Re-purposed Men's Shirt into Jean Skirt

 

I found a creative use for my husbands old button down shirts!  I cut out the front part of the shirt and used in the back of my jean skirt.  This way, I can make the skirt a little straighter (as in not too full), but still be able to walk.  I can unbutton as many buttons as I need to, or keep them all closed! 

Fleece Tie Blankets for Charity

I decided that in 2011 I was going to use the talent that God gave me for crafting, for something bigger than myself.  I have always believed in Pro-Life, but after the miscarriages of two of my own unborn babies, a passion has been lit in me to help these unborn babies live.  In the trauma of a natural miscarriage, I have realized like never before how truly precious an unborn baby is.  I have partnered with a local woman's clinic that helps women in unexpected pregnancies.  They offer free pregnancy tests and early ultrasounds, give them counseling and the resources to continue their pregnancy.  If they choose to become mothers, this clinic stays with them, offering support, parenting classes, and even clothes and diapers, until the baby is 3 years old.  These fleece blankets will be given to the mothers when they have their ultrasound appointment as a reminder of the baby they carry. 

The fleece blankets require two yards of fabric.  I used one patterned, one solid color.  I cut my fabric 3 feet by 4 feet.  Then I cut a square out of each corner that was 4 inches by 4 inches.  Using a rotary cutter and a cutting mat, I made a 4 inch cut every inch, all the way around the blanket.  Lastly, I tied a square knot in every other fray, then turned the blanket over and continued tying every fray that I had skipped.  Tying it this way is more even than tying them all right away.  If you'd like more instructions, see here. 

Would you like to help?  You can make blankets, or donate gender neutral fleece (or any solid color except pink), at least 1 yard chunks.  If you'd like to help, please leave your email address in the comments section and I will email you back with more details.

Stamping on Scrapbook Pages

I found an alphabet stamp set at JoAnn's a few days ago for $2.97!  They are foam stamps, so not as nice as the wood block or clear plastic ones, but much cheaper!  Here are two pages I made for Rebekah's baby book.  The word "cheese" is actually on pink paper, the colors in the pictures look a little different.

Here's a funny little story to make you laugh today.  My kids were in the bath tub having a great time, so I took the time to fold some laundry in my son's room.  When I went back in there, they had dumped a bottle of strawberry scented baby shampoo, a bottle of body wash, and a third of a bottle of Tresseme conditioner into the bath!  So, they got extra clean this morning, and at least they smelled really good!  Ahhh, the joys of kids!

Button Jar

 

While looking for buttons for Caleb's vest, I realized that I had buttons everywhere!  Some in my sewing box, some in a drawer, some with my scrap book stuff...  I decided to make a pretty jar to keep them all in one place.  The jar is actually an old mayo container.  I made a new label for it and added ribbon and a flower on the lid.  I dug the jar out of a cardboard box in the garage that I have been keeping for the kids.  The box is filled with paper towel tubes, yogurt containers, meat trays, bottles, etc., anything that I think may be useful for a craft. 

Love Scrapbook Page for Room Decor

After going to a Stamping Up party this weekend, I decided to try my had at stamping on my pages.  A big thanks to my friend Laura, who let me borrow her beautiful stamps!  This page is going to be framed and hung on my bedroom wall, which is why it has the blue and brown color scheme.  My husband wrote a beautiful story called "The Master's Garden", that he read to me at our wedding reception (in front of everyone).  More than 6 years later, I still get teary eyed when I read it.  I finally decided to frame it so I can look at it often.  The blue paper is actually a denim pattern (found at JoAnn's), and I used a brown ink pad to color the edges of the cream colored paper that the story and title is written on.  The stamp set is from Close to My Heart, called The Key to My Heart.

Boys Reversible Vest

Look how handsome my son is in his new vest!  I have been waiting to post this, our internet has not been working for the last few days.  A new wireless modem fixed that, and now I can use my iPod for more than just music when I'm at home!  Back to the vest.  This is the second one I made.  The first one ended up being too small, which was very sad!   Then I over corrected and made the second one too big, requiring me to sew the side seams, rendering it not reversible.  I didn't care for the blue side anyway.  Both of them were made out of a pair of my husbands dress pants and one of his button down shirts.  I followed the tutorial at Make it & Love it, she has several other tutorials for re-purposing clothes, I just love her site!
 

You can see my seams on the side that weren't meant to be there, oops.  The blue shirt material was really thin, and it was hard to work with.  Next time I will make sure my material is a little thicker, plus the plaid really hides your mistakes and crooked sewing lines!  The too small vest is below, I think it's much cuter.  I was very impressed with myself for making such good button holes though!  

