Fade Into Summer Shorts

Happy Memorial Day!

Since this weekend is the official weekend that kicks off summer, what better way than to welcome the wearing of white with a bleaching project.  In Florida, we don't really abide by that whole only-wear-white-after-Memorial-Day rule.  This project is easing into the wearing white gradually, by doing a fade-out on a pair of cut-off shorts.  This idea came from P.S. I Made This. (Such a great site, you have to check it out!)

I took my really dark blue Gap pair of Long and Leans (I love my Long and Leans) and chopped the legs off.  I used a pair of shorts where I liked the length and used those as a guide in cutting the Gap jeans.

Once the shorts were cut, Vince and I made a solution of 2 parts water and 1 part bleach in a bucket.  We propped the shorts up in the bucket so only the bottom portion was dipped in the solution.

We let it sit there for awhile.  The original instructions said for 30 minutes at first but that it could take a few dips.  Well, we had it in the bucket for about 5 hours (it was about midnight at this point) and it was bleaching it, but it was not white as snow yet.  Good enough!

Next we took them out and dumped and rinsed the bucket of bleach solution out.  In the same bucket, we made a solution of 2 parts water and 1 part vinegar.  This will stop the bleaching process.  Completely soak the shorts in this solution for about 10 minutes.

Once soaked and completely stinky, the next step is to wash them in the washing machine.  Wash them alone for this first time only.  Then dry them as usual (alone this first time, too).

Guess what, my crafty peeps?  You are done!

Washing them made them a bit whiter, maybe because I was seeing them wet and these are now dry.

I will wear these shorts proud at a Memorial Day BBQ party tomorrow.  Thank you to all the military that had fallen to allow us to be free!  Rest in Peace.

Source: google.com via Nancy on Pinterest

Black Denim Dress & Bow Earrings

I have a par-tay that I will be attending soon, so I wanted to get something new for it.  I've recently lost a few pounds, so some of my cute clothes do not fit right anymore.  This is the perfect time to get something new or new-to-me.  Which in this case, it was new-to-me.  Don't knock Goodwill, it really has some great stuff!

Anyway, I bought this blackish/steel gray denim strappy dress that is a mix between casual and dressy.  I like the top: it is fitted to the waist with adjustable straps; then it is full in the skirt.  I don't mind the fullness, it is just too long.  I will be hemming this.

Bad hair morning...look at the dress not my hair!!

I'm simply going to cut about 6 inches off the bottom.  The rest fits fine.

Major chop-off

I calculated that the hem will be 1" so I will need a 3/4" fold and then another fold that is 1".  This is so the raw edge is folded away.  Subtract those lengths from 6", I will actually cut 4 1/4" off the bottom.  I used chalk to mark my cut line.

Time to fold and press

Once pressed and pinned, I sewed around the edge with black thread.  That's it for the dress.  I told you it was easy.

Now, I wanted to make matching earrings.  I found this pic in a magazine of bow earrings that I pinned to my Pintrest board so I could do a designer knockoff on it someday.

Source: rubymarrow.com via Nancy on Pinterest

These earrings are from Delfina Delettrez  and they retail for $1300 - way out of my price range (c'mon, $1300??) so I will have to improvise.  I gathered some jewelry supplies and I was off.

Black ribbon & pearls

I had thin black ribbon, a strand of pearls (that was me practicing my bending wire technique), a few flat-head pins and a pair of fishhooks.  My idea is to make bows with the ribbon and place them in line with pearls.

First, I had to learn how to tie a bow prettily.  Eh, just a minor obstacle.  I Googled "tying a bow" and I found a tutorial from It's in the Details blog from Lisa Pace that made it a snap.

Second, I tied four bows; I took a flat-head pin and placed a pearl on it and poked the other end through the bow from the bottom.

Nancy's way of beading

I'm sure there could've been a better way of doing this, but I don't know enough about beading to care.  After the bow was threaded on it, I trimmed the pin down and made a loop for the link.  This will be the bottom segment of the earring.  From the bottom, I linked one of the pearls, a link to thread another bow on, then another pearl.  I then finished it off with the fishhook.

Black bow earrings: Priceless!

I think they came out cute!  To make sure my bow stays tied, I dotted glue on the backs of each of the knots.  Vince then wielded his mini torch to sear the ribbon edges to prevent fraying.

