Owl Bookend

Here's a very easy crafty project. I made these owl bookends for my bff's baby room. Here's how:

I drew a picture of an owl, made sure it was symmetrical, and cut out the yellow fabric with the pattern. I then added green felt wings and eyeballs, black circle eyes, an orange felt beak, and a belly.

Using the same owl template, I cut out the tree fabric (from the belly) for the owl's back:

With right sides together, I sewed the owl up, leaving a good 3 inch hole at the top of his head. I filled him up with rice* (cup and a half-ish) and some poly-fill, till he was nice and fat. *The rice helps the owl stand up and weighs him down to make a more useful bookend. I then stitched the hole up by hand.

The owl matches the bunting that I made for bff's baby room as well:

This is in my sewing room. It looks so cute hung up in the baby room. 

Hoot hoot!

Simple Dimpled Green Skirt

Alright, maybe it has pleats, not dimples. I was just trying to rhyme.

When I got married, my bridesmaids got dresses from J. Crew, I ended up making one of the bridesmaid dresses, so J. Crew sent me a few yards of the fabric, a beautiful green cotton silk faille. I had some leftover, so decided to make a nice little Fall skirt with it.

Using a rectangle the size of my waist x 1.5, I made three inverted pleats on front:

Put two wider pleats on back, and closed the rectangle with a matching zipper:

**** Disclaimer: I am not fancy, nor do I know how to curl my hair. This is the result of wearing a sock bun for a couple days and then taking it out.

I put on a waistband, doubled over, the size of my waist. Side view:

Obligatory blurry action shot:

Thoughts? Feelings? Suggestions?

Scrappy the Fish

My BFF is having a bebe, so I wanted to make a stuffed animal. I used a bunch of scrap materials, and so that is why he is called Scrappy the Fish!

I sewed a bunch of varied size and texture strips of fabric and did two different color schemes-

Oranges, yellows and greens...

...and pinks, blues, and greys.

I made a big construction paper cut-out of a fish (you could do lots of other animals too), placed it over the sewed together scraps, and snip snip snip.

I added little smiley faces on each side of Scrappy, and some felt eyes.

Then, I sewed together the fish, right side together, leaving a gap in the tail so you can fill the fish up with stuffing.

Scrappy Guts

Last, I zig-zag stitched the tail closed.

Scrappy likes to look out the window.

Color Block Simple Shirt

I wear my heart on my sleeve back...

Super simple sort-of color block shirt. I got this very soft, light weight cotton in turquoise and peachy pink. 

I cut the shirt by tracing another shirt that I liked, but before I cut the fabric, I sewed a nice long peachy pink rectangle to the turquoise fabric like so:

I only color blocked the front of the shirt (duh), so I only used that fabric for the front of the shirt. 

I also made some little cap sleeves:

I added a heart to the back, just for a little surprise element, and because I think it's cute.

Twist and Shout!

Zig Zag Ombre

Used the same technique as here to make a zig-zag-kinda-ombre style nails. Used orange (OPI- a good mandarin is hard to find), red (OPI- big apple red), and a darker red (OPI- St. Petersburgandy).

It's kind of hard to capture in a picture, but you get the idea.

Easiest Skirt Ever

Wanted to share a very easy skirt to make, definitely beginner level sewing.

Take a rectangle of cotton fabric (clearly I'm really loving chevron lately) and cut into a rectangle. The width should be your waist measurement x 1.5, and the length can be as long or short as you like + 3 inches for hemming/waistband. 

Make the waistband by hemming the top of the skirt a quarter inch and then making a "pocket" for the elastic (i.e. I used a 1.5 inch wide elastic, so I made a 1.5 inch "pocket". Slip the elastic in, using a safety pin to help guide it through.

Here is a close up. 

Sew the skirt together, this will be the middle of the back of the skirt (I tried so hard to line up the chevron perfectly, but oh well...) Then, hem to your desired length and top stitch that bitch!

Yet another close up.

This skirt takes in total about 20 minutes, I think I will make a million of them. And you can even dance in it!

Reversible Chevron Tote Bag

Used a variation on this tutorial to make a reversible tote bag after I found this awesome pink and gray chevron canvas fabric. I cut my fabric into four 18" by 16" rectangles (2 of each color), and then made the straps 2" by 20". Very excited to use this bag!

Little Red Dress

Needed more red clothes, so I made a little red dress with a comfy jersey knit. 

Made the top by just making a basic t-shirt, and then cuffed and tacked the sleeves.

Attached a (wonky) circle skirt to the top, and added a little waistband. Its fun to twirl and swirl in this one.

Let me know what you think!

Zig Zag Swag

This is another little nail trick. Same idea as these nails, but with ZIG ZAGS.

I used the blue painters tape, but instead of cutting with regular scissors, I used pinking shears.

chomp chomp

So, you paint one layer of nail polish. 

Then, cut out the strips of blue painter tape with the pinking shears. 

Paint another layer of nail polish on top.

Wait about 5 to 10 minutes for it to dry.

Peel off the painter tape.

Finish with a good top coat.

Voile!

Thumbs up for zig zags!

Upcycled Tie Dye T-shirt Dress

Oh no! I have no arms!
Made this easy dress out of 3 old tie dye t-shirts and an old gray t-shirt. I thought I'd share.
As I said, I used an old stretchy gray t-shirt for the top, cut the sleeves off.

Take three old larger sized t-shirts. I took three tie dye t-shirts (that used to be my brothers), and cut rectangles out of the front of each, like so:

Then, pin and sew ruffles every inch at one end of the rectangle, looks like this :

Sew the skirt by sewing all of the sides to one another with a straight stitch (right side together).

(should look like this before sewing the last two sections together)

Sew the skirt onto the tank top and trim the excess fabric from the bottom part of the tank top. Hem bottom of skirt (or leave edges raw...whateva) and voile! A casual summer dress. 

The finished product.

Close up on the gawgeous ruffles.