Let's launch off this blog with a Party Dude!

Meet my little party dude!

How awkward it is to write the very first post in a brand new blog. Here goes nothing! 

I'm not a total stranger to the blogging world, as I used to blog at marsh-family-madness@blogspot.com. However, that blog has been severely neglected and it's been on my mind to start a new one for a while. 

This summer, I transitioned to a new role as a stay at home mom. I am taking the change of pace as an opportunity to jump back into the blogging world, this time with a new focus: sewing! 

When I started my original blog six years ago, I never would have guessed that I would ever have any interest in sewing. Yet, here I am, completely obsessed and constantly in a sewing daydream.

I feel that is only appropriate that I kick off this blog with the start of a new Project Run and Play season. I have sewn along from time to time on my old blog, and I'm excited to do it again. I wasn't able to sew along as much as I would have liked in the past, but I have always followed each season from behind my computer monitor, drooling over the talent and voting for my favorite look each week. 

This week the theme is to create an outfit inspired by a cartoon from the 1980s. I will admit that this was difficult for me, as I don't know if I have ever watched a cartoon from that era. I was born in 1985, and we didn't have cable when I was a child. We owned 2 VHS tapes: Bambi and Peter Pan. When I was four years old, my mom claims that I could recite the whole Bambi script from memory.

Neither Bambi nor Peter Pan are actually from the correct time period, so I had to do some Googling for this challenge. I was completely clueless until my husband reminded me that our girls loved the Teenage Ninja Mutant Turtles, which are in fact from the late 80s. 

In fact, my husband had recently purchased the original TMNT series so that he could watch it with our daughters. They love watching it together, while I do something way more important, like sew, haha! 

Apparently there is one turtle that both girls like best: Michelangelo, who is nicknamed the "Party Dude." When they watch the intro of the show, they are usually arguing over who "gets to be" the Party Dude while they watch the show... whatever that means.

The goal of the challenge was to create an outfit inspired by the cartoon without creating a costume. This was good news for me. I love practical clothing and am not a big fan of creating costumes. In fact, I usually (*gasp*) buy my children their Halloween costumes. However, I made the mistake of telling Eve, my second daughter that I made her an outfit inspired by the ninja turtles and she was disappointed in the outcome at first. 

"Mom, where is the half shell? How can I be a turtle without a shell?"

Sorry Eve!

She warmed up to it quickly though, as she loves new clothes and these ones were soft, a nice added bonus!

And she looked adorable. Here is the final look:

Let's break down the outfit piece by piece, first the pants!

I love how these pants turned out! I used a corduroy and had fun with the "stripe" placement on all the pieces although it's hard to tell in person. All details in this pants had a purpose as I used the character April's pants as inspiration:

I thought I would create a pair of yellow pants, but when I went fabric shopping, I felt that the yellow looked too "costumy" when paired with the other fabrics.

Instead I choose the fabric to coordinate with the rest of the look and kept the details on the pants, which are:

-Patch pockets

-Cargo pocket (I only put on one, because I love the look of just one cargo pocket.)

-Knee patches

-Elasticized hem 

I used Dana of Made's short pattern, with the provided patch pocket pattern pieces to get started. I elongated them into pants and drafted the rest of the details myself. I am so happy with the fit and the details and these will be a staple in Eve's Fall and Winter wardrobe for sure.

Next up, the shirt:

For this shirt I used a very soft flannel. No Ninja Turtle reason, I just like my kids to be cuddly. The weave on this flannel just happened to be the perfect color and pattern for a turtle shell, without being over the top. 

I used Peek-a-Boo Pattern Shop's Classic Oxford shirt and made the following modifications to make it more ninja-turtley:

-I changed the pocket shape to a hexagon to mimic the turtle's shell.

-I rounded the collar to not only make it a little more girly but because turtles have a round shell, duh.

-I added a belt because the ninja turtles all wear a belt. I added a casing because I felt like the belt needed a shell (Am I stretching it too far?)

Finally, the last piece of the outfit: the infinity scarf:

The inspiration for the scarf comes from Michelangelo's orange headband (eyeband?). Instead of having the fabric worn like a mask (yes, that's better word than "eyeband") I much prefer it as a scarf. I feel like it pulls the whole outfit together and now she is truly ready for fall.

I used this tutorial to make the scarf. It was truly a 15 minute project and I'm planning on making a lot more for both girls for the fall and winter. 

And there you have it, my party dude outfit for my Ninja Turtle lovin' daughter:

"Mom, is that where the Ninja Turtles live? Is that a sewer? What's a sewer again?"