Much better (dress, not the hair) lol

The dress does look much better as a short dress.  I have the earrings on too, but it's sort of hard to see in the pic.  I will post a pic or two when I'm at the party, so you can see the dress and earrings in action.

Have a great week!

UPDATE: Here is Vince and  I at the party on Friday night.  We were supposed to have our mean face on...oh well. 

Ribbons and pearls

You can see I am wearing the earrings and I added a necklace that I used the same black ribbon but I took a pearl bracelet and tied the ribbon at the ends so it hung in the middle.  Accessories made easy!

Fix It - Skirt & Tank

Happy Memorial Day!  I had big crafting plans for this long weekend and I ended up doing none of them!  Hey, everyone needs a do-nothing weekend once and awhile, right?

Alterations are never very high on the sewer's to-do list.  I have a huge pile of to-do's that I never can find the time to fix.  So, since I was lazy this weekend I figure I would look in my cache of pics to see what I have done recently and I found a white denim skirt and a blue tank top.

First the skirt.  I bought this at Goodwill for less than $4.  It is a J.Crew white denim skirt that has a normal waist.  By normal, I mean not the hip-hugging, low-rise style that gives anyone who is a few pounds above their "desired" weight muffin top.  I have my fair share of low-risers, but I was glad that this one is one that I do not have to suck in my tummy to wear comfortably.


White denim, so 90's!

There is actually nothing wrong with this skirt, but since I only paid a few bucks for it, I had no buyer's remorse wanting to make it a bit more chic for the summer.  The bottom hem has a roll to it and I know that I will have to break out the iron every time I wear this.  Not very grab 'n go if you have to take the ironing board out in the morning.  I have frayed the ends of skirts and jeans before, so I was leaning towards that direction, but I did not want a mini either.  The length of this skirt was good as it was, so I decided to unstitch the bottom hem and unfold it.

Carefree, here we come!

The unstitching was a bit tedious, but not too bad.  I took a standard seam ripper and went all the way around the bottom hem of the skirt.  Then I unfolded it, like you see above.  You can also see the the raw ends are already fraying: Perfect.

When you unstitch something, be patient.  You will have to break the thread several times and pull out the tiny lengths with you fingers or tweezers, but you will be rewarded in the end with no rips or holes.

Orts of threads

Once it was unstitched and unfolded, I took it over to the ironing board and ironed it with steam and starch.  I knew the folds were not going to iron out, that is why I went this route rather than lopping off the bottom hem.  This way, it gave the skirt a meant-to-do-that deconstructed look.  Done!


Ta-da, Starch!


Next came the blue tank top.  This is a sale rack, Forever 21 purchase.  The straps were very long, so I had to shorten them.


Soon to be stunted straps

I prefer to alter the backs of items, rather than the fronts, so that you do not see stitching or other imperfections, in case the thread does not exactly match or an otherwise "oops" happens.  I took the same seam ripper and unstitched the back straps. 


Mark where they came from with a pen


I marked where they originally went so I could affix them in the same location.  I pinned it in place and tried it on.  I did this until the straps fit well.  These straps were originally placed at an angle so I wanted to ensure that the same angle was pinned.


Look how long the straps were!


Since the band gong around my chest was elastic, I installed a ballpoint needle on my machine.  I did not bother with a zig-zag because I was not sewing around the circumference, just an inch or so.  The elastic will still be stretchy around the rest of the top.  This is not fabric that will fray much, so I did not finish the edge, after I cut the extra length off.  No one will see it.


Perfect criss-cross angle!


This ensemble was less than $10 and it is very comfy!  Just a little bit of stitching skills and you can decontruct and alter someone else's cast-offs to be unique to you.


Plenty of daylight left to enjoy!


I have worn both of these pieces since I fixed them at the end of March and am truly satisfied with how they came out and how they wear.  This skirt will fray more as I wash it.  I will trim away the excess long threads, but you can keep them there and that will give it an even more casual look.

Try looking in your donation pile of clothes and see if there is something that you can tweak about them that may make them wearable to you again.  It doesn't even have to fit, you can totally cut it up and make a headscarf or a fabric belt.  Or if it has a stain, consider dying it a darker color or try tie-dye. 

Let me know if you try a Fix-It project of your own!  Happy Deconstructing!

