DIY birthday gift for girl

We had a birthday party to attend this past weekend for a pretty special four year old.  I was trying to think of what I could make her when Walter piped up that he wanted to make her something.  More specifically, he wanted to sew her something.
Well how can you say no to that, gentle readers?  You can't! Since Walter has become quite good at sewing pillowcases we thought that would make a nice gift. We rummaged through my fabric stash and found all the fabrics we would be needing which made this a $0 gift for us.  If you had to buy the fabric from the fabric store for this project you would be looking at a cost of $6-$10.

We used the pillowcase sewing method referenced in this blog post. I did add a quick "MEOW" applique    to the trim piece, the same way I appliqued in this blog post.

I also thought it would be cute if I made the birthday girl a sleep mask to go with her pillowcase. Obviously, as suggested above with the "MEOW" applique, I made the mask to look like a cat.  It was pretty darn cute and got quite the response when the gift was opened at the party.

Here is how I made a cat sleep mask:

  First I drew the basic shape of a sleep mask and also cat ears on a piece of paper

Sleep mask pattern

I cut four pieces of grey fleece for the ears

Grey fleece ears to be

Cutting the same ear pattern a bit smaller I made pink triangles for the inside of the ears and pinned them onto two of the four grey fleece triangles. Then with a quick zig zag stitch I attached them.

Soon-to-be cat ears

Next, with right sides together (pink sides in) pin and stitch your ear fronts to the ear backs.  Keep the seam allowance as narrow as you're able. Then turn right side out.

Cat ears

Next, I took an elastic and cut it to 13 1/2 inches. Okay, it wasn't really just elastic I had laying around.  I used a headband I had bought for my daughter and never used.  You can buy inexpensive elastic headbands from the dollar store if you don't have one on hand.

elastic for around the birthday girls head

I layered my grey fleece with a piece of felt and some satin on the bottom so it would feel smooth and wonderful against her face

Three layers in the sleep mask: fleece, felt and satin

Using my paper pattern I cut through all three layers of fabric.  Remember, satin frays quickly so you might want to heat seal the cut edges with a lit match before you continue on.  

I also took a tiny scrap of the pink fabric used for the ears and made a tiny nose.  I sewed that onto only the fleece layer.

Eye mask with nose

I pinned the ears between the layers along with the elastic then gave it a quick top stitch.

Looking pretty cat- ish

Using some black fabric paint I added whiskers and eyelashes.  

I think it's precious!

And here is the finished set together, a cumulative effort between Walter and I.

Taa-daa!