Getting Ready for School - Sewing

I have just saved myself about $20 making these easy sewing projects for my daughter for school. For those of you who have read my post about my "action plan" , I did not need to purchase anything for these projects. Everything came from my supplies, right down to the smallest details. So technically speaking they didn't cost me anything! Well except for when I purchased them in the first place! It sounds good though, don't you think?

A gorgeous floral fairy library bag and a personalized turquoise gingham art smock.

The library bag is a basic tote bag pattern that I designed based on the size of largest kids book I could find. It is also reinforced with extra rows of stitching along the base and on the handles to make it withstand the weight of a few books.

The pattern for the art smock is from a toddlers smock that I have made larger and longer. Art smocks are normally fairly boring looking so I wanted to make this one look a bit more "cool". I used some Jones Tones Metallic Ultra Paint to write my daughters name on the front and embellished it with a couple of craft rhinestones. This paint can be used on almost anything and is machine washable too! I think I would have loved to have had an art smock like this one when I was a kid!

(Added 5 Feb 2008)
I surprised my daughter with the art smock on the first morning of school. The reaction was "It's so much better than the shop ones, do I really have to use it? I don't want it to get dirty" What do I say to that? What a compliment!