Tonight, I had THE MOST DELIGHTFUL time with my dear friend Melissa….with whom I NEVER get to spend enough time! After class, she came over so that we could make flowers for our hair. She walked into church yesterday wearing the most gorgeous silk flower in her hair. When she told me she was stalking Etsy to purchase another one….I, of course, couldn’t handle the fact that she might spend $15 on a hair clip when she could – all together now – MAKE IT HERSELF!!!
So, I had the clips and the felt and the glue gun. She brought tons of silk flowers (and some not so silk – and at $12.99/stem, those do NOT fit into my gameplan, so she’s returning that one). I would like to say that “we” made them…but the truth is, she kept me great company while I made them. But, SHE wears them beautifully, so we’ll call it even! Here are some shots of our fun night and fun products…
I'm not sure anyone will notice the pink one in my hair...
I had to get her 3rd one on just right!
Jonathan was getting worried that we'd really wear ALL of them at one time!
yes, Melissa has another one hiding on her right side too!
Even Baby Betsy couldn't resist.
so, how did we do it???
Soooo easy…(especially for Melissa!)…you’ll need silk flowers, whatever size you want. Pull away from the stem and trim some of the excess stem off. Hot glue a piece of felt to the back – be sure to use a generous amount of glue. cut an identical piece of felt and make room for the clip. Hot glue them both onto the other felt piece. let dry and be fabulous!
Time: if your by yourself, you can make one of these in about 10 minutes. If you invite Melissa, it will take you about 2 hours.
Cost: The flowers (when purchased on sale) are about $2/each or cheaper. The alligator clips are about $1.25 for 6..hot glue is dirt cheap. Felt is even cheaper….so, your total for 1 clip will be about $2.50. So cheap for so much fun and cuteness. THANKS MELISSA!
I am SOOOOO glad I made the time to DIY today….Can I just say it again…I AM SOOOOO GLAD I TOOK THE TIME TO DIY TODAY!
A couple of weeks ago, my dear friend (and one with whom I’d LOVE to hang out more) Lori Dewan gave me a magazine tear-out showing how to take a man’s button-up shirt and turn it into a dress for a little girl. DARLING! I have been carrying this paper in my purse everyday since so that I would NOT forget to create this little ditty.
Furthermore..oh the coincidence is astounding….my husband Jonathan received a button-up shirt for Christmas that was just a little too small. Me, being the packrat that I am, just knew I couldn’t give it away…”there’s GOT to be something we can do with this fun shirt…” Well, thank you very much Lori and Martha Stewart for this tutorial….here’s the before and after….
If you don’t have a Lori in your life, you can find this tutorial online here. I didn’t bother printing out the pattern, I just guessed on the measurements. Martha Stewart says this will easily fit a 4-8 year old…Ellie is only 3, so it will swallow her for a bit, but I’m so excited that she’ll be able to wear this for a long time…if I don’t decide to shorten it!
Time: this took about an hour…it takes a little bit to figure out how you’re going to cut into the shirt, and then I made the bias tape by hand using scrap fabric.
Cost: FREE!!! Can I say that again….FREE (take a shirt you already have but no longer wear, add bias tape and ribbon from your stash, and you too can make one for FREE!)
Stay tuned – I’m going to be doing another give-away this week…..gosh it’s good to be back!
Oh my goodness, I have missed this little blog!!! For only about a million reasons, I have not been able to post anything for a good while…but tonight – I’m back!!!
I have no idea how many strapless dresses is too much, but hopefully it’s more than 3! I found this most gorgeous fabric and HAD to make another strapless dress..but this time I had to add a ruffle…duh! I am loving all the tiny floral prints that are all over the magazines for Spring, and this fabric fits right in. Totally tiny, totally prairie…totally chic, whatever you call it! I hope you love it - you’ll see it in a couple of weeks….with a cardigan, of course…no strapless dresses in church people!
