Maternity Dress Refashion

While blog hopping, you will find a few zillion tutorials on how to up-cycle different articles of clothing. I have a few articles of clothing set out for such purposes, but this dress was higher in priority. This is a maternity dress by Motherhood Maternity, which I bought used for $5.00, that fit well when I had a baby bump, but now that I have a basketball bump, the dress is just a bit too short to comfortably wear to church.

I have 6 pairs of yoga style black maternity pants, and some of them are floods, so they were an easy choice to donate to the project. I cut off the pant leg hem and also the waist band, then I pressed the pants so that the outer leg seam was 1/4 of an inch to one side. I then cut 4 inches from that outer seam the entire length of the leg so that my material was really 8 inches wide, with a seam 4 and 1/4 inch from the front side. Repeat this from the other leg of the pants, so there were 2 long strips. The bottom of the dress was 35" wide so I trimmed the length of the strips to 35 1/2 inch and sewed them together to make one long tube using a 1/4 inch seam.

From that point, all I needed to do was to fold the strip back in half, making sure that the seam was going to be on the inside of the dress, and pin it to the dress hem. Because I was working with 2 very stretchy materials, I pinned very close together to increase my chances at an even finished look without puckering. I do not have a walking foot, so I stitched very slowly, making sure to not pull on the materials while sewing with a small zig zag stitch. Viola! I can now wear this dress for the next 12 weeks of pregnancy.

If I get adventurous, another day, I might shorten the sleeves and add a black binding to those too.... I haven't decided yet. What do you think?

Rectangular Sewing Again!

Every time I make something, I think its the coolest thing I've ever made! Even better than what I made last week. Of course, that only lasts until the next time, but its a fun feeling! I have discovered a LOVE for sewing anything that doesn't require a formal pattern, gathers, pleats, zippers or even button holes. When I stumbled upon "The Idea Room" I found a ton of fun crafts to make, but since I was looking for a quick gift idea, I settled on this.

The Fashionable Fabric Keychain. Have you ever noticed when looking at other peoples sewing projects that they have the cutest stinking fabric you've ever seen??? I often feel like this, and sometimes is discourages me from starting the project, but this time I ignored the thought, dug through my stash for a minute, and came up with a pairing that I thought was pretty cute. I also already had the fastener on hand from previous attempts to make a binky clip. Boo Ya!

A simple craft with everything on hand; so perfect for so many reasons, no runs to the store and no money spent are my favorite two! Her tutorial was very simple to follow with lots of pictures. I think the most time consuming part was changing the thread and bobbin on the machine twice to match the materials!

A Week of Crafting in Review

Fruit Storage
I started asking around and perusing the net for a large fruit basket about a month ago. Preferably one with tiers for easy access and superior storage abilities. You can go through a good amount of fruit in a family with 4 kids. The only good choice that I felt was an option is a tiered hanging basket, but seeing that we are renting, and I know it would be a penalty to screw anything into my lovely kitchen cabinets, that will not work. A friend sent me to a blog featuring someone making a tired dessert tray with different sized plates and small candle holders. Turns out that is a large craze at the moment and there are many, many different takes on this idea in blogs everywhere.I adopted the idea to use long ceramic trays, and a package of cake stand columns, sealing the deal with e6000 glue. The top tray is just low enough below the counters that you can still easily get to bananas. The night I made this and took the picture, we were running low on fruit, but you can see how much potential space is available for your produce.

Up-cycling Jeans to Apron

The biggest downfall about the way we shop for my dear husbands clothes, can be a

great boon to available craft denim to me. You see, he doesn't like to go shopping. Who can blame him when we always drag along the kids? When we go to the store, we buy 3-4 pairs of jeans, and a

few new shirts, generally a pair of shoes. Since they were all bought at the same time, they all wear out about the same time as well. So in the past week or two I've accumulated some materials just waiting to be up-cycled. I stumbled across "A Girl and a Glue Gun" in a search for recycling denim projects and loved what she did! Her tutorial says to use the

same size jean for your apron that you'd normally wear. I think that using a slightly larger jean would be preferable because I like a bit more side coverage to my apron. Of course, since this isn't a

Maternity apron, I couldn't model it, so I just layed it out for a picture.

