Crafty Tax Attorney

Trying to bathe Ralphie

2013-05-16T19:04:00.001-07:00

This is the most exciting thing that happened today: I tried to bathe the dog because he was scratching himself all night. When I shampooed him he escaped to the straw (his most favorite place ever EVER!) and rolled. This is the rolling sequence....and you get some nice shots of our veggie garden.

How to: Fabric Storage

2013-05-15T18:05:00.002-07:00

I am not the most organized person. (My husband is laughing right now pointing to my piles of crap everywhere in the house). Most of my piles are craft or laundry related. I can't help it. I've recently inherited a ton of fabric from a friend and am slowly washing and ironing it, dyeing it, etc., and need to figure out what to actually do with it.

I was laying in bed this morning while trying to eek out 9 more minutes out of my alarm, and I realized I had an entire shelf above my clothes in my closet that didn't have anything up there. I am short so it's not great to have clothes up there that are inaccessible. But it would be a great place to store fabric since it is unused space and I don't need fabric all the time. Or I don't need all the fabric all the time!

First, like any diligent crafter, I scoured the internet and Pinterest until I found a technique I liked. The Little Green Bean had the best and easiest and most cost effective method for my situation. And I just happened to have some foam board laying around the house perfect for this project!

There will be no photos of the fabric nightmare that is happening in the craft room. It is bad. And I am embarrassed I have four huge plastic tubs of fabric in the garage that I haven't even gotten to for the washing part--so there is that also.

To prepare, I also watched this video on foam board cutting since I don't want to half ass this project and have janky foam. My foam ended up being sort of janky anyway...

First I started with cutting my foam board into 10 by 10 rectangles. I used this Craftsman knife thing, but something sharper would have been nice.

Here is the space I will be putting the fabric--it's above the hanging section in my closet. (The hanging section is also known as the section that has not yet made it to the laundry explosion pile or that has not yet fallen onto the floor to be forever lost under my wedding dress and other crap...)

I laid my fabric out length wise and then folded it in half and then folded it in thirds--I sometimes folded and then folded twice depending on how wide the fabric was.

Then I secured the fabric into the fabric and pushed it through to the foam on either side to hold it in place on my bolt.

And here are the pinks and oranges in the closet starting to be organized!

I don't think I realized how much fabric I actually have when I started this project--I'm going to need about 50 more of these closets but I'm not going to worry about that yet.

Cardigan Refashion for Summer

2013-05-14T08:14:00.000-07:00

I love this old blue and white sweater of mine--but I've worn it to death and have a newer version of it in black and white that has taken more prominence in my closet. I'm trying to refashion things I'm not wearing, so yesterday it was this bad boy.

Not bad to start with. There is nothing really wrong with it but I wanted to take it from a winter cardigan to a summer cardigan. First I needed to update those buttons!

Remember these guys from this button refasion? I'm using the same buttons!

First I seam ripped off those ugly boring buttons.

I left the threads in the top so I would be able to see where I was putting my button. I took the threads out right before I sewed each button. It's great to have a guide like that because you will never eff up!

Looking cute little button!

Here it is rebuttoned!

Next I chopped off a lot of the arm length using a rotary cutter and cutting mat.

I'm not using that arm piece yet--but wait for a future project!

Pin the arm hole and sew.

Boom! Updated short cardigan, perfect for summer.

AND I could wear it over that blue dress I button refashioned!

May 2013 Garden Update

2013-05-13T09:27:00.001-07:00

Almost a month ago we planted our garden. On the list of plants were the following:

1. Kale;
2. Broccoli;
3. Pole Beans;
4. Cucumbers;
5. Zucchini;
6. Strawberries;
7. Red onions;
8. Brussels Sprouts;
9. Green Peppers.

We started all of those from plants and started some peas and corn inside the house and then transplanted. Unfortunately for us, birds LOVE tiny pea and corn plants. We also tried spinach from seed which normally grows quickly, only to discover birds pilfering the plant beds.

Yesterday we added a few new plants to the garden.

Hello artichoke!

Corn to the right and an early girl tomato to the left.

Grape plant! Savignon blanc grapes!

Close up of the baby grapes.

We have our first broccoli coming in too! Everyone who comes over is amazed that this is how broccoli grows. It's pretty exciting!

And our first zucchini!

Our pole beans are trailing nicely.

We have been able to harvest our kale about once a week. Those plants have already paid for themselves multiple times over. Kale is so easy to grow and it's super expensive at the store to get good organic kale that doesn't taste bitter.

How to make a very easy lavender sash in less than 5 minutes!

2013-05-12T20:05:00.002-07:00

I love my Husbando. But he is a triathlete and his laundry STINKS. Like sweating for four hours stinky. Since I am in charge of the laundry, I only use fragrance free detergent and static sheets. This causes a problems with some of the padded spandex and/or running ensembles that just don't smell clean post washing. Enter the organic lavender sash. I throw one in his wash and the same on in the dryer. The whole laundry load doesn't smell like lavender when you take it out but the manly funk is for sure gone.

Start with a scrap piece of fabric. They don't need to be large. This is probably a three inch by six inch piece. It doesn't need to be ironed since it will be thrown into the laundry.

