Virtual Grandchild
 

I've been away from the board for a bit while I busied myself making lots of masks and a few baby things. Our only granddaughter was born in January, a baby we never dared hope for because both parents are in their mid-forties (I kid you not!). We have grandsons who are 10 and 4, but a granddaughter this late in life is a little bonus, and we're thrilled. However the current events have made her inaccessible to us for months, except by pictures and Zoom.

The "baby" in these pictures is exactly her size at the moment. I'm not sure why I have had this doll for years. One time in the mid '90's my daughter's high school band had a fundraiser garage sale. As I was walking across the parking lot toward the sales tables I saw in the distance someone tossing a baby in an alarmingly careless way, and only when he put it down on the table by one arm did I realise it was a doll. Since nobody had bought it by the time I got there I had to, in order to save her from any further abuse. Usually she sits quietly in a doll crib from my childhood. It's on a high shelf and I rarely get it down. My son's comment when he saw the picture was that the real baby is very grabby right now and would not have let the cat just sit there for long. So Lizzie the cat can be thankful for that, but we'd rather have the real baby here.
The whale and the "worry monster" zipper bag are for the four-year-old big brother. The monster was an in-the-hoop embroidery design from Sweet Pea, and I should say, too that the pockets on the orange dress were from Designs by JuJu. They are done very conveniently on the embroidery machine and come in several sizes. Now I have to find a box. The orange dress is really a much more muted shade than my picture seems to be, somewhere between pumpkin and peach. The owl dress might get some green rick rack before I send it off.
Thanks for looking! Anybody else sewing baby things, please add pictures!

What a fortunate little gal to have a grandma that sews. I did so for my daughters, but was busy with career pressures when my granddaughters were born. Love the first dress with the embroidery around the hem line: Sweet and special.

all very nicely done, an fortunate that you have the right size model

Just last night I bought a pattern to make some little dresses and things for my baby granddaughter. All my kids are boys so I'm having fun sewing for a little girl now. :)

Virtual grandbabies are just not the same are they? I am so glad you had the perfect model for the beautiful dresses you made and the whale it priceless. Zoom does make it a bit easier for a face to face but just not the same. I am sure that the dresses and the whale will be well received.Congratulations on this special grand child.

What a fun package that will be to open, just like Christmas! Maybe they will share that with you on zoom.

Rose, I love your dresses! Can you share the pattern info please?

We have an 11 yo DGS and 13 yo DGD, and just added a new DGD at the end of May, so I'm starting to make little outfits again. We feel very blessed that they live about 6 hours from us and we both work from home now, so we can isolate, drive straight over and love on her for a few days.

I hope you can do the same soon. It's so hard when you can't be with them when they are small and changing so quickly.

Great gifts you have made! It's so much fun to sew for little girls. Here are some I've made recently for my grand baby girls:

Thank you. Congratulations on your new DGD! The embroidered dress is from a vintage pattern from when my daughter was a baby in 1978. I was surprised it was still usable. I made it a little differently, using the lace instead of a ruffle. It's Butterick 6718, which might turn up for you on Etsy or eBay or some other source. Or this Etsy pdf pattern is virtually identical but has pockets and more sizes included: https://www.etsy.com/listing/7825608...uyer_promise-1 The old Butterick pattern has a long version and two sleeve styles as well as a bonnet, panties and ruffled pram pillow. The other two dresses are my altered version of an Etsy pattern: https://www.etsy.com/listing/6070415...f=yr_purchases I intend to make the ruffled one at some later date. The whale pattern, in case anyone else wants to try it, was a freebie, and very easy to make: https://sewitsmade.com/blue-whale-tu...-free-pattern/ When my older DGS was 4 he had a shark toy that he carried around everywhere, so I'm hoping his young cousin will like the whale.

Thanks! The baby is adorable and so are the dresses! I was inspired by earlier pictures you posted when you made the beautiful baby sweater some time ago, but I my knitting skills are meager. Dresses are much quicker and will get more use in the hot climate our DGD lives in.

