T-Shirt

I took my husband's old t-shirt

used this tutorial

and created this shirt:

I love it!  It was quick, simple, and cute.  Once I finished the first, I immediately made another.  Way fun.  Try it!

Big, black dress.

That's all it was when I bought it for $1.25 at the local thrift store.  That's also what drew me to the dress.

Big: No problem.  When has that ever stopped me?

Black: Perfect!  That means there are a million accessory possibilities.

Dress: Well, dresses are my favorite thing :)

I love that it's got texture, too.

I got to work by taking in the bodice, arm pits, and arms.

Then I took off a foot of length from the skirt with the help of my fashion consultant.

Now that it's finished, I can imagine myself wearing this dress lots and lots this winter.

Like I said, the accessory possibilities are endless!  I could wear it with legging or tights, with a coat or a sweater, or just a colorful scarf.

Sweater Weather

It's sweater weather ya'll!

I've been waiting impatiently for the temperature to cool down.  Having lived in California my whole life, it shouldn't come as a surprise that it stays warm until November or December.  But every year I continue to complain that it's too darn hot for Fall.

I got this sweater from my favorite thrift store for $1.25.

It's kind of cute the way it is, right?  I had this idea in my head that I would wear it as a mini dress with tights and heels....but then I put it on.  You see, that may work for tall, skinny girls, but I'm a short, curvy girl.  It was a no go.  So I got creative.

I took the shoulder pads out, of course.  I also removed the buttons, thinking that I was going to keep the length.  I was going to replace the gold buttons with larger, black buttons.

After I removed the shoulder pad and tried the sweater on, everything changed.  I realized the arm pits were droopy, the sleeves were loose, and the length was terrible.  

I changed plans and decided to make a cropped sweater.

This is pretty much my new favorite thing.  I've done this with a couple of my husband's old t-shirts recently.  It's so simple and so cute!  I'll show you the t-shirts soon.

After I trimmed the bottom, I hemmed it, and I took in the sides and the sleeves to make it a little more shapely and a little less droopy.

Testing out a new model pose, apparently

Much better.  I adore this sweater now!  I wore it yesterday and I wanted as many people as possible to see it.  You know the feeling :).

It looks like things are going to remain cool for the time being so I'll have to work on some more sweater projects for you.

Pretty skirt & bad face day

I picked up this skirt for $1.25 over the summer at a thrift store.  The color is BEAUTIFUL!  Pleated skirts are totally in this Fall too, so there was no question that I needed to buy it.

As you can see, it was a little big on me.  The waist was too large and it was too long for my short legs.  Being that this is a pleated skirt, I knew a simple hem would not do the trick.  I'm sure there's a way to hem pleated skirts, but I'm not familiar with that magical method.  So I had to come up with another solution; I cut off the top.

Everything beyond that point was fairly basic.  I created a new casing for the elastic, made the elastic a bit shorter, and ran it through the casing.

If this concept is new to you, notice that I placed a safety pin at the end.  This helps to have something substantial to hold on to when you're running elastic through casing.  This works for ribbon and chords as well.

In the end I had a pretty, teal skirt.

This is where we talk about my face.  You see, it was early in the morning and I was in a hurry to get these pictures done, so I wasn't wearing any make-up yet.  But it seems nobody told my face it was time to wake-up.

Either way, I did eventually put make-up on, my face woke up, and I had a great day in my cute outfit.