Bicycle Dress from T-Shirt

 This size 3-4 girls dress was made using a free pattern and instructions by Dana from "Made" using a large t-shirt.  The only variations that I made is instead of freezer paper stenciling a banana for the "Warhol" dress, I used free clip art from The Graphics Fairy of a Vintage Bicycle and added a ruffle at the bottom using a decorative stitch.

Items used:

• Free pattern and instructions from Dana from "Made"
• The Graphics Fairy of a Vintage Bicycle
• T-Shirt (I used a women's large)
• 2 pieces of fabric 2 1/2 inches by 26 inch fabric for bow
• 1 piece of fabric 2 inches by 36 inches for ruffle
• Printer and paper
• Black fabric paint
• Scissors
• Iron
• Sewing machine and matching thread 
• Straight pins 

I followed the instructions up to cutting out and stitching armholes and gather stitching, but before stitching together I printed off a half-page image of the bike then played around with where I wanted to position it on the dress.

 Using the black fabric paint I went over all of the black lines with black paint the positioned it on the t-shirt with the paint side down and lightly patted it down to transfer the image (Note:  it will be a mirror image to whatever image you are transferring, so it won't work with lettering).




For the remainder of the dress, I followed the instructions.

I also added a two inch ruffle (approximately 1 yd wide) at the bottom, using an iron to press up a 1/2 inch hem then stitching down and using a gather stitch at the top.  I then sewed the ends together, pinned underneath the shirt at the hem then applied the decorative stitch to finish.

Linking up to:

FELT EGG

I am making some felt foods for my great-niece for Christmas and found a pattern for felt eggs at the following site. http://melissagoodsell.typepad.com/day_to_day/tutorial---felt-food-eggssliced-orange/

Items used:

• 1 piece White felt
• 1 piece Yellow felt
• Thread, yellow and white
• Scissors
  

From the pattern cut out two pieces of white felt for the egg whites and 1 piece of felt for the yolk. You can get several "eggs" from 1 piece for felt.

I had stitched the "yolk" to the top of the egg, then hand stitched with a blanket stitch the two pieces of the egg together.

I am linking this to Helping Little Hands Felt Food Cook Along. I just came across this site and plan on joining in the the fun!

BLOOMING TOTE BAG

For Earth Day Walgreens gave out tote bags with a purchase I got the tote bag below. It was a little too plain for my tastes so I decided to turn it into a blooming tote bag covered with flowers. This is what it looked like before: Some of the flowers I have made with links to tutorials at the following: http://craftsandcreationswithkathy.blogspot.com/2009/05/fabric-flowers.html http://craftsandcreationswithkathy.blogspot.com/2009/05/felty-flower.html http://www.cutoutandkeep.net/projects/sunflower_facinator Others are misc. creations and a few of the flowers and the leaves were left over from my "Spring In A Jar" project. Some of the felt flowers were made using 9001 glue, others were hand-stitched. All of the flowers were attached to the bag with a hot glue gun. Items used:

• Tote bag
• Fabric or felt (to make the flowers)
• Artificial flowers
• 9001 glue
• Hot glue gun and glue sticks
• Needle
• Thread
• Scissors

BUTTERFLY MOBILE

This project was for a Mother's Day gift for my son's step-Grandmother. It was originally intended that he do the project on his own, but it turned out to be more of a joint venture as it was tricker than I had estimated.

Nearly everything for this project was purchase from the Dollar Tree and spent $3, as I had scissors, thread and the ribbon on hand already.

The original project with a tutorial was found at

http://www.cutoutandkeep.net/projects/butterfly_mobile

Items used:

• Tissue paper (multi-colored)
• Wooden wreath (medium sized)
• Pipecleaners (multi-colored)
• Scissors
• Thread (could use fishing line also)
• 1/8th inch wide ribbon

The butterfly shapes are made by cutting approx. 9x6 inch pieces of tissue paper folded in half with as curve at the bottom and side (see below) but straight at the top. You then use 3 butterfly shapes for each butterfly. My son chose to use mostly one color for the top and bottom and a contrasting color in the center.

You then choose the color of pipecleaner you want to use with each butterfly.

To make the butterfly, center the pipecleaner then fold it over the lower edge, then scrunch the tissue paper to make the wings and then twist both sides of the pipecleaner together to make the butterfly.

Here is where it gets tricky; tie a piece of thread that is about 12-14 inches long through the pipecleaner at the bottom of the butterfly centering it then tie a knot. Then pull the threads up and tie a knot about an inch from the edge then tie a knot around the head of the butterfly, then trim the thread. It will look like this when you are done.

Cut 4 pieces of ribbon about 10-12 inches long, tie each piece to the corner of the wreath in a knot, then pull all four pieces of ribbon together and center them, then tie knot.

Cut varying lengths of thread, tie to the center of the thread on each butterfly, then tie the thread to the wreath. This is easier if you have one person hold up the wreath and the other one tie the threads. We did this with each of the butterflies except the center one, which we attached with a ribbon to the knot at the center of the ribbons.