Crinkle Toy

We had some company in town over the weekend. We BBQ'd for lunch one day, and they bought a bag of Sun Chips in the crinkliest bag ever. Despite Micheal Pollan's warning that the more something crinkles, the less you should buy it, Sun Chips didn't listen. This is definitely the loudest chip bag ever, and its compost-able you know. Since I have been collected the plastic cereal liners to make reusable sandwich wrap-ups with, it was natural I would want to keep this bag to create a baby toy. I had seen an adorable 'how-to' done by "Andrea's Originals" in a previous craft search and had a link in an email! Horray! I love when I think ahead enough to mail myself craft projects. Otherwise, it was just a passing thought. I did some research on the bag itself to make sure it was safe to use for such a purpose and feel that it is. The bag cannot currently be recycled by most municipal recycling plants, and will only decompose in a proper composting unit. Unless the bag is surrounded by the key ingredients in a composting pile, I think it will work well for this project. Like most crafted things, I would machine wash, but hang to dry. While I was sewing Abi played with the pin cushion. It happens to be a turtle. I had my camera with me and managed to snap a picture before she sensed the cameras presence. She's also modeling the apron. After the other girls had tried it on, it was of course her turn, and she never wanted it taken off for the night. I wish I was as handy with the camcorder, because she says 'turtle' so well, its just adorable!!

Fitted Table Cloth

After all helping little hands went to bed, I started to work on this last project, a tutorial given on "Smashed Peas and Carrots". I had cut the proper dimensions out earlier in the day yet any time I started to work on the corners the entire table cloth got the wiggles. The table the girl covered on her blog, has exact square corners, making it an ideal candidate for the simple box corner treatment she whips together in minutes. I didn't realize up front that my table has large rounded corners. So while I wanted the same outcome, I had to change what I did. Instead of the simple box corner seam, I ended up gathering toward the center of the corner from each side, and then tucking material from each side behind the middle of the corner material. I then folded the excess up and under to ensure that the entire perimeter of the table had 4 inches hanging over. Perhaps all this has technical names that would be much easier to understand, but I don't know what they are, Sorry. Overall it's been a fun week!

Calorimetry Crochet A.K.A. Thick Headband

Over the weekend I saw a few of these adorable headbands that were selling for 10-15 dollars each! Of course my frugal nature sent me searching for general instructions so that I could whip up my own and use up some of my yarn stash. After all, if you don't spend money on finished products, you can spend that money buying new notions, right? Well, once you clear our your old stash to make room of course. For this project I was using some left-over Alpaca/Lambswool blend that I had hand-died. This project really does not require much yarn, so check your stash and see what small yarn cakes you have tucked away.

I searched around for awhile and found an Etsy store which sells patterns with wonderful reviews. I normally do not buy patterns, because for small projects there are generally plenty of ideas shared for free on the net, and I feel I am competent enough to figure things out on my own through trial and error. I worked through the pattern in about 2 hours. While it was well written, and rather easy to understand, the thought behind the pattern really lacked. The bottom calorimetry (made from the pattern purchased on Etsy) lays flat, and because of the way the pattern increases and decreases the edges are rough.

So, the next morning, I started working up a different pattern to see if I could get better results and I am much happier. Can you see the top calorimetry has some shape to it? It is slightly concaved. This stretches and fits to the head well. The size difference was a concious choice. I made it a bit smaller to fit both Abi and Issy, where the bottom wrap would fit a large toddler up to an adult. The best part of buying the pattern was the cute flower that came with it. I trimmed it out in white to make it stand out and then attached it to an alligator clip so that it can be worn separately. I tried to model it on Abigail as well, and while it fits, she wouldn't leave it on her head long enough for me to snap the picture. I don't know where she gets that stubborn nature, I really don't.

Meeting Organizational Needs - On the cheap

For the entire year, the kids have had their school books in a bookcase on one shelf next to the kitchen table. We have tried labeling areas for each child, separating each area with plastic pencil cases, and even bookend/dividers. Regardless of the method that was in place, the little two could not put their books away in the correct place. I was lucky in they would get their books and pencils put away off the table, period. While the piled shelf doesn't really bother me much, except for the morning that I cannot seem to find Child X's writing book, this was (one of) the biggest bains of my eldest child's existence. Other children's books were in her area, they were touching hers, they were breathing the air of her books!

So off I went again, on a late night search for another solution that I could enact to fix this massive disaster of a problem. I came across some very cute and chic magazine holders including the ones found here. Of course I didn't have any magazine holders laying around the house to just cover, so I had to do a search for a good substitute, preferably one I did had laying around the house already as

a.) It would be free

b.) I wouldn't have to run to a store

c.) I could start right away while I was still excited for this project!

