Ginger Made: McCall’s M6016, or The Tiniest Magnum P.I.

This is, hands down, the best thing I’ve ever made.

Rock the hula, kid!

Before you’re all, “Hey, girl, enough with the hyperbole!”,  just stop for a second and look.

IT’S A TINY HAWAIIAN SHIRT.

I can’t even look at this without laughing.  There aren’t many things funnier than babies dressed like strange adults.  I’d like to imagine this shirt worn by a baby with a mustache and chest hair.  Possibly a crime-fighting, convertible-driving baby with a mustache and chest hair.

This is a gift for one of Man Friend’s oldest friends, who just had baby #3.  She and her husband met while living in Hawaii, and all three kids have lovely Hawaiian names, so this seemed like a good gift.  I used M6016 and a cotton print I scored during a sale at Jo-Ann.  The pattern was super easy to put together  and everything went smoothly and uneventfully.  The toughest part was getting over my fear of making buttonholes!  I did a few practice versions, and while these aren’t perfect, it wasn’t anywhere near as tough as I thought it would be.  I was all worked up over nothing (story of my freakin’ life…)!

I’ll have to get pretty comfortable sewing for little boys– it’s recently been revealed that my due-in-January niece/nephew is in fact a nephew!  Anybody have any favorite patterns or projects to make for boys?  My previous go-to boy gifts, if you knit, are The Brown Stitch’s Chunky Monkey Vest and/or Linden Down’s Baby Sophisticate sweater.  What about you guys?  Other than PJ’s for Man Friend, this is the first item I’ve sewn for a dude!

In other news, I found myself completely overtaken by a fit of insanity and signed up for a 5K yesterday.  This may not sound very eventful, but as Man Friend pointed out, it’s doubtful that I’ve run a total of 5 kilometers in the last 10 years (I was a bigtime runner in high school, but realized that I actually hate running and haven’t done it since)!  Here’s the kicker– it’s two weeks from today!!!  Am I totally screwed?  People!  I know!  This is crazy, but it’s a benefit raising money for walruses!  WALRUSES!  I can’t think of a more hilarious reason to run!  And my dear friend and also-reluctant-runner, KristyWes, is doing it with me (and inspired me to sign up!).  So.  We’ll see.

What about you guys?  Any novelty 5k’s on the horizon? Have you tried anything new (or done anything a little crazy) recently?

Ginger Made: Boy Pajamas!

Hi, everyone!  Thanks for all your warm wishes– Man Friend is back in good health!  To celebrate that, and our 6th anniversary (tomorrow), I stitched him up a fancy new pair of PJ’s!

He’s quite the Star Wars fan, so I used a sheet set.  The fabric is really weird, some kind of strange, stiff poly-cotton blend, so maybe not the nicest for pajamas, but he loves the print, so I guess that’s OK.  Maybe they’ll get a little softer after washing them a few times.

Look at puggy adoring his pop!

As you can see, I made no attempt to match the print.  I probably should have positioned it a bit more strategically– it looks a bit sloppy.  Oh, well!  I also didn’t use a pattern– I planned to trace a pair of Man Friend’s pajamas, but I couldn’t find or he doesn’t own any actual pajama pants (just track pants or sweats… so fashionable…), so I traced a pair of sweatpants.  The sweats are a bit too big for him, I guess, cause these turned out a little large.

Bad news– Cap’n Crunch has defected to the Dark Side!

Man Friend requested that I not show his face to “cultivate an air of mystery” about him.  Hahaha!  Don’t you just want to know more about this mysterious, pajama-ed stranger??

Hope your weekends are going swimmingly!  I’m looking forward to jumping back into MMM tomorrow!