Now I’ve done it. I’ve officially been scolded by my mother for not being more “with it” on my blog posts. Sorry mom! I have a feeling she’s the only one who’s noticed, but just in case she’s not – I do apologize to you all!
I can assure you that I have been DIY’ing everyday…just lately it’s been restricted to Etsy orders and I’m usually in such a rush to get them mailed out, that I don’t take the time to grab a photo. Plus, you can see better photos of those dresses on my shop, anyway.
Well, tonight, I am preparing to head out for a conference this weekend. So, naturally, I need to make me a little something to wear….since I have NOTHING TO WEAR…somehow that doesn’t seem believable even to me! Anyway, I found this GORGEOUS fabric and just had to make another one of those strapless numbers out of it. I bought enough fabric to make a couple of these because this is a dress that I MUST own for myself too.
All the magazines are touting the most gorgeous “BOLD PRINTS” for spring. When i saw this bold print, I knew it was the one for me. My photos aren’t doing it justice…the fabric has more hot pink than what is shown. Still, I just love it! Watch out Lubbock! (yes, that’s sort of a joke, but yes, I am going to Lubbock!)
I’ll make some fabric napkins in the morning to take to the dear family that will be hosting us this weekend. For Saturday, I’m going to have to be creative since I’ll be traveling…but I’ll try my best to come up with something MOM!
Here's mom with Ellie, me and MeMaw!
Well, today, the kids and I (with fevers and all) had to be out of the house by 9:00am to begin our 4.5 hour drive to East Texas for the baby shower I mentioned yesterday. While in the midst of a frenzy to grab shoes, diapers, presents, and so forth….it hit me…TODAY’S DIY… a covered button “MOMMY BRACELET” to match the 6-month dress I made for little baby Sara (due in 3 weeks!)
So, in literally 10 minutes, I whipped up this bracelet.
It helps that I already had the hardware on hand!
I purchased the hardware/bracelet here. You’ll need eight 3/4″ buttons to cover….be sure to pull out the “loops” in the back of buttons so that you have a flat surface to adhere to the bracelet. Cover each of your buttons, and then hotglue them onto the bracelet. DONE. EASY. FUN. YAY!
Total Cost: $4.50 if you use scrap fabric. ($2 for the bracelet and about $2.50 for the buttons)
Total Time: 10 minutes if you’re comfortable covering buttons. For sure no longer than 20 minutes!
Tomorrow I’ll be attending a baby shower for my lovely cousin-in-law Liliana and her little baby girl Sarah. So, today I made sure to carve out enough time to make little baby Sarah 2 dresses…one for 3 months and one for 6 months…I only hope no one from my family reads this blog post before the shower!
The 3-month Dress!
The 6-Month Dress
LOVE the Nicey Jane fabric from heather bailey!
These two dresses took a total time of about an hour. I had never made this pattern before, so it took me a bit to figure out the measurements, etc. I purchased the PDF tutorial here, and I purchased the gorgeous Nicey Jane fabric here.
Total Cost: $13 ($4/each for a half yard of fabric and $5 for the pdf pattern – which I will use a TON this spring and summer!)
Time to make 2 dresses: 1 hour! (I couldn’t even get to the store and back in an hour – AWESOME!!!)
Oh, I hope she loves these dresses…if not, I’ll steal them and figure out a way to make them in MY size!
Hi friends!!!
I’m afraid I’ve gotten so far behind on my Etsy orders that I don’t have anything “new” to show for all my DIY’ing the past 3 days…but I can ASSURE YOU that I HAVE BEEN DIY’ING!
Rather than leave you in the dark, I thought I’d show you some pictures of what I’ve been up to…it all pretty much boils down to late-nights, which explains the No Picture Zone lately!
Today – the kids were knocked out with fevers. While this is indeed a sad thing…it did afford me a couple of hours to get almost caught up – yay! Today, I knocked out three dresses – one Crimson Watch Me Walk Away dress, one Olive Watch Me Walk Away Dress, and one very happy Yellow Team Spirit Dress with Gray ruffles.