Fold it in half and sew the two seams on either side of the fold.

Turn the sash so that the seams are now on the inside.

Grab your pound of dried lavender you have laying around your kitchen. Oh--you don't have any? I recommend Save-On-Crafts. They are local (to Northern California) and their shipping is super fast. I purchased 2 lbs of dried lavender about 5 years ago and still have this pound left that I use for soap making. Every house should have some!!!!!!

Pour that dried lavender about 3/4 of the way into filling the sash.

Hellllllllo lavender!

Fold the raw edges in.

Sew that top seam. And voila! You have a lavender sash perfect for laundry! You can also stick it in your undies drawer or closet.

Here's another view. It's a great thing to make for holiday presents or birthdays to stick in a present bag or stocking stuffer.

How to make a dress without a pattern

2013-05-12T08:00:00.001-07:00

I started wanting to make this dress two toned green and it turned into something totally different. I wouldn't say I love it--which happens with a lot of projects. I feel like a darker color would have been better for me and absolutely something with a pattern. Oh, and I need to learn how to do actual finishing of garments because when you see what I did to the neck of this dress you might pass out. You have been warned!

Another thing that has been clear through this process is that I desperately need a dress form. I'm having a hard time getting those shots of what the dress should look like on me (lack of full length mirrors without laundry in the background, short child arms, caffeinated shaky hands, and general disdain for how the outfits look on me.) It looks okay on the floor but you can't see how it drapes...

Anyway--to the tutorial! (Which I have to finish quickly since it's Mother's Day and we have a whole bunch of gardening/crafting/hiking planned!!!)

How to make a dress without a pattern:

You will need:
1. Sewing machine;
2. Matching thread;
3. Scissors;
4. Sewing machine,
5. Equal fabric for lining and outer fabric; (You will probably need somewhere between 3 and 4 yards of each lining and outer fabric--how do you know for sure? Pick a dress out of your closet you love and you will need about an extra 10 inches or so to hemming, etc., from the shoulders to the hem--so measure that dress and then add 20 inches to the measurement and buy that length);
6. Trim (I used some old lace for the neck line);
7. Pins;
8. Belt to cinch waist (or you can sew a corresponding sash either to your neckline trim or the inner lining.

Directions:

1. Start by selecting your fabrics. In this case, the dark green is going to be my lining fabric and light green fabric is my outer fabric. These are soft cottons. I had to do a lot of ironing.

2. I laid my fabrics length-wise on my floor and then doubled up the fabric length-wise. I slipped the lining fabric inside the same way. You could also lay them on top of each other. Don't you love you can do this anywhere!? Guerrilla sewing! (I have a cutting table but it is COVERED in stuff from my last crafting classes).

3. Have your dog come help you sew. Hey Ralph! Lay your dress that you're using for your pattern against the fabric. And cut around the shape of the dress. You can always cut more later--I'd urge you to keep it longer than you think.

Here's what my dress looks like cut.

And then I open it up.

4. Here's the neck hole. I pinned along where I wanted the shoulders to be and stitched the lining to the dress. This actual shoulder detail when sewn will appear about 1 to two inches below your actual shoulder and closer to your bust than your back.

5. Sew.

6. Try the dress on. It will be a crazy armless caftan thing. I tried it on with clothes underneath to help me figure out how much armpit I wanted to show. Pinch and pin on each side where you want your arm hole to end.

I don't have a dress form--I just pinned directly onto myself.

7. From that armpit hole, pin down the sides of the dress and sew!

8. Try on again and adjust the length to about 2 inches below what you want it to ultimately be. Try it on with a belt before you make this determination because the gathering at the waist will make it shorter and I don't want to be blamed for you flashing your girly bits at the office!

Oh look! A wonky thing happening! I've never seen that before! (Not!)

9. Pin your bottom edge and sew. You could also add trim here if you're up for it. but don't do it all at once.

10. Try your dress on again. Cut your neck hole down to where you want it. For those of the larger breasted persuasion, I would recommend a higher neckline, especially if this is a work dress.

11. Finish your neckline and arm holes. Don't say I didn't warn you--what happened here! That is my neckline. I was not drunk when I sewed this I just don't always know what I'm doing. So I decided to cover the neck with lace.

12. I started up at the shoulder line, a bit behind the stitch I made in Step 4.

I sewed from the left down to the center of the top and back up and around.

Here is the end of the trim.

I folded it over and continued sewing.

And you're done!

Here is the finished product--yes I need a dress form:

If I had to do it over again, I would use a darker color with a pattern and maybe try a knit fabric. Enjoy!

Teal Rit Dye on a yellowing fabric

2013-05-11T07:19:00.000-07:00

The other week I tried to dye all of the white clothes I wasn't wearing anymore black....which turned into an epic purplish fail. As it was my first time dying, everyone threw in their two cents, and what I heard over and over was "you should have used vinegar." Now, the bottle and the internet, because of the type of fabric it was said to use a cup of salt and not vinegar--so I used salt. This time, I tried the vinegar. Other things I did wrong last time were too many garments in the bucket, and not enough color saturation.