Lucky Star Key Chain

This project was done in a couple of hours, for that is all the time I had allotted.  Since I have been doing all of the Sweater Purses, they have created a lot of scraps that I have been collecting in a bag.  So this project is a scrap project.

Here are the items I will use to make my key chain:

Scrap-a-plooza!

I had printed out a star shape on paper and cut it out, then had denim, pink and gray sweater scraps.  I used washable marker to trace the star on each scrap.


I'm not above tracing, no freehand for me! 

I can't draw to save my life, so I had to trace if I wanted my shape to even resemble a star.  Plus, a star is an easy shape to cut, no rounded edges or fine detail.  Once traced, I then cut them all out.  There are two of each because I will be making this double-sided.

Fourth of July scraps


I cut them all out the same size and then determined what order I would stack these in.  I really liked how the denim looked on top when I did Sweater Purse 3.0, so I decided, Pink, Cream, Denim.  I took my paper star and drew lines about a quarter inch in with a ruler (yeah, I can't even draw a straight line without help) and trimmed it.  Then I retraced the cream stars and trimmed and repeated again another quarter inch in and trimmed the denim stars.



Second round of tracing

 
I totally have Lucky Star from Madonna in my head right now.  I heard she refuses to play her old stuff at concerts, is this true?  I've never been to one of her concerts, but I had heard a rumor that she would charge the venue extra for her to play songs like Material Girl and Lucky Star.  I love those songs!
Anyway, back to the trimming.  I trimmed out all the stars so there are a total of six (6) stars.  I then stacked them to ensure that was what I wanted.

Star stacked action

I thought it made sense to sew from top to bottom, so I sewed the denim to the cream then the cream to the pink.  I did the sets separate.  While I was sewing and thinking that there must be a better way to do this (they were not staying straight for me and so the stars came out a bit skewed), I snacked on one of my favorite snacks: Toffifay.

Yummmmm

Toffifay is described as a caramel cup with a whole hazelnut dropped into, then a chocolate hazelnut filling covers the hazelnut and then it is topped with a drop of chocolate.  I love these!  Vince's mother eats these and I had never heard of them until she got me addicted to them.  I can find them at Walgreen's and Joann's (strangely enough).  Joann's sells them in a package of four, while Walgreen's sells them in a package of 15 (often at a buy one, get one free).  Try them!!!

Again, I digress!  The stars are finally sewn together.  Like I mentioned above, they are not aligned as I had imagined and are a bit off.


How do you read unaligned stars??

I did not like that so much pink was showing; it also made these really large.  I trimmed the pink to the cream star.

Much better!

Now that the stars are stacked and trimmed I then put them back-to-back and took needle and thread and hand stitched them together with a whip stitch.

The Stars Unite!


Once the stitching was done, it was time to make this a key chain.  In my kit of rivets, it contained some colored ones, rather than just silver or gold.  Luckily, there was a red one.  Vince did the honors of punching the hole and affixing the red rivet into the star.

Riveting Star

Once the rivet was attached, then I took a key chain and attached it to it.

A star is born!

This was a quick project, but I think that if I were to do it again, I would do it differently.  I think by cutting out all of the pieces ahead of time, that left me with little to hold onto while I was sewing them together.  I would try cutting out the smaller one first, then sewing that onto the next one, for me it was the cream.  Then cutting the cream out based on the lines of the denim.  Do the same for the cream on the pink. 

When I gave this as a gift, she said, "How did you know I love stars?"  Funny, they were an easy shape. :-)

If anyone tries something like this, let me know what worked for you.  Thanks!

Sweater Purse 3.0

I hope you're not sick of the Sweater Purse yet!  I still have several to do.  Maybe I will mix in other posts so you gals don't get burnt out on the Sweater Purse.  This time I wanted to use a pattern that I had bought ages ago, but had never used.

The Wristlet

I love the wristlet.  I have several that I have purchased, but I have never made one.  Sometimes I get into these funks that I won't do anything with a certain type of implement or concept or whatever and won't go near them for awhile.  At the time I bought this, I really wanted to do a wristlet, then something happened with a zipper project and I swore off zippers for awhile.  So, all of these styles in this pattern collection have zippers, ergo, no wristlet was ever made.

I hope to be over it, so I pull out the basic pattern guide for the front and back and liner.  I cut out the pieces from the pink sweater and liner from Sweater Purse 2.0.  That sweater will probably yield at least one more complete project (a small one from the sleeves).