Yesterday, I managed to whip up two Urban Hippie Strapless Dresses, and the day before that I finished a Queen Bee dress for none other than Angela! ( I think it was two days ago, it may have been 4… I’ve lost track!)
Anyway, just to show you that I haven’t neglected my challenge… here are shots of two of today’s dresses…
Of course, I ran out of buttons!
Thanks for checking in…I’ll be back with something NON ETSY tomorrow – guaranteed!!!
Today’s DIY has been in my head for a long time…and in my sewing room for almost as long. I’ve had it “almost finished” since about February 3rd! If you follow my Etsy shop, then you might remember my New Year’s Resolution to create a new dress every month using that month’s birthstone. Well, here on February 21st, I’ve finally finished February’s dress.
It’s hard to tell by the photos, but the dress is a true Amethyst purple – very rich and deep in color, I love it! I think this color purple looks fabulous on ANYONE!!!
For this dress, other than the color amethyst, I was also inspired by all the rain and snow that has been taking place all over our great state this month. I was standing in line somewhere (at the post office probably), and the person in front of me had a darling little trench coat on. “Hmmmm. I feel a new dress coming on.” I knew right then that February’s dress just HAD to be “IN THE TRENCHES”… a little form of a trench coat – but without all the bulk and masculinity! And, I think it’s super fitting that I should finish this dress today because Austin is expecting 3 to 4 inches of snowfall – right now it’s snowing the biggest, fluffiest snowflakes I’ve ever seen in Texas!
I’ll try to get a picture of it on an actual human being sometime soon! Happy Winter everyone!
This little dress has been in my head for about 6 months…i am SO relieved to have let this one fly free!!!!
It’s a simple little strapless dress with an Obi belt – I used an asian inspired designer fabric for the dress, so I created an Obi belt but used the oh-so-American polka dotted fabric on it. Say what you like, but I love it. When things get stuck in my head for so long, they don’t usually end up looking as nice in real life as they do in my head. In this case, however, I think I’m even MORE in love with it in the real world…I’ll have to try it on to know for sure!
For tonight – I’ll rest easily knowing I’ve just freed up more space in my head….
(don’t worry all of you waiting on your Etsy orders – I’m working frantically, I just took a little break!)
Oh gosh, I just can’t begin to say how happy I am that I finally got around to tonight’s DIY project – TOTALLY THRILLED!!! I have had the frames for about 3 months, and all the other supplies for about 2.5 months…all these supplies have so patiently been sitting in bags and piles in my bedroom, just waiting for this moment.
One of the tricks to decorating on a budget is not getting to committed to any color/fabric/theme. You’ve got to be able to roll with the punches and be willing to see an awesome opportunity when it comes across your path for CHEAP! Such is the case in my bedroom. When we moved in 3 years ago, I insisted on chocolate walls. I still love them! However, everything else I had planned has taken a different turn. One trip to Ikea about 6 months ago finally convinced me to change color course…it’s called DUVET & SHAMS FOR $20….they were a fun green, not the fun blue or red I had been planning for, but $20!!!!
So, today, I have begun the process of integrating this new color pallette into the room…and I needed a way to bring in my all-time favorite color and decorating MUST….RED!
Here is what I came up with – Jonathan says it’s the Twitter Bird. To which I responded with another bird of sorts. =) These are MY birds. I love them. They are sweet. They are simple. They are red. They have hand-sewn buttons for eyes. (I don’t hand sew anything, so you know I must love these birds!)
Four facing right...
Four facing left!
basic frame, fabric background, paper cutout, button eyes.
Total cost for this project is about $50. More than I usually spend, but considering I got EIGHT frames, it works out to be very inexpensive per piece. (Frames: $3.50/ea, Mats: $2.50/ea, Fabric: $7 for 1 yard, Paper for birds: $0.50, Buttons: from my stash)
Time: I started these right at 7pm. They were hung on the wall by 8:45pm. Not bad!!!! Now for lighting….
