Inspired By Pinterest: Reptile Skirt

This skirt caught my eye on Pinterest because I have 3 yards of pink snake fabric that was given to me by a friend. I was intending to make them into pillows or decoupage a whole console with that but never got off my behind to do that. Until this skirt came along.

Let me tell you that sewing this skirt was a lot harder than I expected. I had never worked with such stretchy material before so it took me three cuts of the fabric to get it right. The first time, I put an old skirt over the fabric and cut it out. It resulted in a very poorly shaped skirt so I ditched it. The second time, I forgot to add in seam allowances. The third - oh I had to unpick the zip because the lining got caught in it. In the end, I am too tired to fix up any faults because there isn't anymore fabric left! I made the waist too loose so it will be on my agenda to fix.

I wore it with a black top at first and realised black is a difficult colour to photograph in. When I wear this skirt, I would very likely wear it with a black top.

I wanted to highlight the skirt more too so I swapped to a white top. 

 

In the picture, the gathering near the top of my waist is actually caused by my arm against it, but it is hard to tell what you look like when you put your camera on self timer.

My shoes - are new, another splurge during the Black Friday sales. I can't remember what I spent on it.

And just because I enjoy being a goof ball, here is my now customary "freak shot". Here I am a contortionist. I notice that in magazines, models like to pose like this and sometimes it makes them look double-limbed. I quite like that pose, crazy as it might seem.

Materials: free (except for the zip and interfacing)
Shoes: Joan and Circa
Top: Mango (white)

Thank you for reading, I enjoy sharing my projects with you!

Inspiration Monday: Blue and White Polka Dots

I am trying to be disciplined about my blogging but very often, life gets in the way. :) I turned 42 on Sunday but was down with a bout of food poisoning from Friday night. My youngest son was also sick, so we were recovering at home.

We had one very cold day where it went to minus 12 degrees Celcius (10 deg F) and it was so awesome to experience it. I had the fire going and the heater too but we might as well have been outside, it was freezing inside the house as well.

This week's inspiration photo is this: (Love Emily Blunt, by the way!) I like how she is so casual, and it looks like something I would wear on a warmer day.

I actually wore this out today to see a friend.

I am not too thrilled how my faux leather pants wrinkle horribly - what does that mean, that it is too large for me? I have been wearing a lot of these pants because they keep me so warm. My jeans alone do not help, I can feel the sting of the cold through them.

Shirt: Ebay $8
Sweater: Old Navy, bought during a sale and with a Groupon coupon $15
Faux Leather Pants: H&M $24
Boots: Ferragamo's, old, thrifted $40

Inspiration Monday: Black, White And Red

I found out about Inspiration Monday, a fun challenge from Two Birds that a blogger friend of mine who lives in rainy sunny Singapore, mentions in her blog. Check out Mong's blog, I love her style of writing, and her creations are just so inspiring!

I have been too "active" in the shopping malls and one of my new year resolutions is to be more creative with my wardrobe in order to stop spending.  I was quite pleased with the outcome in the end because I forgot that I had this faux leather skirt that I bought over 20 years ago in Singapore. I have only ever worn it once or twice because the weather is too hot for heavier materials.  The challenge made me think about putting pieces together that I would have never otherwise considered.

Without further ado, this is the picture from last weeks' Inspiration Monday.

And here is my version:

The lighting is difficult indoors but it is so cold outside these days. This was taken in my bathroom! Shooting on a self timer is also not easy because you can't really see how you are standing which is why my eyes are elsewhere! It was below freezing the day I shot this. I like how Ashley Tisdale broke the black and white monochrome with a little pop of red.  At first I wanted to wear my red shirt outside but that would mean that red would be the dominant colour of my outfit. I don't know if I would wear this combination again because the shirt inside makes me look boxy and I had to define my waist with a belt.

One of the reasons I held on to this skirt was that it had a longer hemline at the back which I love.

Skirt - old

Top: Gap bought in 2008

Red Shirt: Thrifted $5

Belt: Came with a thrifted skirt

Shoes: The shoes are new, they arrived a day earlier and they are my first pair of black pumps, $24 Eitienne Aigner from 6pm.com. (I also do not own a black handbag -  that is on my list of things to acquire this year)

I had fun doing this and I can see it being quite addictive!