While I know some people have used cereal boxes for such a purpose, I needed something a bit more heavy duty. I came across the idea of using a USPS Priority Mail box and thought, Perfect! I happened to have a small stack laying upstairs next to the computer waiting to be used for such a purpose!

I cut my angle with a steak knife after finding that my utility scissors where doing a poor job. I measured just under 12 inches high on the back side, and 6 inches high on the front and cut the boxes. You can cut them to any measurements that you think would work well for your situation, but I wanted to be able to use 12x12 scrap-booking paper on each side so that dictated my cuts. Originally I had wanted to use fabric like the Chic ones above, but realized I did not have adequate prints that the kids would like, so I resorted to what I had on hand. I used spray adhesive to put on the paper and then permanent marker with lettering stencils to write their names on the tall end for each child.

*warning* If you are tempted to write your children's name using fancy stencils, ask yourself if your child is going to think that their O is a Q, or their L is an I. Apparently I should have written in my clearest De'Nalien print and called it good.

Since I want these boxes to stand up to daily wear and tear of childrens use, I bought some contact paper and proceeded to cover each one. I even used a bit of packaging tape to hold the contact paper down on the inside of the box so that there is very little chance of the books getting caught and ruining my creation. Hopefully these will last and solve the messy bookshelf problem.

Covered Diaper Wipe Case

I finally finished my Diaper Wipe Case! There are a few zillion tutorials online that I read through and loosely followed. These cute cases often retail for $20+ in baby boutiques so of course I had to make my own. I bought 1 fat quarter which is probably enough material to cover two cases. I had felt on hand, the trim, and all the buttons. I covered the case in a morning while listening to a movie with the kids and baking something. It didn't take long, just a ton of glue sticks! Tonight I found the buttons that I think finished the look perfectly and glued them on. Viola! Finished feels so good!

$1.00 for the Fat Quarter Material

$1.25 for the Huggies Diaper Wipe Case

$0.10 for 5 glue sticks

So my grand total for this adorable little project comes to; $2.35

I can handle that :)

Jewelry

Over the holiday weekend, I went to Michaels Craft and bought a jewelry making board. I have wanted one of these for the longest time! I have a good supply of beads and fixings, but never a long enough stretch of time to make an entire project!
I took a group of beads and layed out bracelets for each of the girls on Friday. I continued to work on these throughout the weekend whenever I had a few minutes to spare and they are almost all done! I will take pictures of them on the girls when I finish them. Abigails bracelet is a funny thing. She doesn't have much in the way of wrists, just a nice little fold, so she won't be able to wear her bracelet for long, as it could feasable be rolled off of her hand without much effort. But hey, little Chunks have the right to be adorned too!

Up-cycled Ribbon Edge Lovey

Bell and I had fun today up-cycling an old dress of mine into a Ribbon Edged Lovey for Abby! I also had a nice stock pile of ribbons that I bought when making hairbows for the older girls so this project was made completely from things we already had. Bell had a lot of fun helping cut each of the ribbons, and then handing them to me while I was sewing. I roughly followed the instructions found on this blog. I did not applique anything but I did add a thin batting. This does make the lovey less likely to be carried nicely in my purse, but with all hard wood floors, everything is nicer with a little cushion. Now only to wait a few months for her to be interested in it!
This lovey is a bit smaller than I had wanted, some darling little one was helping out a bit too much when I was cutting this material. I plan to next make a quilted top and back it with fleece with no batting. I am going to try 24" with ribbon tags only at the corners... I think it will be a little more useful that way.

Faux Boppy

Because we chose to not find out the sex of this baby until birth, I had very little in the way of clothing and equipment. After all, if it was a girl, I would want to buy pink frilly things. Where as a boy needs lots of driving equipment printed on his clothes, and sweaters. There are few things cuter than baby boys in sweaters.
While shopping the past week, I looked at the prices of Boppy Pillows. Wowzers! $35 dollars. Their were also no super cute pink patterns, so it was pretty easy to pass up. Who pays that much for a pillow? You can make a pillow right?
A Googling I go.... and end up with this Boppy Sewing Pattern. I used some material I already had on hand to make the pillow form with. I must admit, my boppy is not as pretty as the commercial counterparts.... but I'm rather attached to my Franken-style stitching. Tomorrow I'm going to delve into the fabric stash and see what I can come up with for a cute cover.