 

Happy Valentine's Day - Toddler Skirt

Happy Valentine's Day!  Here are my two little valentine's, Rebekah is wearing a new skirt I made for her!  Directions and more pictures are below.  This morning I came downstairs and found a beautiful potted rose plant sitting on the table!  In return, the kids and I made giant chocolate chip cookies with icing, and I took one to Kevin's work and left it in his car.  I have been so incredibly blessed with a husband that loves me as the bible describes (1 Corinthians 13:4-6 see below).  He has a strength in the Lord that I can always lean on, and he treats me as if I was a cherished treasure, and I love him all the more for it!  Here's a picture of us on our honeymoon, 6 1/2 years ago.

1 Corinthians 13:4/6 (The Message)

Love never gives up.

Love cares more for others than for self.

Love doesn't want what it doesn't have.

Love doesn't strut,

Doesn't have a swelled head,

Doesn't force itself on others,

Isn't always "me first,"

Doesn't fly off the handle,

Doesn't keep score of the sins of others,

Doesn't revel when others grovel,

Takes pleasure int he flowering of truth,

Puts up with anything,

Trusts God always,

Always looks for the best,

Never looks back,

But keeps going to the end.

Do you like Rebekah's Skirt?  Here's how I made it!  I started with a toddlers pair of pink corduroy pants.  After ripping out the seam, I cut the pants to about knee length and turned it into a skirt, like here.  (Super easy to do on a toddler skirt!)

Then I cut two pieces of curved fabric, 5 inches wide, and about 2 feet wide.  The longer the length, the more gathered the skirt will look.  Also, if you want it to be more flowy, make your curve sharper.  I zig zag stitched around each piece, all sides, and then sewed the ends together.  Finally, hem the bottom side.  (See finished part below)

Then, hand sew around the top of the white part using large stitches, like 1 inch stitches.  Pull the thread tight until the circumference of your bottom piece matches that of the bottom of your skirt.  Pin the piece to the skirt like shown below.  I like to make sure the folds are all going one direction, but that's not necessary. 

Here's the finished skirt, but it looks a little plain.  

So, I decided it needed a little more embellishing.  I added ribbon around the bottom and made an "R" for Rebekah.  I also added a ribbon flower by the pocket with a button as the center, and then made a matching one for a hair clip.  I think it's adorable! 

I hope you all have a wonderful Valentine's evening!  We are going to make chocolate covered strawberries!

Fabric Flower Hair Clip and Stuffed Animal Hospital

This flower hair clip is made from only circles!  After making the khaki skirt shown below, I cut circles out of the scraps, freehand.  Then I sewed around each circle, 1/4 inch from the edge.  I got lucky at this point, because while sewing around the edge (initially just to prevent fraying), the thread tension must have been too tight, which caused the circles to curl.  Then I laid the circles on top of each other and stitched them together.  The top circle didn't curl as much as I would have liked, I think it's because I sewed the edge much slower on that one so the thread didn't pull.  To make the button sewing easier, I sewed it onto only the top circle first and then sewed that top circle to the rest of my stack.  What do you think?

This khaki skirt is made from a pair of corduroy pants.  It is just below the knee in length with a frayed hemline.  

Lastly, I had an animal hospital yesterday with my kids.  We had an injured deer and a teddy bear that split it's seams.  I just sewed them up with a whip stitch, the fuzziness of the fabric hid the stitches.  Here's the pics:

All Better!

All Better!

Chocolate Glazed Chocolat Mini Donuts (with a surprise ingredient)

Don't these look yummy?  My mom gave me this mini donut pan last weekend, and I love it!  The recipe I used is from Jessica Seinfeld's book, Deceptively Delicious, page 160.  I made her exact recipe last time, using pumpkin and sweet potato puree, and they were really good, but I thought chocolate would be even better.  So, I added 1/4 cup of cocoa powder to her recipe (and used soy milk instead of skim milk).  Then I was looking through her newest book, Double Delicious, and found a donut cookie recipe (page 158) that had a chocolate glaze.  To make a long story short, I combined the two and out came a wonderfully healthy chocolate donut!  According to Calorie Count, there are 38 calories in each mini donut, plus vitamins from the pumpkin and sweet potato!  Some of the donuts got a treatment of powdered sugar because I ran out of glaze, they're still good, but not like the frosted ones!

2009 Family Scrapbook Completed!

 

This is one heavy book!  You can see that I had to start putting A LOT of pictures on each page because I was running out of room in my book.