Thanks to all who commented! I ended up adding the rick rack.

so sorry You can't love on that baby in-person! We finally got to see our 3 g-boys over the 4th--it had been 3.5 months and felt like 3.5 years. my middle one, starting 1st grade in a couple of weeks, wants me to make him a "leaf" jacket--we discussed that real leaves would dry out and crumble--so he agreed that leaf fabric would be ok (of course his brother one year younger wants one too) but I'm having no luck finding a jacket (he did specify a zipper instead of buttons although I figure I could alter that). Has anyone ever bought a pattern from McCall's Simplicity, etc on-line?

So wonderful for you. It gives me hope. no grandkids yet and the clock is ticking.

I was carrying my tiny son through a craft fair. he was laying on one arm and I had my thumb and forefinger wrapped around his thigh One lady exclaimed., " Oh, that IS a real baby!".

Adorable dresses made by both of you Rose and Sewbizgirl. Those babies are going to be the best dressed babies in their town. So nicely made.

Beautiful clothes, babies, dolls. I have some collector dolls that I love. My daughter and granddaughters say they are scary. They are beautiful baby looking dolls to me.

Darling dresses. I have a new GGD. I visited yesterday. I had just come from a surgeon's office, so I washed my hands well when I arrived and had the mother place her on a receiving blanket on my chest. She was very alert and gently fell asleep. A little sweetheart!

Love that story - opposite of my doll tale!

DH and I were past 60 when the first grandson arrived. We had given up, pretty much, by that time. Both parents were 36 then. Then the second son's family started arriving after they were 40. Both of my grandmothers had babies after 40, but by no means their first.

This is sweet. Congratulations! Hope you get lots of time with her. We got to see our granddaughter only for one visit right before the beginning of March. We are being extremely careful because my son who lives near us is diabetic. We have seen them with the 10-yr-old across a room and with masks a few times. Miss hugs! The other son's family, with the baby and 4-year old, live in Houston, which is a major hotspot right now. We can't take any risks with anyone's health, especially in Houston because they are running short of facilities and supplies to deal with the influx of patients.

It's challenging to even drive the five hours without stopping for a restroom, and every possible contact is risky right now, for us as well as the rest of our family. The daughter lives in St. Louis and works in a hospital. She is involved with research, not treating patients, but the people she works with in the study are all high risk because of their illness and the medications they take. I think we're all just going to be apart until there's a vaccine or some other convincing resolution. I just keep reminding myself that people in the past got through much worse than this many times, or at least enough of them did that we're here to know about it. And not that long ago someone like a soldier might have to wait for weeks for just a letter. We are lucky in many ways.

LOL! They've been watching scary movies! I don't have a collection, but recently bought a doll on Etsy. Back in the early 1990's I'd clipped out a magazine ad for the particular doll because the face looked so much like my second son as a toddler that you'd think someone had used him for the model. I had stashed the clipping with some other junk, and recently while dejunking a bit I came across it. I googled and found someone with the doll for sale. Had to get it for that son's daughter. Saving it for later, of course because it's porcelain.

Thanks for the kind words about the dresses. I made one more and the sent them off today and hope they will get some use.

Thanks, Jordan! Sewing these little things has been great fun and cheaper than therapy, as they say. My niece is expecting a daughter in October, so I can just keep on sewing baby things to my heart's content. I have started a quilt for her and may make a tiny newborn size dress like the one with the embroidered skirt, but with long sleeves for winter.

It seems that grandson has a very creative mind. I remember making little zippered jackets for my kids many years ago, but no longer have the pattern. I have not bought directly from the online pattern sites. I'm sure they'd be a reliable source, but I don't know how fast they would be sending them. If you have Joann's near you, they may be doing curbside pickup, and other stores may also be an option for that. I have been been very happy with online purchases from Etsy, where a lot of sellers offer instantly downloadable patterns that you then print for yourself from pdf's. It takes some doing, and some are better than others, but overall, I have had good experiences. You just have to understand your printer settings and get familiar with layers in Acrobat, which is very nifty for the patterns that use that. It lets you print only the size you need. Many of the patterns have multiple sizes, which is great if you're going to make them for both boys. Hope you find what you're looking for.