Inspired By Pinterest: A Line Wool Skirt

 When I saw this skirt, I was struck by its simplicity. I am a reader of this lady's blog, Blame It On Fashion and I love her style. I went to her link to see if I could order it but she lives in Denmark and the company does not ship internationally. Plus it was a hefty price in Euro dollars. The image stayed in my mind and I decided I would make it.

Fast forward a few days later, I went to the thrift store, and picked up this size 14 skirt - in wool, all for $5.

 

Here is a picture of me modelling the skirt. :) It was intentional that I got a skirt this size because I make many mistakes and might need extra fabric!

So I started with a pattern - I used one of my old skirts which is a favourite of mine and traced a pattern around it.

Once the pattern was drawn, I unpicked the whole skirt, but I left the hem because that meant that I did not have to hem it later, thus saving me time. I reused every single piece of this skirt, from the lining to the zipper, even using the pockets to make my new pockets. I made several mistakes with the pockets and accidentally threw out one that I had completed.

I had not sewed a skirt for a long time (about 8 years) so this was a test of my memory, especially putting in the zip part. But I had a sense of satisfaction as I went along, remembering why I took lessons. Pity I stopped at drafting patterns for skirts before I left to live in the Middle East.

This is the end product. I took this photo this morning and it started snowing while I did it. The first snow for the winter, hurray!

Front view:

Back:

Me wearing it.

 

Methinks I made the waist a bit too high. That old skirt I used to draft a pattern with was too tight and it was only after I had sewn the skirt that I remembered that the old skirt used to sit on my hips. As it is now too tight (cough cough, I love my chocolate) I had to hitch it up to my natural waist line. Still, it's not too bad, considering that it was only $5 to make the whole skirt. 

The back view:

The chunky gold necklace is a Goodwill find for $5. 

 There was a lady who saw it first, held on to it but she was on the phone. She left it on the counter top, absent mindedly. I waited, and waited. Eventually she left the store, still talking on the phone so I swooped in and grabbed it before anyone else saw it.  And my shoes...oh sigh. Shoes are my nemesis. I love them and cannot resist them. They are the only things I buy new. I have seen these Zara pair on many bloggers and I love how it is so neutral yet contemporary. However, they are 4" in heel height yikes! I have never worn anything so high before because I had a major surgery on my bunions 20 years ago and they are never quite right.  I wear them and they hurt a little but beautiful shoes are meant to hurt, right? I heard Louboutins hurt like anything...

And just because I want to vary my poses...here's a goofy one. My sons, who are on a week's semester break thought I looked like a freak. I love them because kids are so honest.

Book Tote and Butterfly Art

We had an end of year party for our book club and I made some gifts for my girlfriends, some of who are beginning to be very dear friends. They have been my pillars of strength since I arrived in the USA. I made birthday gifts for two of them as I had not seen them for a while.

The first is a book bag I made for my friend Revathi. She is the organiser of our book club, always the initiative one and she holds the group together with her planning. We do not share common interests (I don't even read any of the books in the book club but I go there for the food and company) but since she loves books, I thought a bag to put her books in would be fun to make. I saw this idea on Martha Stewart and downloaded her transfer print. I did not follow her instructions as I thought her tote was too small. I just measured a canvas bag I already had.

I used drop canvas cloth (to protect the floors from messy paint jobs) from Home Depot - it is the most economical and the canvas is sturdy.  This is the finished product. I printed the transfer picture on to fabric using freezer paper. One could put snap buttons on the "Books" print and the user of the bag could remove it when the bag needed to be washed but I did not have any buttons at the time. You could also buy special chemicals called Bubble Jet Rinse that you pre-wash the fabric in so that when you print, the ink is permanent on the fabric. But as it was just for one project, I was unlikely to use them again and they are pricey.

