Warming Up an Earmuff Headband

So, China is trying to put Etsy out of business for sure. I bought this earmuff headband on eBay for $2!!

Okay, enough about politics...When I received this headband, I really liked it, but it wasn't very warm. Not for me, at least. If my ears are cold, it's over.

I pinned it to some fuzzy blue fabric on the reverse side.

Then, I sewed the two together using a really long straight stitch. I would have done a zigzag, since the fabric is stretchy, but you would be able to see a zigzag from the top, and I wanted the stitches to be as invisible as possible.

See, you can barely tell.

Warmth!

The End!

Two More Fendi Inspired Colorblock Knit Dresses - Teal, Tan, and Grey - Blood Orange, Plaid, Brown, Grey, and Tan

I love this Fendi dress. . .

. . .So I decided to make two more!

I don't know if you can tell from these pictures, but I took a little time to refine the shoulders/sleeves pattern and I brought the drop waist up a little from my last endeavor. I still like the first dress, but these ones are just a little more comfortable and fit just a little better. Once I was happy with my pattern, I simply cut out both dresses and sewed them together almost at the same time. This really cut down on construction time--doing two at once.

It's crazy how just changing the color scheme gives the dress a whole different look. I think these teal green/blues make the dress look sporty whereas my last one looked european.

This blood orange one looks bookish and Autumn-y.

The dark orange part isn't double knit. It's actually semi-stretchy faux suede. You use what you have!

The End!

Fendi Inspired - Colorblock Knit Dress - Salmon, Black, Tan, and Grey

Whether or not you liked my Fendi Inspired outfit a few weeks ago, I haven't been able to stop thinking about the salmon, black, tan, and grey dress that I used as inspiration.

 You can see the front and back of this dress here.

I went to a thrift store and found a bunch of different colors of double knit polyester and then realized I had the exact colors to make this same dress! The pattern isn't a traditional one and it's been baffling me, so I've been putting this one off for a few weeks to wrap my head around it. Then, husband and I didn't leave the house on Saturday, so I decided to make this dress. I have run out of the brown packing paper that I've been using to make patterns, so I taped some newspapers together for this one. It took several hours to figure out how, not only the dress is put together, but how to proportion it for my body--decidedly NOT model shape!

Anyways, skipping ahead several hours, here is the finished dress. Pretty good, huh? Actually, I found the salmon, tan, and grey in double knit, but I couldn't find any black jersey that was thick enough to support the thicknesses of the other fabrics. Fortunately, I found a thick black maternity skirt at another thrift store and just cut it apart.

 It's harder than you think to get the seams to match up. This fabric is really thick. If I didn't have a Husqvarna, I would have been dead in the water!

 You would be horrified if you saw how I put the collar in...I cut the white off a dress I was getting rid of...Anyways, you'd be horrified. I did it in like five minutes.

The sleeves were the hardest part to pattern because they didn't follow the traditional pattern. I don't think I got them quite right, but I will make another dress using this pattern and I will fix them then. They are good enough for this first try, though!

The End!

Couple Shirts Made from Two Skirts - Green and Grey

This one isn't inspired by any designers per se. I just remember an episode of Project Runway where the contestants had to make a similar look for a man and a woman. I was at work when I started thinking about something simple that would translate well for both genders' body types. I played with the triangle. If a triangle is point-down, it emphasizes the broad shoulders and small hips of the male. If the triangle is pointed up, it shapes the chest and follows the curve of the hips of a female. I drew this on a sticky note and my husband said it looked like Star Wars. . .

For some reason I always had this idea in my head using jade or a Kelly green. Maybe because the color is gender neutral? I dunno. I just love green. Anyways, I could never find the right color green jersey in any fabric stores, but I did remember that I had a perfect green colored skirt in my closet that I never wear. It was actually a skirt I'd made from a dress that I'd never worn! The problem with it as a dress: It was just too frumpy. As a skirt, the hemline was always wonky and hit my legs at a weird length. I really loved the color so I'd never gotten rid of it. Therefore, the third incarnation was destined to become two different shirts!

I had another grey skirt that I'd never worn because it was too tight. I found a perfect grey skirt at Goodwill a few weeks ago, so I had thrown this skirt into my sewing room wondering what to do with it.

Here are the two shirts. There are little mistakes in both of them because I had barely enough material to do both of these shirts, so some parts are kind of pieced together (see the shoulders of the girl's shirt especially). Also, the green was wayyyyyy stretchier than the grey, so there is a little puckering that I just couldn't help. I may one day reinforce the triangle seams with elastic, but. . .let's just see how they do without it for now, I say!

This is the back:

The original dress/skirt had this fold over in the front and the back, so I kept it. It helps add just a little something feminine without changing the whole "sameness" of the two shirts. Man fashion doesn't really like embellishment, so I didn't do it to the guy's shirt.

The End!

Chanel Inspired: Striped Sweater

Okay, so this is another one that's really loosely based on Chanel. Anyways, I've been seeing sweaters for fall and winter that have shorter sleeves than you'd expect. I'd been working on this sweater for about two weeks, off and on, whenever my husband and I watched T.V.  I made this sweater from the leftover yarn I still had after the "Baby Boom of '13" as I'm calling it. (Of the 250 people at my church, 10 women will have had babies this year. I made them all mother/baby hat sets, and I had a ton of leftover yarn. Hence, the sweater.)

Basically, I knitted five panels. Two sleeves, two large panels for the body, and one for the neck. Then, stitched them all together. 

(I did other things too, like tapering in the body panels at the top to avoid the shoulders hanging off, folding the "fabric" over to create tubular edges, and tapering the top hems of the sleeves so they hang at an angle.)

This sweater is super bulky, so I will definitely not travel with it! It takes up almost half my carry on!

I lifted the sleeve to show how I matched up the colors on the seams on the sides.

The End!