Fluttershy Halloween Costume {My Little Pony}

Hi friends!  It’s been awhile.  Lots has happened in life.  We’ve moved a bajillion times.  (Ok, like twice.)  I had a baby.  Who is now nine months old.  But here I am today, oh, and we’re getting ready to move again.  (Hopefully we’ll be done moving for awhile, especially since we are FINALLY buying our own home!) 
I wanted to share my daughter’s semi-homemade Halloween costume (I feel sort of like Sandra Lee now). 
She is totally obsessed with My Little Ponies, and just HAD to be Fluttershy for Halloween!



Hoodie, found at the wonderful world of Walmart.  Added felt mane, wings, and ears.  Had a small logo on the front, which I unpick, which was a disaster, so we just covered it up with some felt butterflies. 
Skirt and legging we had on hand.  I just added a pink felt tail with a safety pin to the skirt.
I have been informed that Fluttershy still needs some hooves!  Other than that minor complaint, she totally loves it!

I {Heart} The Quick Unpick

Just found this new blog and had to share it with you: 

“The Spangler” shares lots of fun sewing projects, many of them made from refashioning old clothing.  She has great tutorials with lots of pictures and great explanations.  I haven’t had a serious sewing project probably since Christmas {gasp!} but now I am so excited to try my hand at one of her projects.  Seriously did not see a project that I did not adore!

Here were a few of my favs:

Seriously wish these boots came in my size!

 

This skirt would go perfect with the boots!

 

This adorable dress was refashioned from a woman’s skirt.  I must find a skirt exactly like it, so I can make this exact same dress.  So cute!

Ruffle Flower Purses Take 2 and 3

These were two Christmas gifts I made and gave to my cute little (who is now really the big 2-1 so I should call her younger, but I like to reminder her who’s boss!) and my favorite Sister-In-Law!  (Don’t tell the my other SIL’s, I don’t think they are aware of my secret crafty blogging identity, so hopefully they won’t read this!) 

I am getting to be a purse pro, well at least this style of purses.  I posted about my first purse I made for a friend’s B-Day, HERE.  Since I had a TON of leftover grey vinyl from that project, I decided these two purse loving gals would like one for Christmas.  (Oh, and I could still make ANOTHER purse!  I have that much leftover!) 

Two things that made process a little smoother the second (and third) time around:

• I used a piece of fabric and a piece of vinyl for the strap, it turned out much better than my first attempt where I used two pieces of vinyl.  Sorry first attempt!
• Second, I used two pieces of cotton fabric to make the pocket, instead of a piece of vinyl and a piece of cotton.  Again much better, and still super cute!!

I must give credit where credit is due, I was not clever enough to come up with this pattern on my own.  I found this great tutorial by Tam from Sew Dang Cute, who was guest posting on Ucreate.

I should add, my cute sister is the one in the bottom picture with the black and white purse!  She came down last Sunday and I told her I needed a picture of her purse for my blog.  I also told her I would crop her head out, but she’s just to cute to crop out! 

Be My Valentine!

I love this too much not to share. 

All made from felt! 
You can buy the pattern HERE at the Bugga Bugs Etsy Shop.

 

They also sell non-Valentine related felt patterns.

Felt Picnic

 

Felt Breakfast Cereal

 

They also sell non-food patterns.  I love this camping one (the moose is what really gets me, The Little Miss has been obsessed with this little plastic moose lately), the dollhouse is pretty darn cute too!

 

Here’s a Top Secret Heads Up (not really because you probably already know) Life With the Lebedas has a giveaway going on right now where you can win a pattern of your choice from the Bugga Bugs shop.

I AM NOT getting an extra entry in the giveaway for making this post, I truly just thought they were too cute not to share!  I am trying to wait patiently to see if I win one, but if I don’t, which I probably won’t, I am for sure buying one.  My only problem, which one to choose?!

Also, I have been seriously itching to make some felt food.  Suggestions, tips, offers to just make it for me, would be much appreciated!

Ribbon Christmas Tree Shirt

In this household a new holiday means a new shirt for the Little Miss!  It only took me halfway to Christmas to make it!  But once I sat down and got started it went really fast, like two hours tops. 

