Monday, November 7, 2011

Autumn Wreath

My apartment is in desperate need of some cute fall spirit, so for Craft Night, I made this cute wreath!

Here is how I made it: 
First I got the idea to go collect leaves from around my neighborhood and put them in my flower press.

Then I "laminated" them using tape and cut them out to add to my wreath.

For the base of the wreath, I went to Home Depot and bought an insulating foam tube for $1. 98 or something about that price range (which is better than the $7 for a styrofoam base from a craft store). I didn't really play with it much to try and get it to be more circular, so it ended up kind of egg-shaped.  I think if you worked with it a little, it wouldn't be too difficult to make it more circular. I'll let you know when I try making my Christmas wreath.

All the rest of the material I already had lying around. Fake sunflowers from the dollar store, three or four different types of ribbon, the cloth looks like burlap, but it was just more of a weave my mom had laying around, and rafia.

For design, I just kind of placed the materials on with my fingers and decided whether I liked it or not, and then hot glued it. WARNING the hot glue with deform the foam tube. I made sure there was a good holding on the duct tape with the fabric, and then just glued everything to the fabric.
Here's the final product again :)


Total Time: about 3 hours. This is largely due to the fact that I wasn't following a certain pattern design and the fact that I've never made a wreath before. Most of that time was me trying to figure out what a good wreath should look like and where I wanted to place my material. 
Total Cost: $1.98 for the tube. But if you're buying fabric to cover it, ribbon, etc. it could add up to around $20 or $30, depending on how nice of fake flowers and ribbon you got.

Projects I'm currently working on:
~A baby quilt for my baby girl coming in January
~Autumn pillows with leaf applique 
~Garland to match this cute wreath

Keep crafting!

Wednesday, October 19, 2011

When by Water... Construct a Raft!

Two years ago, for family vacation, my parents found a cabin about an hour east of Moab with a tiny little lake (I'm calling it a lake due to how deep it was). There were bugs all over that thing, so swimming was out of the question. So what else to do with all that water? Sail it. 

 Sometimes creativity and adventure meet! And those times are the best! There was a bunch of timber lying close to where this was constructed, so all it took was a few nails, and it surprisingly carried me across the whole lake.
Of course, towards the end, any hope of staying dry had been crushed. I believe I even took off my shoes, rolled up my pants, and tried to propel my small craft faster by hanging my legs off the side and kicking. 

Lesson to be learned? When by water, build a raft!


In other news, here are a few projects that I will be making in the near future:
  • Autumn pillows
  • Halloween and Autumn wreaths
  • Autumn garland 
  • Magic Wands
  • Possibly center pieces as well. 
Stay tuned!

Wednesday, October 12, 2011

50's Summer Dress

In 2009, I decided I wanted to be a 50's chick for Halloween. So, I found this super quick pattern, and some fabric hiding in a closet and sewed together a dress in three days! True story! It did drive be nuts at a few points within those three days, but I finished it! 
This is the only picture I have of the whole dress, and it doesn't show the bottom well, but it gives you a good idea. So the dress is just one piece. You put the dress over your head, then bring the front around and button it in back, and bring the back around and button it in front, so it looks like a vest. In the picture, the bottom part with the blue edging actually comes down to my knees to make a full skirt. Also hiding in the closet was ribbon made from the same material as the dress, so the headband and the dress match perfectly!

Total cost: All I bought was the blue edging and 6 buttons, so the cost was less than $10, I believe
Total time: I know for a fact I start Monday and finished Wednesday, but the hours I'm unsure of. probably around 20 hours. I know my mom and all her sewing friends were impressed with how quickly my first major sewing project went.

Sunday, October 9, 2011

Potpourri Vase

 As I went to dances throughout high school, I always kept the corsage given to me. By the time I had graduated, I had quite the collection on my hands! Also over the years, I had picked up a most interesting vase. One day, I decided to pluck the petals off of all the corsages one by one and put them in the vase to condense my collection to a more manageable size. For the record, plucking dried petals from a rose is actually quite difficult. But, I think the end result was worth it.
 This is an aerial view of the vase with some of the petals inside.
 What the final product looks like
Well... final product up to the point to which it's full. I finished filling it and bought a cork to put on top. It now sits on my 'antique' shelf at home with a few other crafts I have made. 

Total Cost: For me, $2 or so for the ten corks I bought. If you don't have a vase, you could probably find one for $5 or so at a thrift store or pawn shop.

Jam!

This summer, my mom's raspberry bushes had an overabundance of produce, and she was nice enough to give me and my husband probably ten cups of raspberries. With half of that, I made us some raspberry jam! It is one of the most simple things I have ever made, and yet I was so proud after I had finished! I mean, look at it! Isn't it so beautiful? I sure think so :)


My Friend George

 Not all creative work is sewing and such. This is my friend George who I made after coming home from classes one day. Very random, but super fun! I used toothpicks for his arms and food coloring for his eyes, scarves, mouth, nose, and hat. As you can see, the food coloring bled a little bit, but still worked for my purpose. If you have kids, or want a good nostalgic experience in the winter time, make a snowman!

Engagement Dress

I love the 1950's! For our engagement pictures, we decided we wanted to do vintage pictures of different era's, so I made a dress. Not only does it LOOK vintage, but the pattern I used was from my grandma from when the dress was actually in style! How fabulous is that?! 
 As you can see from the pictures, it was a fairly simple dress. It has a zipper on the side to get in and out, which is actually quite tricky, especially since the pattern was missing sleeve pieces, and the sleeves I made were too long and skinny to slip in and out with ease.
The dress had a very wide neck, very simple, and I also sewed a few extra scraps to use as ribbons in my hair. 
The most time consuming part was probably the pleated skirt, although it really wasn't too difficult, except when I needed to size it down to fit my hips. All in all, not too bad. 
Also part of the pattern was a belt, which is super cute! you can see it slightly in this picture. It also wanted me to make a drapery to hang from the belt, but I was using cloth that was given to me, and I didn't have enough to make the drapery. 

Total time: about 20 hours
Total cost: since the fabric was free, just thread and the belt loops were purchased. under $5

For Starters

 To start off this blog, I'm sharing a dress I finished July 2010.  The picture above is me placing the final detail decorations to the dress.
 The dress consisted of two parts. A white under-dress, and a blue overcoat. Both patterns I altered slightly. On the white dress, I created the sleeves, and added a cross-backing.
 On the blue dress, I altered the snaps to come together on the left side of my body, instead of in the middle. I also altered the sleeves so I could have more movement for my arms.
 This shows the decoration on the back.
The final product! My dad is a photographer, so he took me out for a shoot to show off my creation. For this shoot, I made the dress, the jewelry, and learned how to do my hair in barrel rolls. I even learned to paint my toenails with rhinestones. 
This is probably my greatest sewing project so far! My favorite dress! I only hope that it will still fit after pregnancy!

The total time I put into making the dress: about 80 hours
The total cost: I didn't dare calculate. It was definitely above $50, maybe as much as $100
Hair time: I practiced the hair style three separate times before the shoot and it took me about 2 hours every time.
Jewelry cost: I used glass beads as a base. These, although more expensive, have more weight to them, so I like the feel better. I believe all the different beads I bought came close to $40. Definitely not cheaper than buying, but definitely more fun to make!