"Project Runway" -- Here I Come!

As I'm sure you can tell from many of the posts, Sarah is quite interested in art and fashion. She especially loves to draw dresses and told us that ever since she can remember she has wanted to be a fashion designer. One look into her closet will tell you that this kid LOVES clothes! And when I asked her to pose for these photos she ran to her room to put on a new pink dress "just because she hasn't had a place to wear it yet!"

We've tried to think of ways to help her learn about fashion, fashion design and art techniques. Aunt Kimberly and Uncle Jason have been AWESOME in supplying her with the best in drawing and painting supplies! She always carries one of the drawing pads they've sent and pencils (usually many pencils from various thicknesses to colored pencils) in her school bag and comes home many days with some new dress she's drawn or some type of drawing.

We rented seasons one and two of "Project Runway" which is a reality fashion design show and Sarah really seemed to enjoy watching the episodes and asked lots of questions. She was fascinated with how they worked on mannequins and draped fabric. After just a few episodes she was wanting old shirts to cut up and redesign! We are gearing up to watch season three soon. And, yes, Kevin is a great sport and we watched all the episodes together as a family!

In the past few weeks we've been working on making our spare bedroom into a "fashion design" studio where Sarah can just plop down, play around with fabric and get her creativity going. Once summer school is done at the end of this week, Sarah and I are going to learn to sew! We've picked out several patterns and I've tried to stock the shelves with various colors and types of fabrics and trim. I've been able to pick up great lots of stuff on Ebay -- from a giant box of assorted thread to boxes full of assorted trims, buttons, and zippers. Each box that arrived at the front door would elicit an "oooooooh -- ohhhhhh!" and it was really fun to see her wade through the various items. She's gone with me to Walmart to dig through the $1 a yard fabric and, won't you know it, always complains that they don't get enough pink fabric in!

A few years ago my mom bought a sewing machine and left it at our house. The poor guy sat lonely for many years but now will have some fun things to sew! Plus, we bought him a little friend -- a serger. It took me several hours, but I waded through the serger book, figured out how to thread it and make it go and was so happy with myself -- Sarah sat down, flipped open the lid, looked inside, said a couple of "uh-huhs" and was off an running with fabric flying everywhere in no time! Kids.

Sarah has already dug through the shelves and picked out three kinds of PINK fabric. We did Sarah's measurements and made the mannequin match her form exactly so she can work on the mannequin and see how the fit will be on her. She calls the mannequin "Sarah #2". She's already done some cutting (without any type of pattern) to start a slip dress design she has in her head. She's serged the fabric and has started pining it to "Sarah #2". Maybe she won't need me to teach her anything after all!