Halloween Mantle

If you know me well, then you know that I LOVE HALLOWEEN.  Ironic since I am scared of absolutely everything!  I was so excited for Halloween this year that I started decorating about half way through September.  I wanted the spooky goodness to last.

When I saw this page in the Pottery Barn catalog last year, I knew I wanted to make something very similar.  I found the glass vases from Dollar Tree and glued them to painted wood pieces from Home Depot.  I have NO idea what they are called.  The skulls were also found at DT last year.

Also stolen from this page was the apothocary jar look.  I spray painted the rocks and was planning on writing on them with chalk.  Well, I changed my mind.  Instead I added a DT skeleton and an awesome spider from Quilted Bear.  Oh, how I miss Utah in the fall.  Tear!

Now for a little ghetto...

I love the look of the dead tree branch.  Pottery Barn did this last year and I knew I wanted to mimic the idea.  I have been on the lookout for branch for awhile now.  Shawn made fun of me because I was constantly scoping out the trees.  The moment finally came last Saturday.  I headed out to pick up a pie and happened upon the perfect tree.  It was right in front of the restaurant where I was picking up the pie.  I parked my car right next to the tree, went in and picked up the pie, and then casually "checked out" the tree.  I hastely ripped the branch off, threw it into the car, and drove away like a bat out of hell.  When I got home, Shawn just looked at me and shooked his head.  I wanted that branch and knew it would be mine!!  A little black spray paint and it was perfect.

Love skulls!

I used the same concept here with the skulls and the Spanish moss.  I like the idea of using simple orange branches because they can easily transition into my Thanksgiving decor.

The birdcage is a little hard to see.  I covered the bottom with a layer of Spanish moss and added some extra skeletons trying to "escape the evil bird".  My crow is another DT item.  I also threw in a battery operated tea light.  It flickers and adds a little extra "spook"!

I have other Halloween items around the house, but this mantle is my "showstopper"!  Love it!!

Pleatin' it up!

I'm lovin' the pleats lately!  I have a friend at church who made a cute little outfit for her baby and I started to replicate it.  As I was cutting the pieces, it donned on me that pleats would make this shirt even cuter!

I followed this tutorial.  Only difference: when cutting the front piece, cut it in half taking away a little extra.  Cut an extra piece of coordinating fabric for the middle.  If you want to add the pleats, make sure to place the pleats between the two fabrics before sewing.  Simple and cute!

Oh, and HAPPY BIRTHDAY to my mother in law!

NEW Pleated Dress Winner!

Sadly, Kimmie never emailed me so I had to choose a new winner.  Bad for her, good for one of you!

Congrats, Tracy! Email me.

Pleated Dress Winner

Congrats Kimmie!  Send me an email at bretinsley@hotmail.com with the following measurements of your princess: around her chest, from shoulder to knee, and around her upper arm.  Also, if you have a specific color in mind.  You have 48 hours!!

If you didn't win, try following this tutorial for a super easy and super cute dress!  Thanks to everyone who participated!

PS One day I will get this random generator thing figured out!

Leggings

Want to know how to turn this

into this

Check this out!  It seriously took me about 10 minutes.  I love that I can use an old shirt and make it into something functional for Tana!

I See You

I LOVE Halloween!  Like REALLY LOVE Halloween!!  It is by far my favorite holiday.  The decorations, the costumes, the candy.  What's not to love?

I have had a few of these glass on glass frames for awhile now and have been trying to figure out what to do with them.  Enter Martha.

I ran across this tutorial the other day while perusing the Martha Stewart website.  I adapted mine a little but kept the same process.  The main difference was that I only used the glow in the dark glitter.  Totally love that stuff.  I also have not decided if I will add the Mylar in the back.  If I do, my sister had this AMAZING idea to buy a balloon at the Dollar Tree and cut it open. 

I bought the handle at a store in Washington.  They were on sale for $1 each!!!  I glued the handle to the frame and then added the ribbon as an embellishment.  I bought the letters from Hobby Lobby, painted them orange and distressed them.  I found the glittery spider from Walmart.  They come in a BIG package of black and green for $0.97 and are actually confetti.

Such a fun, simple idea.  The eyes are a great addition to my Halloween decor!

Pleats and a Giveaway!

I am a sucker for pleats.  Like an absolute sucker.  So when I was playing around with some new material last night, I decided that pleats were just what this dress needed.

My original intention was to sew gathered tulle to the bottom, but have you ever tried to sew with tulle?  Crazy frustrating.  I did not have the patience for it last night.  I am definitely glad that I gave up on the tulle because I LOVE how this turned out.

I do not have a picture tutorial, instead just some basic directions.  You can follow this post for a basic construction of the dress.  Obviously you will need to add length as the tutorial is for a shirt.  You can also follow tutorials here, here, or here.  Whatever one fits your fancy.  The only difference I made to the construction was on the sleeves and the neckline.  Instead of making my elastic casing right along the edge of the sleeve and neckline, I sewed a seam about a half an inch away from the edge and then made my casing.  I wanted there to be a little more of a ruffled look on the edges.  You can see the seams in the picture above.

