Make Do & Mend

First off, kids go through clothing like crazy. I feel like I'm buying them new clothes all the time. Now with 2, I thought it would be easy to have hand-me-downs. After all, boy clothes work just fine for girls, especially shorts and pants. However, that is not quite the case with my kids. My daughter, who is almost 3, will argue with me that she has nothing to wear if the items in her drawer aren't pink or purple or have hearts or flowers on them. We will go round and round until I finally dress her and dramatic sighing ensues. When any piece of clothing isn't to her liking she will say it is her brothers or that it is too small. This even includes black leggings bought specifically for her, which she picked out. (I explained to her that neutrals, like black, make other colors prettier, so she has resigned herself to wearing them if she absolutely has to).

So, I have been saving 6 pairs of shorts sizes 2T-3T, which were my sons that I felt were pretty gender neutral. I know from experience that these just won't fly with my daughter, so I came up with the brilliant idea of embellishing them to make them more "girly". A little trip to Fabric Depot and we were in business!

My goal with each pair of shorts was that the embellishment would cost less than a new pair of shorts. So everything I did was around $1-2 or under. The first 3 I just added buttons. Off with the plain buttons and on with red heart buttons. You can't see it, but the upper left pair have strawberry buttons. These met the approval of my daughter and took under 10 minutes to do each set of shorts. 

The next pair I took polka-dot ribbon and ran it through the belt loops. I sewed it at each of the belt loops, stretching it at each one slightly, so it would stretch with the elastic. My daughter is very skinny, so I'm not too worried about them being too tight. Then I added a purple button from my button stash and called it good. She loves them!

Next pair I added a little ribbon to the pocket, I didn't think it was enough, so I added lace around the inside of the cuffs. 

The last pair, I added ribbon just under the elastic waistband and then added it around the cuffs of the shorts. I did it below the elastic, just so it wouldn't interfere with the stretch. 

It took me one afternoon and a bit of the next morning to do them all. I'm really happy with how they turned out. More importantly my daughter loves them all and thinks they are the best thing ever. So, hopefully this will mean a few less arguments in the morning and a little quicker time getting dressed!