Domesiticity gone masochistic

Today I did what Matt calls "going all domestic and stuff".  Essentially that means I either A) got out the sewing machine to do more than just general repair; B) tried an entirely new recipe just to see what would happen; C) baked a bunch of stuff; or D) cleaned the house from top to bottom, including reorganizing everything. 

Today's domesticity revolved around the sewing machine.  I wanted to make Emily a new swaddling blanket of a type she wouldn't kick off in the middle of the night.  I made the pattern on Wednesday, and bought the fabric yesterday.  Today I sat down and made the blanket.  It turned out pretty well for a random attempt at making something of which I've only seen pictures.  I made the pattern myself, and had it all in my mind as to how I wanted it to turn out.  And for once, it really did turn out the way I had envisioned. 

Basically, the blanket has two arms to it-- one short and one long. 
The baby is laid down in the middle section, and the short arm wraps around first to tuck him/her in. 

Then the long arm wraps around from the other side and goes completely around the baby. 

I've seen this type of blanket elsewhere selling for more money than I was willing to spend.  A lot of blankets like this also have a little "footie sac" in them to put the baby's feet and legs into.  I didn't make one for Emily's blanket, however, because I just plainly couldn't wrap my head around how to do that and still have it be a reversible blanket.  Of course, now I have an idea as to how that could work, but I'm still not sure of the practicality of it. 

So, after pinning the pattern on, I saw I would have plenty of fabric left over.  I decided to make a smaller version of the blanket for Kirstin to use with her baby doll.  No problem, I just did the math to get the ratios correct after taking a few measurements of her doll.  Her blanket turned out better than Emily's because now I was really getting into the sewing stuff.  I still had little bits of fabric left over.  I just couldn't let those go to waste, either in the garbage, or sitting in the attic waiting for future use.  I eyed up Kirstin's doll.  Hmm...I can make pajamas for this doll.  It shouldn't be very hard, especially as it doesn't move when I'm trying to get any measurements.

Boy, was I in for a surprise!  There is a fine line when something a person generally enjoys doing turns into a form of masochism. Masochism isn't quite the right word, as that connotes a level of enjoyment through the pain that just wasn't there at the end.  Whatever the correct word, I crossed that line tonight.

I was just going to do an easy shirt and pants for Kirstin's baby doll. I carefully measured everything I needed to measure on the doll.  I made the patterns, and cut them out.  I found portions of fabric onto which they fit, and cut the fabric.  I decided to do the shirt first.  I had just spent more than half an hour at calculations and drawing very carefully with the ruler to make sure this pattern would work.  Then I looked at the sleeves.  There was no way the doll's arms would fit through something that small!  Ugh. 

Well, that's okay.  I can just do up another pattern and make the sleeves bigger.   So, that's what I did, using the same careful measurements from before.  I also checked to make sure the head would fit through the hole just to be certain.  Everything was fine.  I was excited, because I could just imagine how excited Kirstin would be to get these doll clothes!  I pinned and hemmed and did the seams in this oh so simple shirt.  Then I held it up to the doll.  Wait a second!  What happened?  All my meticulous measurements!  All my math to make sure I had everything right for the seam allowances!  And I made something that MIGHT fit a Barbie doll. That doesn't include the time spent in fixing the bobbin, which decided to do a dance and get all tangled up, the countless times I had to thread the needle on the machine, --squinting and moving around to get it in just the right light--and the time spent cutting off all the end threads so the shirt didn't look like it sprouted hair.

After all that, and the shirt was certainly too small for her baby doll.  Now dejected, I just stopped working on it.  I didn't even attempt the pants.  I was done out by doll clothes today.