Sewing Room Organization - on a budget! - The felt fabric corner

I'm happy to report that I'm FINALLY starting on my sewing room redesign! 

The goal: 

**To completely reorganize everything in my room and probably move around the furniture. 

**To find a space for my new embroidery machine.

**To put up artwork and other stuff I find visually inspiring.

**To keep my room neat and tidy. I need to be able to actually find what I'm looking for.

**To have my dream sewing room!

**And do it all on a budget. Reuse or refurbish anything you can.

First up, the felt fabric area! And I'm only talking about the 9 x 12 sheets of felt, not the ones cut off the bolt. Those I have hanging in my closet. But these sheets now have taken on a life of their own. It started out not too bad since I didn't have too many colors. So I just made something out of those metal cube things. 

But that fast became not too convenient anymore. 

So I got a scrapbooking tower, which proved perfect...for awhile. 

But then I got more colors and didn't have enough shelves or width in those shelves. 

And then comes my sister to the rescue who saved these 2 office paper dividers from the trash! Mine!

 See the huge pile of fabric on top? Yeah, I'm a fabric hoarder and I'm OK with that.

And they turned out to be the perfect fit for my felts!! All colors can be separated with plenty of room in each space for lots of sheets. And I still have some free spaces on the last 7 or so slots that I just filled with random patterned sheets that I've never used, but were too fun not to buy. 

Perfect size fabric organizer that are free! What can be better than that??

Price tally:

**2 office paper dividers saved from the trash - $0

Off to a good start! 

1000 Etsy Sales...Almost!

WOW! Looking at my Etsy shop sales, it looks like I'm only 23 away from a huge milestone that I've been working towards: the big 1000! I think when that number is hit, we need to celebrate with a Fat Cat Giveaway! Just not sure what that giveaway will be yet. Or course there will be a Fat Cat involved though. Stay tuned for more news soon...

Jack Fattington Cat Pincushion!

Hello all! Good grief it seems like I just keep getting sick! I've caught 3 different bugs in the last month and a half. Not acceptable at all. So I haven't had a chance to do all the fun projects I've got planned for myself. Good news is I only have another week of work and then I'm on vacation for TWO AND A HALF WEEKS!!! I've never been so happy in my life! I better get lots done in that time! But...at least I got one new Fat Cat Pincushion done.

Meet Jack Fattington!

He's made from felt and is stuffed with polyester fiberfill. He's made from my own patterns and stands approximately 5.5 inches (14 cms) tall and measures approximately 11 inches (28 cms) around the belly.

If you'd like to see him in my Etsy shop, click HERE!

 Still to come: Sally and a zombie girl fat cat pincushion and lots of Halloween stuff!

Come on vacation, you can't come fast enough! 

Bellatrix Lestrange Costume...Finished!

Well I got the Bellatrix costume done just in time for the library's Harry Potter Library Bash! Literally at 11:30 the night before I decided it was good enough. I had to eliminate the hood and the painted on swirls, but I'll add them in at another time. when I have some more time.

My favorite part was making the bird skull necklace. I couldn't find one I liked and I didn't want to pay the money for a replica one. So I did what any normal person would do...I sculpted my own out of clay. I'm actually shocked about how good it looked at the end. I was quite impressed with myself!

(Unpainted...just clay base)

 (Finished product)

(Stick I found outside that I used for the wand)

(Finished product...sanded down, added extra clay and painted)

(Corset stitches)
 
 

Happy Birthday Harry Potter! Next year, I'll have the costume 100% completed!

Bellatrix Lestrange Costume...part 3...the lace-up sleeves

I finally hit a snag in this costume. The dress was easy to make. The corset was easy to make. For whatever reason, the sleeves were not easy to make. After 3 or 4 tries I finally got the proper amount of spacing in the laces. Luckily I bought an extra pack of eyelets, so I still have enough to add onto the shoulder and sleeve top areas.

1.5 weeks to finish this up!

Bellatrix Lestrange Costume...part 1...the dress

I probably should not be taking on any more projects at this time, but that's what I do so, I'm making a new costume. The library I work at is having an all day Harry Potter Day event on July 31st. So of course I'm aiming to get a costume made up for it. I do work a 10 hour shift that day, so I may as well have fun while I'm there!

Since I do tend to be drawn towards the darker characters, I chose to go with Bellatrix Lestrange.

I chose this dress version because 1.) I just like it 2.) construction shouldn't be too complex and 3.) very importantly, it's distressed. So when I have a million other projects and I need to get a fast costume made: chose one that doesn't need finished edges. 

I zoomed into my reference picture and saw that the fabric has faint scrolls all throughout it (not counting the dominant painted or embroidered on ones). And so I knew exactly what fabric I was going to use, because I had already bought some years ago because I liked it. I had to run to the fabric store to get more yards, but at least I didn't have to make any decisions. Though they didn't have enough fabric to make the hood that is attached in the back. So if I manage to find more fabric and time, the hood may get added.

Cutting out and sewing the dress took only about 2 hours which was nice and I sewed in the front gathered stitch. I still need to shape the neckline a bit and cut off, and distress, the hemline. But all in all, the shape is good.Also note, that is not the corset in the picture, it's a random piece of black fabric I put on just for reference.

