the Disneyland Rapunzel character dress, I think her white petticoat is actually a lace trim sewn to the purple skirt. This time I didn't sew down the lace-up ribbon, I just laced it through some ribbon loops and tied it.

I topstiched all of the bodice ribbons. I want them to stay in place, plus that's what they look like in the movie. If you pause the movie and really take a good look, Rapunzel's sleeve has topstitched pink ribbons, but the front of her dress has eyelets, with grommets, and laced up with pink ribbon. I don't do grommets. I used a ribbon to make little loops and topstitched a pink ribbon over the top to make the edges of the bodice vest look.

I didn't add the lower section of the sleeves because the girls would get too hot and the sheer fabric on the lower sleeve would fail the itch test for sure!

Now that I really look at the bodice and the lace-up detail in the front, I think I put it upside down on the first dress and then sewed it in place that way. OMG! I Did!!! Ugh, why did I do that! It ties at the top of the bodice, not at the waist!  Ooops! Hopefully the three-year old won't notice my big blunder, but she probably will.

Libby loves her dress but it looks a bit short in the bodice. I'll have to remember that my kid is growing and make the bodice longer next time. She now has three princess dresses in this same bodice size and style: Belle, Cinderella and Rapunzel.

Gracie's dress is the third one I made. Her bodice is completely different in that it isn't a peasant style. It has a zipper down the back.  She insisted on having the lace around the neckline, I was hesitant for fear of her complaining that it would itch (the anti-itch factor is very important, can you tell?) so I finished the neckline first and then added the lace just in case she wants me to remove it, I can keep the neckline in tact. Nice to have the option to change your mind, right? If/when she asks me to remove the lace, I can take out one row of stitching and the second row will keep it finished and neat. I won't have to sew it again. Ta-da! Much to my surprise, she really does like the neckline lace. Bonus.

I made her bodice a size 7 since she's been growing so much and the last dress I made was a size 6. Wrong. She grew a lot! And she's grown round the middle much more than she's grown toward the sky. I had to add a piece to each side of the bodice to accommodate her chub. I just guessed at this, there is not technique involved, just took a couple of scraps and made long triangles out of them and stuck them between the bodice front and back all the way up through the armpit. The sleeve hems still meet where they were originally planned. The length of the bodice is just right, at least I didn't mess that up like I did with her holiday dress (she never noticed).

Just like Libby's dress, I added a white lace trim to the purple skirt to simulate the look of a petticoat peeking out from under the dress. I used the leftover eyelet lace from the quilt I made for her for Christmas.  It totally rocks. She isn't complaining about the waistband itching so I guess she's ok with no skirt lining. I did her lace-up the same as Libby's with the loops and the ribbon laced loosely. So far, it's only come untied a few times. I'm debating whether to stitch it in place or not. I'll have to compare notes with Leah's mom and see what she thinks of the topstitched ties.

Gracie's skirt has a different  floral ribbon going down the front of the skirt. Disney's Rapunzel has an embroidered floral motif along the edges of her skirt in the front along her center pleat. I duplicated that look by running two lines of flower ribbon down the front of the skirt where a pleat would be. The first two dresses have a more colorful ribbon of little flowers, this dress has pink flowers. I ran out of the rainbow flower ribbon and the store did not have the same ribbon in stock when I went back for more. That's ok, this ribbon is pretty too and they don't need to be identical in every way.

I think the dresses are authentic enough to the movie costume and yet simplified just enough for little girls who play hard. Gacie and Libby are testing the durability of the dresses as I type this out. For the past two days, they've both covered their dresses in food and juice drippings, a bit of dirt, and twirled a million times. They are thrilled! And, they figured out that if they wear their super poofy skirts underneath that Santa brought them, the dresses look even better. Cool!

I have enough fabric and ribbon to make two more dresses for our favorite local friends. They have spring birthdays and I think these will make very nice birthday gifts. These little girls love to play dress-up just as much as my little girls so I know they will be a big hit. That will be five Rapunzel dresses by the time I'm done! Unless of course, someone else wants one.  Hint!

The Chocolate Covered Cherry Incident

I accidentally backward snorted a chocolate covered cherry. I popped one in my mouth and bit down on it, letting that yummy sugary goodness ooze out and then I forgot all laws of gravity.

I bent over, way over, and ducked my head inside the kids' fort made of blankets where my littlest one was giggling her head off. Daddy was in the tent with her and he was tickling her ribs and her feet making her squeal. With my head upside down, I sort of laughed and inhaled my chocolate covered cherry UP my nasal cavity!

I whipped back upright, but it was too late. The chcocolate covered cherry had gone all the way up my nose from the back and now I felt the urge to sneeze, so I grabbed a tissue and blew my nose before the sneeze could happen. 

Yup, I blew out the chocolate covered cherry candy into the tissue; it was a big sugary booger! It went in, now it's out. Full circle. Through my nasal cavity! That's not how it is supposed to work!

It stung. It still stings actually, and it's been a few hours. I drank some water, but that didn't go the same route so it didn't help matters any. 

I think I'm done eating Christmas candy now.