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Thursday, September 17, 2009

Making the Beds When Your House is Burning

I think I've talked about this phenomena before. My overwhelming desire to do silly piddling things when something entirely else needs to be done. Right now there isn't anything too pressing. Just all those little things that would make our house look like a home, instead of a college dorm room that hasn't been fully unpacked. Like hanging up all our pictures, or finishing that blasted dresser so we have places to put our unmentionables. How about hanging up those curtains I bought the first week here to keep out the sun? I have a nice long list of all of these kinds of chores. Not terribly urgent, but life would be sweeter if they were done. But no. Not happening. Not yet anyways. Instead I have been on a week long, turbo-charged crafting kick. Woo Hoo!

First I did one of those t-shirt makeovers that are so popular on the blogs lately. This amazing woman does some of the cutest things to a t-shirt. Me? Eh. I bought two turquoise-blue boys shirts at the dollar store and did what I could. It turned out ok I suppose. I cut off the collar if the bigger shirt and used the smaller shirt to cut up into "petals". I sewed the petals around the new neckline to make it ruffly. Kinda. Then I made a few gathered strips and sewed them to the end of the sleeves. Like I said, it's ok, but not amazing.

Here is the original shirt and the petals being cut out.
You sew the petals in half to make them look like little flowers. Sort of. Forgive the embarrassing self-portrait here. It was late and I felt too dumb to ask Clayton to take my picture. But hopefully you get the idea. Not too bad for $2.

My next project, although poorly done, was immensely satisfying. I made a "new" liner for Eleanor's door-bouncer. I just traced a loose pattern from the jumper, cut it out and sewed the new fabric directly on top of the old one. Leaving the seams exposed. To take it apart and do it properly would have been such a pain, and not worth it at all. So I was pleased with how nice it looks considering the shortcuts I took.

Here is the original fabric. I remembered just in time to take a before shot. You can also see the before in the jumping videos I posted of Eleanor last week. Tres 1992!

You can kind of see the old pattern through the new fabric, but again. I couldn't be bothered enough to add another layer of lining or whatever. Lazy crafting.
The project I finished today is the most adorable and happy one yet. They turned out sooo well! But as it will be a present for a few people, I can't blog about it, or post pictures. Yet. I will in a week or so. So hold on to your hats.

Tomorrow I hopefully get to help a neighbor paint her entertainment center, and I hope to pick up some blue paint for Eleanor's room while we are in the paint department. Then I can do the next craft project which is a garland for her room. Oh I am all atwitter about that!

Oh, you ask, where is my daughter during all of this? Well, most of this is taking place late at night. Some during her naps and some with her on the floor next to me. Today she spent about 10 happy minutes fluffing and patting a big roll of tulle on the floor while I cut stuff out. I got up to put away scissors and throw away my scraps and came back to find her like this.

Totally entombed.

I love this girl. Which reminds me. For Halloween I couldn't think of anything terribly clever to make Eleanor. I debated between witch and ballerina. I finally bought a few things at the Goodwill to make her into a warm-up ballerina (no stiff tutu, more legwarmers and pink wrap sweaters) but still haven't decided for sure. Then today I thought how adorable a Dorothy from Wizard of Oz or Alice from Alice in Wonderland would be. Any thoughts? I am going to put up a poll to see what you all think. Feel free to write in any other genius suggestions in the comments sections. Or any boring suggestions. I am all for stealing other people's good ideas. Keep in mind that E is 6 months old and I want to have some hand in making it. I also like the idea of "family costumes". For example, dad's a Dr., mom's a nurse (or second Dr.), and baby is an accident victim. A few years ago our friends, the cute Hansen family, went as a football player, a cheerleader and little (tiny baby) Sophie was the football. Alright. Polls open!


4 comments:

Sandra said...

You are so crafty! I love the shirt! As far as halloween goes (since I am not creative at all), I would say a kitty cat is easy - dress her in black and have a headband with back ears and paint whiskers on her face. I don't know if she's into pulling everything out of her hair phase though. All of your ideas look fun too. By the way, E is getting cuter by the minute, I love it! She is getting so big!

LD said...

Way to go! You are ambitious and crafty, I especially love the t-shirt make-over. I definitely could get more done if I didn't nap while Zannah naps.

Ann said...

I didn't know that shirt was hand made! What the heck! It was way cute! And I can't wait til you can post pics of your other project! THEY ARE TO DIE FOR!! I decided I wanted you to help me make some. Maybe after the bread rolls we said we'd make. But we did get the entertainment "unit" (haha) done!! Much thanks to you! I think your rubbing off on me to get some actual things done! See you call it procrastinating doing something else. I call it actually doing something wortwhile, instead of sitting on my butt all day. SO THANKS!

Allison Hansen said...

Thanks for the cliff-hanger! If your newest project is any thing like these, I won't be able to sleep til I see it! And Halloween... great minds think alike! We're going as an "Alice in Wonderland" theme this year: Sophie as Alice (she actually coincidentally had a blue dress with a white collar!), Millie will probably be the white rabbit, I'll be the queen of hearts and Michael will probably be Mad Hatter.

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