So yesterday I WALKED to Joann Fabrics in an effort to curb my spending on craft related items. It took about an hour and a half round trip. And I walked away with a bottle of Teal Rit Dye.

So the fabric I ended up using, I inherited from a friend who was cleaning out her mom's extensive fabric stash. I loved this pattern but felt the yellow of the fabric had faded and needed to be darker and greener/bluer.

Here I am dying again! It's really weird when you are having a conversation with a non-crafty person and they ask what you've been up to lately and you respond with "OMG I've been dying lately!" and they look at you with a look of concern and their cell phones partially dialed to get you in a 5150.

About 5 minutes in I tried the cup of vinegar. I ended up only stirring this baby for about 20 minutes because I was lazy but it turned out a great color.

Here it is looking sad in the sink but much more vibrant than the initial yellow.

And here it is after going through the laundry. It's quite a difference. I cannot wait to make a sundress out of this! Or maybe a top! My options for crafting are limited this week due to work, cleaning, family, family, family, mother's day, etc., but I'm taking Monday off to craft and make doctor's appointments. So I hope you'll be seeing this fabric back soon!

How to customize the size of a dog collar

2013-05-10T16:19:00.000-07:00

Most of the dog collars I like are just too big for Ralph. There is a great dog store named George that is walkable from my office--it is a dangerous place! I have purchased a number of collars/awesome things from George including a bow tie and top hat that he wore to our wedding:

There's Ralph being fancy! Doesn't he look handsome?! And if THAT wasn't cute enough more you...check out his new TIE! Yes he wore it to the dinner party on Monday:

I also bought this collar which I call the "country club collar" but it is WAY too big for my beagle baby's neck. The stitching is hot pink and the inside is orange! So cute for summer.

First I seam ripped open the end part in the inner loop.

That is the end you're going to cut off.

Snip to desired length.

Then zig zag stitch the raw edge.

Sew that end back on to the collar to reform the loop.

Another view:

Here are my final stitches.

And here it is on Ralph.

He's very busy taking a nap right now.

You can do this with any collar--dog, cat, etc.

Things I'm Obsessed with this Month

2013-05-09T17:28:00.002-07:00

I'm too tired to craft something and I've already opened a bottle of wine...so that is how the rest of this evening is going. (Oh and I have a 16 & Pregnant marathon DVRed!!!!!) Basically I got up at 3am today, did a presentation, worked a full day, did all kinds of household chores and crap and now need to relax. I even forgot to take the dog out again...but that's what a yard and/or husbands are for.

I did want to say a few words about two things I'm totally obsessed with right now.

One is the new Fall Out Boy album Save Rock and Roll. So worth the money. It helps me wake up in the morning and I also listen to it when I work out. The album is SOLID all the way through. FREAKING ELTON JOHN is on the album. How could it not be awesome??? And I'm sorry but Patrick Stump has totally transformed his look. Dang! Look at that hair! And I freaking love it. This is who Patrick used to be. And of course who doesn't love Pete Wentz--but that goes without saying....

The second thing I have watched a billion times lately is Burning Love. It is an EPIC online show parody of the Bachelor/Bachelorette/Bachelor Pad TV shows that is hosted by Yahoo!. You will enjoy cameos from Paul Rudd, Michael Ian Black, Natascha Leggero, Michael Cera, Adam Scott, Christine Taylor, Jerry O'Connell, the crew from The League (Paul Scheer and Nick Kroll!) Freaking Leslie Bibb is amazing as "Bevarly". That's right, not "Beverly," but "BeVARly." And love love love June Diane Raphael who plays "Julie" who has her own season. So much inappropriate awesomeness. All of the eps are online now and FREE for Julie's season and for season 3 of "Burning Down the House" which is the Bachelor Pad parody. They are competing for $900! Definitely NSFW!

How to make an outdoor cushion cover

2013-05-08T16:27:00.001-07:00

My friend bought a fun table cloth and wanted to use it to cover a piece of foam cushion. She didn't have a sewing machine and wasn't hot on the idea of glue gunning it (which is pretty much my solution to life). The fabric was a bit too short for the project she wanted so we extended the width of the table cloth, slapped on some velcro, and finished the ends with safety pins. This was an easy and fast project that she could wash if needed and could easily take off the velcro and pins and re-use it as a table cloth. This is the final product:

And she has this killer view of Mt. Tam:

Here's what a started with: foam cushion, table cloth, accent fabric for extra piece, sew on velcro.

First, I measured and cut my extra piece of fabric. Then I hemmed the edges.

Then I pinned my coral piece along the length of the table cloth and sewed.

Here's what it looked like after:

Then I sewed the rough side of the velcro onto my extra coral piece:

And then I matched up the soft side of the velcro on the tablecloth side and sewed that on.

Then I placed the foam in the center of the fabric and velcro-ed it together and folded the edges up like you would if you were wrapping a present and secured them with safety pins. You could also have added more velcro but we wanted to make it really easy.

And then we ironed it to get out those wrinkles! And this is what we were looking at when we ironed. Not bad. Not bad.

Here it is by itself.

And the final product again!

How to make an easy lined skirt with an elastic waist

2013-05-07T21:00:00.000-07:00

So this project ended up taking me about an hour and a half. This is a lined skirt with an elastic waist.