This is what I came up with (and a matching bow, or course):

It looks super cute on to, if you can get your model to hold still . . .

 

{Materials}

Shirt (ours is a 3T)
Ribbon (I used about six different color/styles.  Some of the ribbon I had on hand by the spool, some I bought at Wal-Mart by the yard.  I didn’t use more than a yard of any, more like 1/2 a yard of most.)
Sewing machine (optional, would be just as easy to sew by hand.)
Needle and Thread
Pins
Heat n’ Bond or double sided fusible interfacing
Iron
Scissors

 

{To Make}

To start I collected my ribbon and laid it out to get an idea of what would look best. 

I started with the bottom of the tree, cut an 18 inch piece of my ribbon. 

Ruffled the ribbon using my sewing machine, set tension as high as it will go and stich length as long as it will go. 

Cut my next piece of ribbon about 1/2 an inch shorter, 17 1/2 inches.  Ruffled.  Cut the next piece 1/2 an inch shorter, 17 inches.  Ruffled.  Continue until you have cut and ruffled all your pieces.  I ended up with nine layers. 

I laid my ribbon out once more on my shirt to make sure I had enough ribbon layers to make a tall enough tree.

Trace a triangle/tree onto paper side of Heat n’ Bond.  My triangle/tree had a six inch base and seven inch sides.

Pin layers onto Heat n’ Bond.  Follow the instructions on the back of the Heat n’ Bond package.  Follow these very carefully.  Iron the back/paper side.  Do not remove paper side until you have cut out your shape.  Otherwise it will be a disaster and your shape template with be gone.  But if you do mess up, you are smart, just use your noggin you can figure it out!

 

Remove pins, cut out tree, remove paper.  Pin tree onto shirt, iron tree onto shirt.  To be safe I turned the shirt over and ironed the back, instead of the front where the ribbon was.  Then turned it over and ironed the front, but placed a towel over the tree.  I was worried about the ribbon melting to my iron.  Irrational fear?  I say, better safe than sorry!

Instead of sewing around the edges and across the layers with my sewing machine, I did some sewing by hand.  I didn’t want my ruffles to get all smooshed down.  I fanned out the sides of the tree a little so it didn’t look so much like a straight triangle.  I just put a small tack stitch in each ribbon then sewed across the ruffle about a 1/2 inch by hand. 

Last step is to add a tree trunk.  I used a piece of brown ribbon, cut it about 3 inches, folded it in half, tucked the top unfolded edge up under the tree and hand sewed it down with tiny tiny stiches. 

Last but not least I added a bow on top of the tree.  Just a simple four loop bow, like you would make for a girls hair bow. 

This morning when we finished doing the Little Miss’ hair I decided that no bow we had would do, so I just HAD to make new one to match her cute new shirt!

 

{Some tutorials that might help}

I kind of followed this tutorial where she made a ruffled candy corn shirt.

Making ruffles with your sewing machine.

 

I’m linking my festive shirt up to these holly jolly parties this week!

Plus a few more:

Ruffled Purse

You’ve had a birthday shout “Horray!”,

We’re going to sing to you today. . .

My friend Mindy recently had a birthday.  I wanted to get her something special, because she is super special.  Mindy loves purses, so I thought that would probably be the road to go.  For some reason I thought it would be a terrific idea to make the purse myself . . . Things went well, for the most part.  I found this great tutorial by Tam from Sew Dang Cute, who was guest posting on Ucreate. 

So I trucked my tush to Hancock Fabrics, where everyone was so nice and helpful.  We recently moved here and I’d been going to JoAnn’s because that was were I went where we lived before.  But honestly some of the people there where sort of cranky, not to me directly but to other costumers, which made me very scared to ask them questions.  And now they are going out of buisness, (interesting correlation, huh?) so I decided to try Hancock. 

I wasn’t sure what colors I wanted until I saw this wonderfully lovely yellow, white, and grey flower print. 