I could always call this the Boob Wristlet!

I did not realize how this pic looked until I inserted it in.  Well, as you can see, I cut the fabric from the breast area.  Ha ha.  No one needs to know the origin of the fabric, just that it existed.

So, with the same pattern guide, I cut out the liner fabric and chose a zipper from my stash.  I think I got these zippers from my mother or they were leftover from my grandma.  She sews, but does not sew clothing with zippers, so I have a bunch of random ones.  This was a neutral tan or yellowish zipper.


It looked so easy....


So, to spruce this little number up, I wanted to do an applique again.  But I did not want it to be loose on the wristlet, but flush with the sweater.  I chose some scraps from my past felted sweaters (see, you never throw scraps out).  The recipient of this wristlet, her name starts with an L, so this was going to be my applique.  I drew a letter L on a piece of paper and traced it on my cream felted scrap and a slightly smaller L on a  denim scrap from my Laptop Bag post.  I distressed the denim edge a bit and sewed the denim on the sweater L.  Then sewed this layered L on the current sweater cut piece.


This reminds me of a Varsity letter

I had to think ahead and decide what I wanted my wrist band to be made out of.  I thought of sewing strips of the sweater together, but it would get too thick for my machine and would look sloppy.  So, my next idea was ribbon, but ribbon seamed too flimsy.  I rifled through my scrap bag and I found the inner seams from my jeans, again from the Laptop Bag post.  I did not use them at that time, but kept them anyway.  Good thing, because a section of this would be perfect.  I also had to think about where I was going to get a split ring and hook for it to attach to.  Vince wanted to help, so I sent him in search for these items around the house.

In reading the pattern, it had me make these zipper stops which are attached to the front and back before you sew the zipper on.  They are supposed to cover the zipper ends, I guess.  I never did these before, but I sewed them in anyway.  Then I positioned the end of the wristband on the side edge and pinned it to be sewed into the side seam later.

Something just ain't right!

This is the thing with patterns.  Does anyone try these out before they go saying they are easy or that certain steps are an integral part of this project?  I sewed these stops in even though I did not like them.  I measured the zipper several times to line it up with the stops and the length of the wristlet opening.  I cut the zipper and stitched it to make the new zipper stop.  I pinned it in the purse....yup, the zipper was too short!  How?  I don't get it.  Anyway, I am making the best out of this zipper and not getting a new one to cut.  This pattern also had me basting everything but the turkey to this opening area.  I hate basting....

Basting away

I continued to follow the pattern; I pinned the liner to the sweater portion, sewing along the zipper and up the sides and leaving the bottom of the liner open so I can turn it right side-out.  I also sewed the sweater sides and bottom.  Since the liner was so thin and the sweater was so thick, this turning was proving to be a little hard.  Important: make sure the zipper is open so you can turn it. 

The hole was too small; I had to unstitch it more

Once it was finally turned, I pulled out the liner enough to sew the liner hole closed by topstitching it (rather than slipstitch, where it is invisible).  At this point, I'm at the end of my rope and need this project done.  I insert the liner back into the wristlet and with a needle and thread make two stitches in each inside corner, connecting the liner to the sweater.  This way the stitches act like an anchor and the liner will not pull out when in use.

Yea, go Big L!

Now, remember I sent Vince off to gather some necessary items to complete this wristlet?  He came back with items that were very chunky, like a carabiner clip (used in mountain climbing).  Obviously, he knows nothing about wristlets; but a wonderful guy for trying.  So, we looked through the kitchen junk drawer, then my craft bag, then finally his toolbox.  The final hook and split ring came from some key chain that held a key for something that he doesn't even own anymore (well, that is what I told myself when I snatched the hook and ring).  The hook is like something that would come off a lanyard.  It was perfect!

Showing off that great zipper

I won't say that zippers are my favorite sewing thing, but I don't necessarily hate them anymore.  I still think the zipper stops were overrated, but I'm no biggie in the sewing world, so what do I know?

Chic liner debuting again!

Ok, that, I hope, is the most difficult one that I do.  That pattern really is not for material as thick as a sweater, so I really only have myself to be shaking my head at.  I want small and simple.  Back to the drawing board, no more patterns for these sweaters!  They need freedom from the restriction of pattern rules.  I will try and keep simplicity in mind for the next ones (and I don't mean the pattern maker either)!!