This is a really easy skirt to make for any sewing level. I used a bright green fabric for the lining fabric and a very sheer dark blue fabric with flowers on it. The elastic I used was just what I had laying around which was about a half inch thick.

Here are my supplies:

Measure your lining fabric around your waist where you want the elastic to go. Cut two pieces of the lining fabric that size (don't worry about the length yet). Cute two pieces of the outer fabric that same size as well. So you will end up with 4 pieces of fabric that look like squares or rectangles and are all the same size.

Clearly my fabric needed to be ironed so I did that....

Then I pinned along the side edge, all four pieces together. This would mean your two lining fabric pieces are on the outside (green) and your two pieces of outer fabric are facing each other on the inside.

Sew the seams on both sides. Then I sewed the top of the skirt just to keep the lining and outer fabric together. If you're REALLY good about pinning and ironing you can skip this step--but I am lazy and am much better at sewing and then pinning so that is what I did. At some point, I held the skirt up to my legs and figured out where I wanted the skirt to fall to. It's always better to keep it longer and shorten as you go than to spend all this time making a way too short skirt. When I found the length I liked I just cut a half inch and ripped each piece so they were all relatively equal.

Fold your top fabric over to make the waistband. It should be a bit thicker than the size of your elastic and you want to leave a gap in the waistband somewhere where you can insert your elastic.

I used the guide from my previous top stitching as where I would sew the waistband to.

I left about two inches open for inserting the elastic near a seam.

Then I pinned a safety pin to the edge of my elastic to help move it through the waistband of the skirt.

Pull the elastic all the way through. When you get to the end, knot the elastic and then try it on and adjust the length of the elastic to how tight you want it.

Take out the knot and overlap about an inch of the elastic and sew on it. I would say do zig zag stitch but mine was acting like a B so I just threw in a few other normal stitches and called it a day. Look at that craftsmanship!!!!!!!!

Then I pinned and sewed up a big bottom hem:

And here it is all done and ready to wear to work tomorrow.

Here it is hanging. Yay! I'll definitely be making more of these in different colors and I also want to experiment with trims and lace to make them fancier. Happy sewing.

Dinner party, etc.

2013-05-06T21:17:00.003-07:00

So tonight we threw a dinner party and I am currently drinking a glass of wine with ice cubes in it about 2 hours past my bed time (9pm) and devouring this bad boy from Sweet Things:

If carrot cake was a person, I would marry it. NOM NOM.

So we had a Monday night dinner party which I never do. Generally, Mondays are for lamenting that it is the beginning of the week and grieving the end of the weekend. Tonight was different and I feel like Monday night dinner party is going to be the new trend--maybe not every week, but definitely once a month. It was sooooooooo nice after my shitty day at work, complete with crying, graying hair, and a general lack of enthusiasm for my legal career, to have something else to focus on and people to feed. The Italian mother comes out in me when I feed people. It makes me so happy. I can't wait to have babies to feed.

Here's some of the hotness from the dinner table. Cute huh?

Yes, those are sterling silver fortune cookie place holders!

Don't you love paper flower napkin holders? Here's the tutorial if you want to make them.

And of course, our fancy beagle Ralph is his tie. You can't have a dinner party without a beagle in formal wear.

How to hang vertical succulent planters

2013-05-05T14:20:00.000-07:00

My mother in law bought us some vertical planters for our garden. They are perfect for succulents or strawberries! I decided to go with succulents since they will be enduring all kinds of weather and wind in the area I placed them and succulents are quite hardy.

BTW I LOVE my new drill. The battery charges in no time unlike our old one which would die during a simple job and then you would have to wait 15 hours to charge the thing.

Here is the fence I decided would be good for the planters. It also has fresher wood than a lot of the other parts of the deck since this was rebuilt before we moved in because there was so much dry rot in the planks.

I marked with an X all of the places I would be drilling. I own ONE pencil and some how that pencil is always available for crafting and I always need one for something. One freaking pencil. I have an entire JoAnn Fabrics and Michael's warehouse in my crafting room and only one pencil. It makes no sense.

Here I am drilling the hole in the X.

I used long screws that went in about 2 inches and stuck out an inch to hang the planters.

Here are the planters. Pretty good placement for not measuring!

I filled them half up with dirt.

And cut some succulents off of all of the other succulents I have growing in the yard.

Here are a few up close shots--they all have the same layout but are a little bit different.

How to make a rosemary wreath

2013-05-04T14:38:00.001-07:00

I am a bit wreath obsessed lately. In the last few months I have made wreaths out of fabric scraps, twine and felt flower wreaths, and yarn and felt flower wreaths out of pool noodles from the dollar store. And today I made a rosemary wreath.

You will need scissors (I use Fiskars--they are the BEST for almost everything garden and/or sewing related), lots of rosemary, a wire wreath form, and gloves. SERIOUSLY you need gloves. When you handle rosemary, all kinds of oil are released onto your hands which are waxy and difficult to get off. Use gloves through this whole project.

First I harvested a boat load of rosemary from my sister's house! Thanks Chiquita! (Not her real name but that is what we call each other). And it is not banana related--we both hate bananas.

