one hot dog : ) or warm anyway

My daughter Katie LOVES dogs : ) unfortunately us having one right now is not a reality. She compromises by taking wonderful care of her 'puppies'. She is a fabulous caretaker of these stuffed animals. This includes washing, dressing, and bandageing their booboos : ) She is a major sweetie and I'm really looking forward to seeing her with her new baby sis in few months!

One night she asked for some clothes for her puppies I had a thought! About a year ago when I sorted through my husbands socks he had a lot of loners : P of which I thought we could use and make some sock puppets one rainy day. We haven't done that yet but I discovered a couple cuts will repurpose a wool sock into a really cute sweater for a little dog, real or play : )

I personally think it's cute enough for a real dog. If I had a little doggie, they'd be sporting one in this colder weather : D
NO SEW! folded to fit and the scrap turns into a mini cute beanie : )  Too Easy!!!!!

Fibonacci flora

Hello! I'm in the process of upcycling a stack of old men's t-shirts (thanks dad!)I deconstructed and reconstructed my first of them using an existing shirt, that I like the fit of, as a template (sorry for no tutorial : P ) Between opportunities to work on it I'm taking care of my 2 little ones, but I find those little breaks are great for inspiration to come in! No doubt if you follow craft blogs you have seen many "how to's" for fabric flowers, I have! BUT I have not seen one with this technique that came to me along with my favorite flower dooodle I have been doing the last year or so when coloring with my Katie bug : )

This technique uses the Fibonacci sequence. I absolutely love natures patterns and love math (im a nerd, lol). If you are unfamiliar with it, you're missing out if you dont look into it!

Below I made my plan for the petals. I used a water eraseable fabric pen. If you want to use a longer piece of fabric to have one continuous piece it's minutely easier. I used the scraps I had and found it made no difference to add the extra petal piece using the width available. It isn't important for it to be perfect but you do want the petals in the right amounts to be close in shape, and you want to progress in size : ) 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, and 13 petals... if you want to go on to 21, or beyond, go for it!!!! : D




my first few petals i weaved the needle through in a simple stitch


i pulled through and went back with the needle making a loop of thread through the first few petals


then i flipped it over and began to work from the back pleating the fabric and spiraling around the base made by the start


here you see the backside completed. i personally think the back is just as pretty as the front but a daisy like flower wasnt what i was going for


the one on the left is completed with some seed beeds sewn for some dazzle : P it is after washing and drying as well. on the right you see a flower that went to 8 instead of to the 13. i also made the cuts between the petals deeper. I'm showing it here before washing because i actually liked how the ink outline looked and wanted to show you in case you would want to use permanent marker and have an outline : ) this way you could see that possibility before creating your own.



And voila! i made a smaller one going to 5 petals of equal size and sewed them to my 'new, old' shirt!


in case you wanted to see the whole upcycled shirt:


: ) i have a favorite shirt right now

bleached out

It's been a while since my last blog but fortunately the blogging world hasn't noticed yet, though maybe someday it would be nice if it were- when i have the time :) I've wanted to try this project for a few weeks now and have seen several examples online.... none i seen used masking tape so it left me wondering how well it would work. Masking tape has been a wonder creation for me lately! I have been having surprisingly wonderful outcomes with it for a number of recent projects. Also, I've been addicted to the new Cricut my super, amazingly kind, MIL got me.
But you can create your stencils (or buy them) cutting free-hand with scissors, printing your image or letters from the printer, using an exacto-knife, where ever your imagination takes you!! I saw on one site a woman just layed branches down on fabric and used this technique and it looked great! In other examples I seen no sort of adhesive was used at all, you could just lay your shapes down and spray. I would imagine you could just twist the garment and have a tie-dye effect. My result has 'fold' marks near the collar; they werent intentional but made it even better!

supplies:

item of clothing, piece of fabric, pillow case --- something that will respond to bleach (my shirt had a single tiny dot of a bleach mark so i knew it would go reddish)

bleach
water
spray bottle (my solution was about half bleach and half water)

card board --- to put in between shirt to prevent going through to other side just in case and for a surface to lay project on while spraying

what you will use for stenciling, if any at all, possibly some rubber bands if tie-dying




a plain, old black t-shirt i was not wearing... At All... :)


With my masking tape stencils cut with cricut machine using Florals Embellished cartridge. With experimenting I've discovered masking tape is Awesomely cut with the cricut when you have the pressure, speed, and blade depth all set to "2".


on cardboard with cardboard inserted inside ready, outside to be sprayed. Right now would be a good time to make sure you have your water bottle nozzle set for how you want it to spray, before doing the garment. I set mine to a 'mist'.


spray lightly and wait for it .........


with a moment it seems to "develop" into the fabric. i sprayed mine from the lower left and top right corners inward with a light mist 3 times at the most and got this effect. as luck would have it :) since i did spray so lightly, if you notice near the tag where my cardbord didnt cover, it did not bleed through to the outside.



And there you have it!!!!! I let it dry outside for about an hour in 95 degree weather before i moved it, but put it on right after taking it's finished pic!
It really turned out beyond expectations : ) the whole time i was cuting and applying my 'stencils' i was telling myself to have low expectations on the detail, but I got pleasantly surprised!!!! they were all there! I credit the masking tape!:)

happy crafting to you! and i have lots of ideas but not enough time or money to do them all but i hope to be sharing them here soon!
lots of love and hugs!
Btw.... we have number three on the way!!!! I had not shared that here yet so why not now! : )

remove the stain restyling

I never got to pre-spotting this chocolate stained shirt, and now my lazyness has turned into a happy fault : ) And lesson learned: don't eat chocolate laying in bed, in the dark : P unless you want stains and a husband laughing at you (and not for the mess on the shirt but your face). I don't actually mind the latter though : D
not horrible, but not unnoticable ->

The Plan: cut out the stain and shorten sleeves to create a 3/4 sleeve V-neck out of a long sleeve crew.

the V-neck.

1st cut: your desired neck line w/a little extra for seam (unless you want a rolled/raw edge : ) the loveliness of knit!) I suggest using a v-neck you already own and like and inserting it inside the shirt and marking where you want to cut ( i used a regular pencil because it isnt white).
2nd cut: separate from the shirt with another cut the desired width of your neckline (with extra for seam).
3rd cut: from the front only of the shirt trim about 1/4 inch to 1/2 inch to achieve a gather when you sew it all back together.

I then sewed the back 'collar' to the shirt because the fabric likes to roll and to prevent a pin mess : )

I continued to pin the shirt's front neckline, inside out, until about 2 inches from the center. There I hand sewed a simple stitch to gather there, and pinned in place (i should've taken more care to do mine but it turned out okay)...... Then it was sewn shoulder to shoulder : P and the hand stitch was removed after.

then a seam was sewn around the edge, but this is optional... a rolled edge is completely acceptable with t-shirt fabric, it wont fray : )

the sleeves.

I wanted a cuffed sleeve rather than a cut off and stitched seam, or rolled cuff. to get the length i wantde i put the shirt on and folded one sleeve up to the desired length. when i took off the shirt i compared it to the other side and added about 2 inches; I used the existing sleeve end to get a straight new edge to cut . Then, the excess 2 inches was folded over (shirt is inside out) then, folded inward and pinned (fan effect).

A zig-zag/triangle stitch was used on the edge where pinned in the picture on the right shown above.

below left - unfolded after sewing

below right - turned right side out

And there you have it!!!! A much more attractive and feminine top! I don't think you need a stain to want to make a pretty top out of an otherwise boring long-sleeved tee, but it served as great inspiration for this project : )

enjoy!

btw...... i still eat chocolate in bed : )