I also made some butterfly stamp art - again an inspiration from Pinterest. This is the inspiration from Pinterest:

 This is my version. I was giving it to a friend who loves life with such a passion. She is a vet and she rescues animals and advertises to give them a home. I enjoy speaking with her because even after all her children are at college, she is still astounded at what life has to teach her I learn a lot from her. I wanted to give her something that had animals in it, yet had meaning in it.  See the butterfly in this photo? I took that in July 2011 before the Sept 11 tragedy occurred. The butterflies represent the lives lost but they are still with us in memories and thoughts. They are never forgotten.

I am really having fun with Pinterest because normally I don't venture very far off with my quilts and painting/furniture crafts. They both said that they liked my gifts. I am glad because I know that there are some who dislike getting hand made gifts, as I recently read in some famous online Design magazine. I always prefer hand made gifts because to me, it shows the effort and thought that went behind it, and hand made gifts are never, never "Oh, what will I do with this?" feeling. I have held on to all the hand made things given to me by my friends from 20 years ago, even hand made cards! What do you think, do you like getting hand made gifts or are they something to be put into the "re-gift to others" category?

Inspired By Pinterest: T-Shirt Scarf

I was away for a week because our whole family was sick with a stomach flu. And now that we are all well again, we lost connection with the internet after a storm. Happily, I was able to do lots of craft stuff as Christmas gifts for friends - stomach aches and lost internet connections did not stop me!

Remember the ruffle skirt? I was not really happy with the quality of sewing because of the white t-shirt underneath. Tip, choose a base colour that closely matches ruffles. I ended up ripping up the whole thing and turning it into a scarf. I will make another ruffle skirt the next time when the weather turns warmer.

 This scarf has been making the rounds on Pinterest so I wanted to have a go at it. You can find the tutorial here.

It is very important that you get a good quality t-shirt that is slightly thicker because as you pull the strips, they tend not to remain curled as the picture above. My t-shirts were from the thrift store and the interlock t-shirts are not as good as the others. They have already unravelled so I have to pull them taut again and again. This is what I ended up with. I had grey in it but it doesn't show up here in the photo. I enjoyed making the scarf but it is more of an accessory than to protect you from the cold.  The days have really dropped in temperature and on Sunday, it was hovering around 1 degree C all day.  However, I am thankful that it is warmer this winter than the previous two we have experienced here. Now we are just waiting for some snow!

Inspired By Pinterest: Ruffled Skirt

From Pinterest

or here

I went to the thrift store where they had men's clothing at 50% off. I picked up about 10 XXL t-shirts at $0.75 to $1.50 and just out of curiousity, I stopped by at Joann's, which is a fabric and craft store - t-shirt materials is around $5.00 per yard.

I won't go into the details on how I made it because the other two websites have instructions. It looks really ugly when you first make it, even my husband was a little doubtful about the project. But when I put them on, he really liked them, which is saying a lot as he doesn't always like what I make.

Okay - I am super sorry for the horrid quality of the photos, seriously, you wouldn't believe that I was working as a studio photographer in Singapore at one stage, I have become so sloppy with photo taking. It is so cold now, in the negatives and I took this inside. It also gets dark before 5 pm so I was too lazy to get the tripod out. 

I scored big time at the thrift store this weekend, I found a vintage Coach handbag (will post about it later) two pairs of shoes and this is one of them. A pair of black oxfords, making it my third pair of oxfords. (will blog about that later when the sun comes out and I can take better photos)

I lightened the photo a lot more so that I could show you dear readers what a boo boo I made. I used one of my old white t-shirts underneath and as I moved, the upper most ruffle would sometimes move up and reveal the white underneath. I also was lazy about using matching thread. I was just impatient to sew! But I just had to take a photo to say that  I made a skirt. Then I took it apart and ripped it all up and made it into another t-shirt scarf! I had made it too tight and as I went to wear it, I could hear the thread rip, as the ruffles gathered the t-shirt material closer and made it tighter.

Cost of fabric - $2.75. I used two t-shirts and I stole my husband's old underwear's elastic for the waist band.
Shoes: Thrifted black oxfords $9
Socks: TJ Maxx a pack of 3 for $6 and top, my own from Target. (old)