Then I got out a plastic ice bucket that I got at Party City last summer and gave the rosemary a bath to get all the dirt/bugs/dead parts off and to give it a good soak before it became a wreath. I'm hoping the wreath dries nicely and will look okay after it's been in the sun for awhile--but we will see.

Keep those gloves out and the scissors close! This is what the wreath form looks like. You wouldn't think it would be that small huh? I rescued this from our Thanksgiving wreath that we bought after we clipped off all the dead stuff. I was amazed such a cute and HUGE wreath could be made out of such a tiny wreath form.

Take your rosemary and start to shove the rosemary into the holes around the wreath form.

Keep shoving until you can't shove anymore in the hole and then move on to the next. Keep putting the rosemary into the hole in the same direction all the way around the wreath.

What a freaking mess! This is what it looks like when it's done. CRAZY!

Now it's time to give it a haircut. Trim evenly around the wreath.

Here is is hanging on my gate

But this is it's final resting place.

Looking cute!

I think next time I'd like to add lavender to the rosemary to add a little color to the green. I also want to try this with eucalyptus branches.

Button refashion

2013-05-03T11:38:00.003-07:00

One of the easiest and cheapest ways to update a look is changing something small on the garment. In this instance I bought some buttons at Britex.

Here is a boring blue shirt dress I wear to work when all of my black clothes are dirty. First I started by removing the buttons with scissors. I would recommend a seam ripper but that was ALL the way upstairs and I'm lazy so I went with the scissors.

You'll need some fun new buttons the same size as your old buttons, a needle, thread, and scissors.

After removing the buttons there should be good demarcation of where the button used to live with two or four holes from where the thread used to be securing the button to the garment. Use that as your guide for placement. Hand sew on the buttons. My buttons were quite heavy so I used at least 14 stitches to sew and secure plus knots.

Here they are all on. Don't they look cute?

Instant upgrade!

And you don't even need a sewing machine.

First Time Rit Dying: A tale of purple fabric failure

2013-05-02T05:53:00.003-07:00

Today I tried Rit Dying. I am not an expert and the stuff I tried to dye black turned brownish/deep purplish. Which is fine because I only used clothes that I don't really wear anyway. It was a good science experiment. I was inspired by Kara's adventure in dying which turned out WAY better than mine. She is magical.

First I bought some black Rit Dye at Joann's and with coupons, my total investment was $4.32!

Here are all the clothes I wanted to dye but my bucket wasn't big enough. The upper right hand shorts and upper left hand purple sweater did not get dyed because they didn't fit in the bucket.

A lot of white shirts and a yellow top and green sweater. All of these shirts I either rarely wear or they need to be mended in some way so I figured this was a good group to try this with. I can always make headbands or wash rags with them!

Here's my bucket. Actually it is Husbando's bucket. And we've had fights about this bucket. Basically it goes like this: Husbando isn't in charge of the house cleaning but about once a year he decides he wants to clean the floors of the rooms and uses Pine Sol of all things which makes the entire house reek for hours. I also don't have control of the cleaning during this time so it makes me nervous. And I feel like he doesn't understand about actually disinfecting and cleaning, not just swishing some water around, etc. Needless to say there has been much yelling by me about the bucket because it symbolizes my loss of control of the cleaning, and a lot of dumbfounded open-mouthed staring from Husbando with helpful comments like "It's just a bucket." So I found it comical yesterday that I had to text him at work that I was using HIS bucket and that I was actually happy to have that bucket for my dying process. Which he totally gloated about over dinner. I now love the bucket.

I filled my bucket with hot water. If I had known about the time commitment for all of this I probably would have tried it in the washing machine, but I was sort of terrified that I would have to go out and buy a new washing machine because the dye would ruin it.

I soaked my clothes in hot water on the other side of the sink.

Poured in the dye. See the color of the handle of the spoon? And then watch through the frames--that spoon is about to be completely black!

I mixed in my clothes and waiting for five minutes.

Then I poured a cup of salt in the mixture--it's supposed to make the dye set better. I also filled the sink up surrounding the bucket with extra hot water to keep the bucket water warm.

I let my clothes steep while I mixed them for about 40 minutes. Here is the result. It took at least a half hour to rise all of these out. I don't think I'll ever do this many at once again. It's such a waste of water.

Here's my black spoon!!!!!!!!! Crazy! Was hoping my clothes would be that color. Oh, and WEAR GLOVES. Can you imagine what your hands would look like after squeezing out dye from clothes for 30 minutes?

After I rinsed the clothes, I put them in a trash bag to transport them upstairs to the washing machine, where I washed on hot on a long cycle and then dried.

Here's the first shirt. It used to be white.

Look at those awesome pit stains that I didn't even notice when it was white! Yikes! Will definitely need to refashion this one. I'm hoping I can save the detail in the top, but we'll see.

This shirt was also white and WAY uglier now!

Look at that mid section of uneveness!

The sleeves are cool. I might be able to salvage these and put them on another dress or shirt or something.

This used to be a yellow top.

Sort of loving these colors together.

But will have to wear a sweater. Freaking pit stains!

This used to be white. It turned out pretty cool with the threading, which I'm guessing is polyester, not dying.