It was way outside my comfort zone of colors, but I decided to go for it.  Sadly this was the only picture that I took, and it wasn’t even finished, or that great cause I took it with my phone.  But this was the best and cutest part:

To find the tutorial click {HERE}

Some things of my own that I would add if you try to make your own. 

• Buy a leather or some type of heavy duty sewing machine needle.  I asked the ladies at the fabric store if the thought I would need one.  They highly recommended it, so I went for it.  I’m glad I did.  I broke TWO leather needles.  I can’t imagine how many I would have broken if I’d used a regular needle. 
• I had a TON of vinyl leftover.  I could make a whole other purse . . . not sure how this happened . .
• I almost ran out of fusible interfacing. 
• The darn pocket was a pain in the neck!  I sewed it on a million times and it kept going crooked and bunching the lining . . . I think it would have been much easier if I would have just used two pieces of cotton rather than a piece of vinyl and a piece of cotton. 
• I also had a hard time sewing the two pieces of vinyl together for the strap.  I don’t know how this could have been easier . . .

Pumpkin Reverse Appliqué T-Shirt

{Supplies}

Coordinating thread
Small SHARP scissors
Fabric (orange and green)
T-shirt (I actually found mine at the Dollar Store)
Pins
Pattern/Picture
Ribbon
Embroidery thread (green)
Sewing machine

 

{How To}

Cut a square out of the orange fabric, big enough for you chose pattern and then some.  Pin orange fabric on the INSIDE of your shirt, wherever you want your pumpkin to be.  We choose the top center, on the chest. 

Pin your pumpkin picture onto the FRONT of the shirt, printed mine of the internet.  I actually did a Google search for “pumpkin appliqué” and got a lot of great results. 

Sew around the outside of your pattern, VERY CAREFULLY!  This pumpkin had a bit too many small curves for me, so instead of unpicking my horrible sewing and trying again, I sewed around my pumpkin five or six times, trying to sew close to what I’d already sewed but not right on top of the stitching.  In the end, I liked the look this gave. 

 

Be careful not to sew the back of your shirt to the front, or the front to the back.  I did not once, but twice!  Only sew the front of the shirt, otherwise you won’t be able to fit a little person in there!!

  Here is what my shirt looked like, remember the orange fabric you pinned the back, obviously you want to be able to see that so here’s what you’re going to do next:

 

  Using your small sharp scissors, carefully cut on around the inside of your stitches.  Getting as close as possible to them, with out cutting them.  

Now you have your pumpkin, but it needs a stem.  I wanted my stem to go behind my pumpkin, so this is what I came up with:

Cut a little slit at the top of the pumpkin, but not through the stitches, just above them.   To make my stem I used a piece of brown ribbon, cut, folded in half, sewed together the open edge.  This will go on the inside of the shirt, so you won’t see it.  So I didn’t worry about hiding seams, or as you can see changing my thread color.   Insert sewed end of ribbon through the slit so that the sewed end is inside the shirt Pin and sew on top of the ribbon, I tried to blend this in with the stitches I already  sewed. 

Pumpkin, check.  Stem, check.  Now for the leaf and vines.  Cut out two leaf shapes, place wrong sides together, sew around the edges, turn right side out.   Put some of the leaf in that slit you made to make it look like it’s coming from the pumpkin and the stem.   To sew my leaf onto the shirt, I used coordinating embroidery thread, sewed up the middle and around the edges.  As you can see I did not to a great sewing job with the machine, but I thought it helped the leaf to match a little better so I left it.  As a finishing touch I used the same green embroidery thread and stitched on a few swirly vines.  

   Pretty happy with my finished product, and it even survived the wash.  I had fears it would completely come apart, but it made it!  My pumpkin was a little bumpy, which added character to a pumpkin, but wouldn’t look so great if it was an initial or something.  So my tip would be, chose something with a simple shape that will be easy to sew around.  And make sure when you are pinning you get everything nice and flat and tight.  Oh, and it was super fast, it took me about an hour from start to finish. 

 

 

I’m excited to make some different versions using this technique, Wal-Mart has a ton of plain long sleeved shirts for $3 right now!

 

For more help and tips you can visit:
Crafting in the Closet and Sugar Bee Craft Addition