I was hoping to be able to start working on the sleeves but all the stores I checked today didn't carry 5/32 black eyelets. I was hoping to get small black ones so they will blend into the fabric. I'm going to check online to see if I can order them and have them shipped in time to finish up all the lacing.

Still to do:

1.) Corset

2.) Sleeves

3.) Distressing

4.) Final details (painting on scrolls)

4. Wig...or decide to destroy my own hair

5.) Wand

6.) Jewelry

Upcycled Wedding Guestbook DIY Project!

I've completed my first wedding project! The wedding guestbook. Ta Daaaa!

My mom found her old guestbook, which she forgot to bring out at her wedding therefore it was unused. So I decided that I was going to convert her guestbook into our new fancy Halloween-ish guestbook. And it's my something old! 

 (Original Guestbook - not quite the look we were going for)

 I knew I planned on wrapping the book up in fabric and then placing a cool piece of scrapbook paper for the front cover. I didn't really want to buy new fabric so I went through my fabric stash and came across a black crushed velvet. Hated the crushed velvet but liked the look of the matte reverse side. Plus it has stretch to it, so I could pull the fabric real tight without worrying about wrinkles. 

And I decided I wanted to put a piece of paper inside the covers as well. Originally I was going for a picture frame sort of effect with the paper attached first therefore being under the overlapped fabric. Now that it's done, I wish I would have done it in reverse with the paper on top of the fabric. But my fiance likes it better this way and he made me promise that I wont rip it apart and do it over, which I'm really considering doing.

(Inside back cover in progress) 

(Finished back cover)

(Finished front cover)

So pretty much the steps were for this exact book:
1. Measure, cut and glue in the front and back inside cover paper panels 
2. Measure and cut out the fabric with enough room to overlap to the inside covers
3. Glue the fabric down to the book. I started with gluing it to the spine first, then just kept molding it along the front and back. Again, the stretchiness of the fabric helped wonders with it.
4. Measure, cut and glue the front cover to your book.
5. Add on sticker letters.
6. Marvel in your own awesomeness for putting together such an amazing work of art.

It did take me a few hours to do this though. But once I got over the fear of possibly ruining my mom's old guestbook, and dove in headfirst, it went a lot faster. I think I had the hardest thing was placing the stickers since they were so thin and swirly. They were a bit of a nightmare to set them exactly where I wanted them. But afterwards, you have an awesome DIY/up-cycled guestbook that everyone, even yourself, will be impressed with!

(Before and after shots)

Ideas For My Sister's Baby Shower

****This is an old entry from a few years ago but I decided to post it back up again due to it's popularity!**** Plus I need to get into my crafty mood to tackle all these wedding DIY projects!
 

I'm so thrilled to be throwing my sister's baby shower! I'm the youngest of 3 girls and my middle sister is having the first baby in the family! I finally get to be an auntie!! Her shower is in a few weeks and my mom an I are frantically trying to get the majority of it done now. We are making all the centerpieces and the guest favors. So here's what I got so far. I hope my sister doesn't read this! Melissa if you're on this site, don't look at this!!


These are going to be the centerpieces on the guest tables. She doesn't know if the baby is going to be a boy or girl so we are alternating between pink and blue umbrellas. These were actually quite simple to make. Very time consuming though. The square is Styrofoam that we painted and decorated to look like a nursery block. The letters spell out baby. We then put small furry bears and blocks onto of it. We inserted a small umbrella into the block and hung small plastic rocking horses, teddy bears, and pacifiers on the ends. All the supplies were bought at a basic craft store.


Here's a close up of a rocking horse, furry teddy bear, and small blocks.

These are going to be the guest favors. We started out by cutting out thin double sided tape in the shapes of teddy bears and carriages. (We used a small cookie cutter and traced the shape.) We then stuck the tape onto glass candle holders and rolled in glitter. Now all we have to do is fill small bags with candy, tie them up with pretty ribbon, add a silver stork charm and a thank you tag. This is a very simple and inexpensive way to make decorative favors. You can use whatever shape and color to fit the theme of your party!

Here's a close up of the purple carriage and teddy bear.

I can't wait for the shower! We still have some more work to do though. We plan on making a much larger version of the umbrella to go on the gift table. And we have to figure out a menu.
Still much more to do but it's going to be fun doing it! I'll take much better pictures of the shower and share those here!

****Add-on Pictures!****

Baby Shower Centerpiece

****This is an old entry from a few years ago but I decided to post it back up again due to it's popularity!**** Plus I need to get into my crafty mood to tackle all these wedding DIY projects!

Alright here is the centerpiece that's going to be on the gift table at my sister's baby shower. It's a much larger version of the guest table centerpieces. It's made pretty much the same way. We took larger Styrofoam blocks and painted them to look like baby blocks. We decorated a large lace umbrella with ribbons and made a bow and dangled colorful plastic pacifiers off of the ends. Then we stuck the umbrella into the blocks and secured it with a lot of glue.

Here's a close up of the top of the umbrella and the pacifiers.

Here's a close up of the rocking horse, stork and baby. My mom insisted on having the Kewpie doll up there and I wanted a stork. We decided to put both up there. You have no idea how difficult it is to find a stork figurine! This is the best one we could find.
And a close up of the cute monkey that goes with her crib set.