This top was white. It looks way blacker than it actually is--it's more of a gray/purple/brown. I think I will refashion it to a tank top.

Pretty!

This was my favorite green sweater when I was in law school but the color had totally faded. Now it's a purpley brown. It still has holes in it. I think I will mend the holes, chop the sleeves and hem them around the elbows, take off the buttons and line with something like I did here and make it a fancy short sweater for work.

From spaghetti strap dress to flowy top with sleeves!

2013-05-01T07:37:00.001-07:00

Again, I'm totally obsessed with Refashionista. I've basically been tearing apart my closet the last two weeks and figuring out fun ways to update clothes I already own. Today we have this yellow dress with spaghetti straps. Spaghetti straps do not work for ladies with huge cans that are almost thirty years old. Or at least not in my case! I've probably worn this dress twice but tried it on a million times. The sheerness in the ass area always bothered me as did the ridiculous amounts of layering I had to do with the top portion to either hide the spaghetti straps or make sure I had enough support. No bueno.

So here is the before:

The pattern is cute. I probably would have tried to dye it, but it's polyester. And after spending about three hours reading about polyester dying, I decided that my life, for now, will be complete without adding that skill set to my repertoire. (Basically I don't want to buy hazmat gear!)

First I cut off the bottom two layers in the skirt--these I'm going to be using for my sleeves. I also cut the lining so that it would be shorter.

I pinned the new lining length.

And sewed.

Here is the shorter top. Starting to look like a shirt!

I separated the bottom tiers at the side seams just by cutting.

Then I pinned the raw edge to make a finished edge. This finished edge will take the place of where the spaghetti strap is. Then I sewed.

I pinned the spaghetti strap to my new sleeves along the newly finished edge of the tiers.

Then I sewed the sleeves in place by hand to tack on all four sides.

Here's the strap that is still on there.

Snip that strap off once it's sewed.

Here's the new top!

Up close!

CUTE SLEEVES!

Updating clothes you already own

2013-04-25T06:32:00.001-07:00

The last three days I have been obsessed with reading through Refashionista's Blog. Jillian did a 366 day challenge where she refashioned clothes she already owned or got at thrift stores or Goodwill and re-purposed them. Mind blown. I finally made it through all of the posts this morning and am sooo inspired to do this myself with some of my clothes.

I started THREE sewing projects yesterday. One was an EPIC fail that could not be salvaged (that's what happens when you get cavalier about pinning without measuring! And I have very little patience for seam ripping. Or pretty much anything.) The other started to be too hard to deal with. The third one I started and had to come back to a few hours later. It's amazing what a break in time can do for your creativity--coming back to a project you're stuck on later, in a different room, under a different lamp, different time of day, different music, etc., can totally change your project.

Here's what it started out as. A pretty maxi dress that is strapless. Which means I basically wore it once and realized that ladies with huge cans cannot wear strapless dresses.

The top part is smocked.

And up close of the skirt.

First I cut the smocked part off of the rest of the dress. I cut above the lining because I thought I would reuse it.

But in the end, the lining had to go. The dress is pretty sheer without it--I'm wearing a slip with the dress right now until I get the time to line it (or what I like to call a time also known as NEVER).

I pinned my top hem.

Sewed.

Next came the smocked top that I was going to use for straps. I "fake" surged on either side of the seam on both sides before I cut so that the elastic thread would more likely hold.

Then I sewed the raw edge on the new straps.

I pinned the straps to the dress and sewed.

Here's the other side.

Boom! Straps to a strapless dress!

Very hard to take photos of self in the mirror. It looks better in person.

First kale harvest

2013-04-22T16:13:00.001-07:00

Acrylic Color Block Painting

2013-04-20T09:18:00.000-07:00

We currently have three things hanging on our beige walls. (We moved into our house 13 months ago). The only one I made was an acrylic color block painting that is hanging in our powder room downstairs.

Supplies:
1) Canvas;
2) 2 acrylic paint colors;
3) Fat paint brushes (I used the sponge ones);
4) Painters tape;
5) Hanging mechanism (I used pushpins because the canvas was so light).

Instructions:

1) Paint your white canvas with a base color. This will be the color that gets "blocked" by the tape and ends up being the accent color as opposed to the dominant color. I would recommend that you make the blocked base color lighter than your top coat, otherwise you will be spending a ton of time painting and repainting the top coat to cover a dark bottom. You can also use spray paint if you have a big canvas--I did that for another project where I did an acrylic base that was blue and then spray painted white over it.

2) Block the pattern you want with the painter's tape. I went with a geometric shape but you can also make any sort of cool interior design--a cameo maybe?

3) Start to paint your top coat in between the spots that the tape leaves.

Here is is all painted:

4) Let the paint dry for a few minutes--that's what great about acrylics--they dry soooo fast! Then peel off the painters tape:

5) Hang. This is the blank wall in the bathroom that we wanted to add something to. I've been on a gray kick lately and thought it would look nice on our beige walls.

Here are some pictures of the color block I did with the spray paint:

I had to do a lot of coats of spray paint.

$10 Revamp to an old cardigan in 30 minutes!