For the pleats, I ended up doing it one way and realized later that it wasn't very efficient.  If I had thought about it ahead of time:  When sewing the front and back dress piece together, stop about three or four inches from the bottom.  Do not forget to back stitch. Cut two strips of material five inches wide and long enough to form your pleats.  Fold in half hot dog style (why yes that IS a technical term...) and iron fold.  Sew or serge the raw edges. 

Make your pleats by following this tutorial.  No point of reinventing the wheel, right?  Pin the pleats underneath the dress.  Try and make sure that your pleats are even across the dress.  Sew about a fourth an inch away from the bottom hem of the dress.  This seam will attach the pleats and give you a top stitch at the same time.  Now that you have your pleats sewn to the front and the back of your dress, finish sewing the last few inches that we left open on the sides. 

I finished the dress of by adding some flowers.  There are so many tutorials for these rolled flowers on the internet.  You can google "fabric flowers" or Make It and Love It has a few tutorials in her "No Sew" section.  I attached my flowers to a pin so that they could be removed for washing.

Love it?  Want to win one?

I will be giving away one custom made dress.  Just leave a message for the following entries:

(Remember leave ONE message for EACH entry)

1. Follow my blog.  This does not really mean anything to you, just to me. 

2. Post about the giveaway on Facebook.

3. Post about the giveaway on your blog.

The giveaway will close Sunday, September 18th at midnight.  The winner will be announced Monday.  Good luck!

Dress Revised

I took my own advice and fixed the ruffle on Tana's dress.  It just looked really funny in those photos.  I thought I could just serge the sleeves and make them smaller, but that didn't work.  I ended up taking the ruffle off of the main dress and redoing it.  Doesn't it look so much better?!?

I also made a quick trip to HL today and picked up some corduroy.  Look how it turned out!  It looks so fall-ish and comfy.  Just think of it with a long sleeved shirt underneath and a pair of boots!!

LOVE the corduroy!  I may need to go back and get some more.

I Thought I Could...

I found this picture on Pinterest the other day, but sadly there was no tutorial with the link.  I studied the picture for a while and then got to work.

I started by measuring Savanah around the bust and from her bust to her knee.  I added two inches to the bust measurement and cut two pieces.  I cut mine at a slight A line so that it would flare a little at the bottom.   



Using my template I cut out my sleeves on each side.  A trick to this is to line up all the edges so you only have to cut once.

Using my black fabric, I cut two pieces that were the same width as my dress and about 5 inches long.  Fold in half length wise and iron flat.  Sew/serge your black border to the bottom of each main piece of fabric.  Make sure to place right sides together.  Iron your seams down.  

With right sides together sew/serge your two dress pieces together.  I really try to make sure that the bottom borders line up.

This is what it should look like once you flip it right side out and iron your seams.

Side note: For future reference I would make the bottom border a tad wider.  It seems a little too narrow in this picture.

To finish off the edges of the sleeves, serge the edges and then fold under and sew around.  If you do not own a serger, you will need to do a double fold to hide your raw edges.

Now the somewhat tricky part...

Cut another piece of your coordinating fabric.  In my case, the black fabric.  My piece was double the width of my dress and about 4 inches long.  Sew you piece of fabric, short ends together, into a tube.  Serge one side and fold under about an inch around.  Iron flat. 

For the other raw edge, fold under twice and top stitch. This will look a lot better then leaving a serged edge like I did in the picture.

Using your seam as a guide, find the middle of the back of the dress.  Pin the seam in your black fabric to the middle of the dress.  To do this, you need to wrap the folded over inch over to the back side of the dress.  Make any sense?  If not use the picture for a reference.  The right side of the ruffle should be facing you. 

Next, fold your ruffle piece in half so that you can find the half way point on the other end.  Mark your spot and attach it to the half way point on the front side of the dress.  Pin around.  Again, use the picture!

You need to make a casing for your elastic.  Do this by sewing around the top of your ruffle about a half an inch away from the edge.  Make sure to leave about an inch open to pull your elastic through.

Cut your elastic to the width of your child's bust.  Pull it through your casing and zig-zag stitch the two ends together.  Once your elastic is in you can sew your small opening closed.  And you're done!

My only issue with the dress above is that I made the ruffle a little too wide.  You can see the difference between the ruffle on my dress and the one above.  I will be making another one and will post a picture with the mentioned adjustments.

Enjoy!

Creative Storage

I am always looking for fun, new ways to store things around he house.

For the longest time I kept my makeup in simple makeup bags under the sink.  My only issue with this was that every morning when I would put my makeup on I would have to go digging under the sink to find the bags.  Eventually that would get too obnoxious so the bags would just stay on the counter.  Not okay!

I know a lot of people keep their makeup in the drawers in baskets, but our bathroom just does not have that kind of room.  Enter pottery!

I found these pots at Hobby Lobby several years ago at the end of summer.  Because they were a summer item, I got them 90% off.  Making them EXTREMELY cheap.

I love the look they add to the counter.  Still keeping everything neat and decorative.  It is also a lot easier to find what I need.  No digging around in a bag or my drawers.

Try to think outside the box when storing items around your house!