my first JJ!

So i've recently got back into a bit of dress-making. A great website for finding free print-at-home patterns is Burdastyle where i found a cute pattern for this blouse, the JJ.
It's super simple to put together with lovely puffed sleeves and a chinese collar. The original version has ruffles down the front and i'll maybe make another one like that, but for now i chose to keep it simple. Even better i found this cool fabric in ikea for £1 something per metre so it was also a total bargain to make!!
Most likely i'll be wearing it to work but couldn't be bothered getting dressed up for the photos so...this is it with shorts!! lol

convenient-pin-cushion

I absolutely love this little wrist pincushion, i find that it is one the most useful things that i have ever made! It was one of the easiest and quickest crafts as well. I saved the velvet-covered metal cuff that came inside the presentation box for a wrist watch...you know the thing that is used to display the watch showing how it will look on your arm. I then just sewed a little cushion onto the centre and got busy poking it with pins!!
The cuff has a bit of give in it so it stretches onto the wrist very easily and i frequently forget that i am wearing it...only to be reminded when i get stuck trying to force my arm into a cardigan or something...the untangling process that follows is not much fun!!

floppy guest craft

Well...this is a one off...i'm posting someone else's craft here...JosephExplosive made me a fab birthday pressie pot of ivy in a suitably nerd-celebratory fashion. From a physicist to an engineer, it really was made from the perfect thrifted material....floppy disks!! Now i wonder what the disks hold....maybe the first edition of llamatron, arkanoid or another one of my favourite old games...rolling ronnie!!! lol Good times...good times!!

chalky bubbles!!

Now what to do with all this chalk-board paint??!!

I thought we could make a photo-opportunity point where we could write messages and get our picture taken with the speech-bubbles expressing our thoughts. Hopefully it's sunny at the BBQ this weekend and i'll get some cool photos of all my family and the deep and burning things that they are dying to say!!
Same as the blue-board i just got mdf cut into the right shape and painted them up with chalkboard paint, before adding a dashed line of white gloss for decoration.

calling occupants of interplanetary craft

This is a bit of a retro-post, because i came across this top in my wardrobe the other day and just burst out laughing!!! I had forgotten it completely!! I loved the material sooo much!! It used to have a very tight high neck and long blue patterned sleeves. The long-sleevey-ness really doesn't suit me and my thyroid-induced-sky-high-body-temperature. SO i removed the sleeves and made this weird padded collar. I loved the way it made me feel all space-agey or something....and it is really comfortable!!!

youthful fantasy fulfilled

The dream of my young life was to see pearl jam live...but i would've settled for just Eddie Vedder if pushed! Anyway...not many of my heroes make it all the way to the emerald isle so i guess i thought it wasn't gonna happen. When then i heard that Pearl Jam (&Eddie) were coming to Belfast for the first time ever...it was meant to be. Thanks to my fabulous family (john & ann) we were kitted out with tickets and all that was left was the outfit!! The ripped jeans were an obvious choice but how to make the t-shirt a bit more "me"...
Apologies...i really could have ironed it for the photo!! lil'pill had a plain hem-line on her version, so i decided just to bunch mine a little round the hips to make it different. I made a line of pleats and secured them with a ribbon on the inside.
...and yes it was fabulous, thanks for asking! What a great view we had...it was suuuuuch a good concert!!!! Fantasy FULFILLED!!!

belated blue-board

Yay!! At long last SuperD's hand was healed sufficiently to complete the little task that i've been nagging (every waking moment) about!!! My garden blue-board is ready!! So now i can write happy messages and let the rain wash them away.
I used chalkboard paint and was initially going for the standard black but there was none left...so settled for cobalt blue (SuperD's favourite colour) to make it a bit more personal and also a bit more obvious what you are supposed to do with it...i stencilled our little faces and dashed line around the edge.
Now i'm all set for my big birthday BBQ extravaganza at the weekend, when this will be used for the cocktail menu and birthday wishes of course!!

packed with pertinent promises

I have been been thinking a lot lately of a way in which i can keep a record of the many answered prayers that have been blessing my life. Somewhere that i can record the problems that I am praying about, and then to record the answer and the subsequent resolution of the issue.
As a christian God leads me in decision making and in showing me what i should (and shouldn't!) do in every situation. It's really encouraging to glance back over the many times when the situation was impossible, and He told me that it would be resolved, and showed me what the end would be, and asked me to believe it...only for the impossible to occur and his words be proved right!!! Every time a miracle, and every time a surprise!!
I choose little business cards and punched them for hanging on a hinged ring so i can add extra pages when it fills up...which no doubt it will!!! I cut the corner off the "problem" pages, so i can find them easily from the other "verse and promise" pages. I covered a stack of the cards with material for the back and front covers and lined them in pale pink. Now next time my faith in God's deliverance from a sticky situation is waning, i'll have some home-truths to read from my own experiences!!!!

rings round my neck

Rings seem to be a big feature of summer jewellery this year and i recently acquired a large quantity of wooden curtain rings so i wondered if i could successfully incorporate them into a summery statement necklace. Problem is...they are really large curtain rings!! The necklace is possibly a bit too "invasive"!! I wrapped a couple of the rings in embroidery floss, one in beads and accessorised with a few rings of shell fragments and beads.
Then for a chain i chose plaited tie-dye to echo the beachy-ness and made a catch from some more of the wire that i had left over.
Finished! Now i wonder if i'll wear it?!!!

flowers at my feet

I loved the idea of customising shoes so bought a plain pair of velvet pumps and a big handful of assorted ribbon roses and got to work sewing them on!!!
I love wearing them...they're sooo over-the-top that you have to dress down to balance out!!!
I made them identical so i wouldn't like one foot better than the other!! lol!!