2013-04-18T16:53:00.001-07:00

My friend Kara recently dyed one of her stained sweaters and it gave me the idea to revamp some of my old cardigans I wasn't wearing. I went into SF with my friend Quynh and we stopped by Britex (a super cool but VERY expensive craft and sewing store). On the third floor I found some awesome gray velvet trim with a lace backing.

The velvet side is the "front" but the lace backing was too beautiful not to photograph. It's this gray/green color. I purchased 2 yards for $5/yard--totally worth it! You could also buy a less expensive ribbon like a thick grosgrain which would be just as cute and cheaper. Or dazzle it up more with fancier trim. It's really up to you and your budget.

Supplies:
1) Old cardigan;
2) Scissors;
3) Seam ripper (optional);
4) Trim (at least 2 yards--measure around the neck of your cardigan and along the lengths where the buttons and button holes are--it will depend on how long your cardi is or what size--measure before you get your yardage cut!!!!!!!)
5) Sewing machine (you can hand sew too but it will take forever plus a bottle of wine and some trashy tv);
6) Corresponding thread (top thread should match your trim and bobbin thread should match your cardi);

Instructions:

1) Select and old cardigan and a trim that you love. Try the cardi on to make sure it fits. If you hate the color, dye it first before you do the trim work.

I chose a cheap Old Navy sweater I have two of (you know--just in case I ruined it).

2) Start by removing the buttons from the sweater. I used a scissor but you can also use a seam ripper (which I recommend--I have NO idea where my 52,401 seam rippers are in my craft room--I must buy one every time I go into JoAnn's but honestly, I am not the most organized person so I went with scissors!).

3) Once all of the buttons are removed, pin the trim around the neck of the cardigan, tucking about 3/4 of an inch of the trim into the interior of the cardi.

4) Sew along the edge closest to the neck edge first. DON'T FORGET TO USE THE TRIM COLOR IN YOUR TOP THREAD AND YOUR CARDIGAN COLOR IN YOUR BOBBIN THREAD.

5) Then sew along the other edge of the trim that is farther away from your neck line.

Here's what the neck looks like--you could have also kept your buttons on except the top button and just did the neck trim. It's really up to what you want to do--experiment! It's great to buy some thrift store sweaters or some cheap sale sweaters to practice on. This was my first one I did and it did not turn out as perfectly as I wanted it to....but I'm sure by the 4th one it will be fabulous!

6) Pin the formerly button side, or button hole side and sew like the neck.

TIP: THE SIDE THAT HAD THE BUTTON HOLES PROBABLY HAS SOME SORT OF RIBBON OR BIAS TAPE THAT IS ALREADY AFFIXED TO THAT SIDE WHICH WILL MAKE THAT SIDE ONE LENGTH AND THE SIDE WITH THE BUTTONS STRETCHIER. MAKE SURE YOU ACCOUNT FOR THE DIFFERENCE WHEN YOU SEW AND TRY AND KEEP THE STRETCHY SIDE TAUGHT SO YOU DON'T END UP WITH TWO DIFFERENT LENGTH CARDI SIDES (ahem yes that happened with this sweater....)

7) Here's the final product (without the length discrepancy which I am shamefully hiding from you).

It's such an easy and fun project and can really transform the simplest cardigan to be something special.

Using a dollar store pool noodle to make a wreath

2013-04-18T06:16:00.000-07:00

I have recently discovered the dollar store and am sort of in love. I saw something on Pinterest about making a wreath form using a foam pool noodle and had to try it.

You will need:
1) Scissors;
2) Pool noodle;
3) Glue gun and glue;
4) Yarn;
5) Felt.

Start by pulling the two ends of your wreath form together to make a circle. It really helps if you have another person holding the ends together while you tape but it's not impossible to do it by yourself.

Tape the ends with duct tape.

Secure the juncture with more duct tape.

Start wrapping your yarn around the noodle. For more instructions, see my previous post about making a twine and felt wreath. I have since found that it's faster if you wrap the ENTIRE wreath with duct tape first as opposed to just that one area. The yarn slides better alone the noodle when it's slick as opposed to when it's on the rubbery foam part. I actually used duct tape to secure it and then clear packaging tape to make it smooth. Try it out and see what works best--the noodles are only a dollar!

Here's what the noddle looked like covered

And then I started putting on my felt flowers.

Close shot! I used one sheet each of a 9x12 piece of felt.

Here's the finished product hanging on our door right now. It's sort of a "Happy Spring/Anti-DOMA/Pro Marriage Equality Wreath."

How to use twine to train plants against a wall

2013-04-17T08:47:00.001-07:00

Yesterday I posted about our garden beds going in. We purposely planted the blue lake beans, cucumbers, and zucchini against the fence wall because they can all grow vertically. Husbando bought me this awesome book for Christmas a few years ago called Square Foot Gardening by Mel Bartholomew. He has great tips for gardening, planting and harvesting, along with how to vertical garden some plants that tend to sprawl (like squash). He recommends a nylon mesh to hold the squash which I have no yet put in the yard yet, but I did start with the easy one--twine training for the beans.

