Monday, May 28, 2012

Mel's PJ Pants - McCall's 2101

This past Christmas, I had grand intentions of making 16 pairs of PJ pants for gifts.  As it turned out, I only managed to make 5.  I plan on getting the other 11 done throughout the year, and yes, some of them will probably have to wait until Christmas this year.

This is my very first project after finishing the 4 onesies.  I hope you like simple things, because I intend to blog about everything that I make, including 11 mundane pairs of PJ pants.  Mwahahahahahaha!!!

On a seemingly unrelated tangent, I'd like to introduce you to our new kitty, Lucky.  He was born in July 2011, so he's still a kitten.  Actually, he thinks he's a puppy.  He likes to bite and wrestle, and he loves to chew paper.  I took this photo back in February.  He's a little bit bigger now, but he pretty much looks the same.  He's got the cutest big buggy yellow eyes!  He's hanging out at the foot pedal of my industrial sewing machine.  I love having a cat to hang out with me in my sewing room.
Except when they do this...
All I kept thinking was, "Thank God it's just PJ pants, and thank God it's just a pant leg!"  Needless to say, I managed to straighten it out enough to cut the pants out.  I'll fix it and trace out a new pattern later.


Here is a close-up of the flannel.  Isn't it adorable?  It totally matches Mel's personality.  As soon as she saw her pants, she said, "Owls! I love owls!"  I love it when people have a distinct style, because it's easy to find things that suit them.  I constantly see things that I know she would love.
I can whip up a pair of PJ pants in about an hour and a half.  I can do them quicker if I'm doing several, assembly line style, because I have to change my serger to coverstitch to finish the elastic waist and hem the bottoms.
This has got to be one of the most useful places to put my label.  If you don't have a label, you can't figure out which way goes front, and which way goes back.  Oh yeah, and I didn't even have to change thread.  I still had orange left from the onesies, and since it matched so nice, I went with it!
Mel loves her pants, and I'm proud to say that they fit her perfectly!  They have about 2" of ease at the hips, and I cut them an inch longer than her waist-to-floor measurement to allow for shrinkage.  Poor girl was wearing old plaid PJ's that were several inches too short the last time I visited her.  Now she has new, longer ones!
Merry Christmas, Mel!  Tee hee!  :D

5 comments:

  1. Very cute! I also love to whip up jammmies.

    My current cat leaves pattern tissue alone, thank goodness. But I used to have a cat that could seek it out like a heat seeking missile.

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  2. Yay, pajama pants! I will happily read about your pj making skillz, as I forced people to do the same when I made a bunch of pjs for Christmas last year! I think I made 8 pairs ... And I have at least 3 pairs in my pre-cut projects backlog now. Love the owl fabric!!

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  3. Hi Kristin, thanks for stopping by and joining my blog! :)
    I'm really impressed with your talents; sewing is something I WANT to be good at, but no matter how I try, I'm just not (very good! lol). Would love to have your talent :)
    Gill
    http://ginamed.blogspot.co.uk/2012/05/beautiful-music.html

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  4. Pajama pants definitely make a great gift! The owls are very cute.

    No cats here, but it's a challenge to keep the kids off the pattern paper. Torn paper is no good, but pins in feet would be worse!

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  5. As much as I feel terrible you had to deal with a ripped up pattern piece - I can't help but chuckle at the mental image of your moggie 'playing' with it! hehe - at least he had some fun! Cute pj pants too :)

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