Supplies:
1) Scissors;
2) Twine;
3) A square dowel the length of your garden bed;
4) Lots of nails (depends on how many plants you have and how many nails you need to place dowel)
5) Hammer;
6) 20 inches of picture hanging wire (or other bendy wire--you can use something from jewelry making too, or you could use string too).

Directions:
1) Cut your twice so that it's about twice the length from where you are going to place your dowel to the base of your garden beds. Cut as many pieces as you have plants to train. I had ten blue lake beans so I cut ten pieces of twine.

2) Wrap and knot the twine multiple times around the end of the dowel like this.

Do the same for the other end so that they are about equal looking:

Here's Ralph helping.

He LOVES that straw.

3) Continue to tie all of the twine to the dowel in about equal lengths. This is what it should look like (it doesn't have to be perfect):

He's been hunting something in that corner.

4) Place nails about an inch below the top of the fence where you are going to hang your dowel. I think I only used two nails, but if you have a longer dowel you may want to use more.

This is what it looks like when it's hung on the nails.

5) Time to secure the dowel to the nails with the picture hanger wire. This was not the finest work I've ever done but you get the idea--it needs to be secure, not pretty.

6) Move all of the twine so that it's behind the garden bed. Every where there is a plant, hammer a nail into the wood behind it in the garden bed.

7) Pull the twine pretty taut and wrap and knot it around the nail like this:

The twine should be straightened out like this so the plants have somewhere firm to trail.

And the total project didn't cost anything because I already had all the supplies. YAY! Happy gardening.

More things are happening in the yard!

2013-04-16T15:41:00.001-07:00

Last year, we purchased our home. In one year the yard has totally transformed. It's gone from this (when we first moved in) to this (crazy overgrown disgustingness) to this (ripping out the yard) to this (laying of the sod). The general outline of the garden has remained in tact to this day, but now I've added hay and garden beds and moved some plants around.

Here is the progression from the last month:

Yup that is a bale of straw (not hay). The people at the store were very insistent that I ONLY needed straw and not hay. My friend Bianca told me that the straw is the cellulose of the hay product and that straw is used for gardens and beds for horses, and that the hay is what horses eat (she is an equestrian and wardrobe consultant--pretty cool huh?).

My mom and I spent about 5 hours wedding that dirt patch on the right and I ended up moving all of those planters.

I really wanted it to be hay and not straw so I could walk around the house yelling "HAAAAAAAAY" since "STRAAAAAAAW" isn't as funny.

I moved some of the planters across to the other side, along with the magnolia. And my poor beautiful avocado trees died in the frost. I was a negligent avocado owner. I actually feel really guilty about these trees dying because they had lived at so many home with me over the last few years and I planted them when I was dealing with some difficult personal shit and they continued to flourish and then I just neglected them.

The beagles LOVE the straw. Ralph has made a few different nests in there already.

I can never get them to look at the camera together!

Once the rain stopped, I bought some garden beds that were pre-cut and had pre-drilled holes!

Here are the beds next to each other. I put straw in the bottom to even out the sides but also for weed cover.

Here are the plants I purchased. We are growing broccoli, kale, brussels sprouts, green peppers, cucumbers, zucchini, and pole beans. (We have since added more to the garden but that will be in another post).

Seriously easy! And it cost about the same as buying cedar and making them from scratch but it only took me about 20 minutes for each bed.

How to Make Felt Bunting

2013-04-10T17:07:00.001-07:00

I have been obsessed with felt bunting lately. I've made it for my mom's St. Patrick's day 65th birthday party, my nephew's birthday (Giants colors of course), and for a baby shower. It is such a cute and inexpensive craft.

This is the baby shower one...well I made about 50 but this was my first one. They don't have to be triangles but they are easy to cut

Up close:

Here's the St. Patrick's Day craziness (all different shapes and sizes!):

Supplies:

1) Felt in a few colors (check out Michael's or JoAnn's--they have precut 8.5 by 11 pieces of felt and that brand they carry is made from recycled plastic bottles!

2) Sewing machine. (If you don't have a sewing machine you can do a few things: a) hand sew (BORING); b) use clothes pins or binder clips to attach the buntings to the ribbon; c) use a hole puncher in the corners of the buntings where you would be sewing and string the ribbon through.

3) Scissors.

4) Rotary Cutter, Cutting Mat and Clear Ruler--you don't technically need these but it is SO much easier to do this, especially if you're cutting a shape in bulk as I was.

5) Ribbon. I used about an inch thick grosgrain ribbon to bind. If you are using the hole punch method you probably want to use a thinner ribbon.

6) Coordinating thread (if you're sewing)

7) Pins (if you're sewing)

Directions:

1) Start by figuring out what shape you want. I love the triangles, so at first I made a template that was three inches by three inches. This is a great idea if you don't have a rotary cutter and mat because you can just follow the line with your scissors. With the rotary cutter you can cut about three levels of felt at once.

2) Once all your triangles are cut, pin the ribbon so that the bunt is sitting in the middle of the ribbon--the more pins the easier your sewing will be.

3) Then sew and you're done!

4) If you want to make the type of bunting that is just sewn and doesn't use ribbon, just sew through the middle of each of the pieces. You can do this with paper too. It's way faster but much more delicate. This is what that technique looks like up close: