That Thing Called Life...A Day in the Life of a Crafty Mom

Refurbish an Old Mannequin or Dress Form

2012-02-20T22:29:00.001-05:00

It was evident the sewing bug would get to me eventually, with both of my grandmothers being the seamstresses that they were. My Maw Maw made all my Sunday dresses while my Granny made special things and costumes for me. Granny was a seamstress for a living, and my favorite thing about her house was "Maude", her dress form. When I stayed with Granny, she would show me her extra stash bash, hand me a box of safety pins and let me go to work on my own designs. I would make sure Maude was right in front of the long mirror just like a model.

I inherited Maude after my Granny passed away. For the longest I was scared to use it again because it was so old, I didn't want to tear it up. I finally brought it home from my parents house and started to use it. My daughter also liked it, just like I did, and wanted to dress it up. It didn't take long for her to tear the thread bear fabric that covered it. It was upsetting to me, because I didn't want it to lose the charm it had from when it was at Granny's house. I didn't know what to do, so I put it up again.

I really needed a dress form, but buying a new one just did not seem right. So I began searching online for the best technique and asking around for advice. One suggestion kept coming back up: duck tape.
Seriously?

Finally this weekend I decided to brave it. I adjusted from the inside as much as I could, but the bolts are starting to rust and fall apart. I started with each seam and taped them in place. I stretched, pulled and all but stood on my head to get the pieces to line back up again. Once all the main seams were in tact, I began to fully coat the form with duct tape, taking my time and smoothing it out as I went. It only took one 55 yard roll of basic duck tape-less than $3-and about 2 1/2 hours to complete. I turned on the Discovery ID and watched Strange Stories of the ER and fully took my time. It's not perfect, but I think it will work quite nicely.

What do you think?

G'nite!

Crayon Roll Tutorial

2012-02-13T22:23:00.001-05:00

These are really cute and really easy to make. I searched and searched for instructions and finally came up with my own so I am going to share it with you. Thank you to my girl Angi over at Bows n Bottlecaps for reminding me of this!

WHAT YOU NEED:

FABRIC (I USED A BANDANA FOR THIS ONE)

FUSIBLE WEBBING

PONY O

MATCHING THREAD
SEWING MACHINE
RULER OR MEASURING TAPE

FABRIC PEN

CRAYONS

MEASURE AND CUT:
3 PIECES OF FABRIC 13 ½" X 5"
1 PIECE FUSIBLE WEBBING SAME SIZE

IRON ON THE FUSIBLE WEBBING TO THE WRONG SIDE OF 1 OF THE 3 PIECES OF FABRIC

TAKE THE 2nd PIECE OF FABRIC, FOLD IN HALF AND IRON

PIN THIS PIECE TO THE 1ST PIECE ON THE RIGHT SIDE OF FABRIC. ALIGN THE OPEN EDGE OF 2ND PIECE WITH THE BOTTOM OF 1ST PIECE. JUST PIN ON EACH END TO HOLD IN PLACE.

NEXT YOU WILL BEGIN MARKING YOUR LINES. USE A WATER SOLUABLE FABRIC PEN. START BY MAKING YOUR FIRST LINE IN THE MIDDLE, WHICH WILL BE AT 6 ¾".

THEN MAKE A LINE EVERY INCH AFTER THAT. YOU SHOULD HAVE A TOTAL OF 13 LINES.

YOU ARE ONLY MAKING THE LINES ON THE FOLDED PIECE OF FABRIC.

NEXT YOU WILL BEGIN STITCHING EACH LINE, BACKSTITCH AT BEGINNING AND END TO LOCK IN PLACE.

NEXT, TAKE THE PONY O AND ALIGN IT JUST ABOVE THE FOLDED PIECE, FACING IN TOWARDS THE FABRIC. STITCH OVER IT, CLOSE TO THE EDGE. I DID A ZIG ZAG STITCH AND WENT BACK AND FORTH SEVERAL TIMES.

NEXT TAKE THE 3RD PIECE OF FABRIC AND PLACE IT OVER THE 1ST 2 PIECES, RIGHT SIDES TOGETHER.

STITCH AROUND ALL SIDES, LEAVING ABOUT A 2" OPENING ALONG THE TOP EDGE.

CLIP THE CORNERS, MAKING SURE NOT TO CUT THROUGH THE STITCHING.

START TURNING RIGHT SIDE OUT THROUGH THE OPENING. YOU CAN USE A BLUNT PENCIL, OR I USED A CROCHET HOOK, TO PUSH THE EDGES OUT.

IRON FLAT ALL THE WAY AROUND AND FOLD IN THE OPEN EDGE.

(NOTE-I SPRAYED WATER FROM MY IRON OVER THE MARKINGS FIRST TO REMOVE THEM )

STITCH ALL THE WAY AROUND, MAKING SURE TO CLOSE UP THE OPENING.

INSERT CRAYONS, ROLL AND SECURE WITH PONY O

And that's it! But be careful, these can be rather addictive. Add crayons, a coloring book, and a matching bag (look for that to come) and you've got the perfect inexpensive birthday gift. When school supplies are first put out, I buy up a bunch of the 19 cent boxes and have them on hand to fill one with.

Please let me know if you make one, I would love to see your take on this!

G'nite!

Birthday Dress

2012-02-07T10:56:00.000-05:00

As tired as I was after a weekend of birthday celebrating, I still managed to make my little girl a birthday dress to wear to school on Monday. Remember this fabric?

How about the ribbon flowers?

I wanted to make a long peasant dress/top from the Brook Dress pattern I have, but I wanted to change it up a bit. I wanted to try out searing since I finally got the technique down pat. I increased the width by 50% for each panel and then sewing in 5 rows of searing about a 1 1/2 inches from the top.
Trial and error.
Sorry I don't have pics to post, but I was a little too frustrated to think about it at the time. The dress itself is a non-fitted design, and I believe I could have done the searing without increasing the width, or with minimal increasing. Needless to say, it was too big. And then I gave too much at the top for the elastic and made the area under the arms too small. It took a little adjusting, some seam ripping, but I got it to work.
I took some of the contrasting fabric and made some straps (albeit too long-I'll fix that later) and sewed them in place on the back of the dress.
All in all, it turned out pretty cute.

For the hair bow, I took 2 of the ribbons I used for the flowers, stacked and glued them together. Grabbed my bottle cap/images stash and made her a quick bow the morning before she went to school. The bottle cap for the center piece has her initial in it.

I took cup cakes to school along with a surprise lunch then got her out of school early. She had her yearly well check so it was excused ;-)

Now it's time to start planning Bubba's 4th birthday party...Disney's Cars.

What do you think of the party and birthday dress? What party plans are you making? I'd love to hear from you!

G'nite!

Little Girl's Sleep Over Party ~ Thursday & Friday

2012-02-04T13:11:00.000-05:00

Thursday was more about getting the house cleaned than anything, but I did manage to get a few more party things accomplished. I made the home made icing and put it in the fridge for Friday, coloring part of it and giving it a chance to set up and become a brighter pink. I also decorated the table and wall but neglected to get picutes as I was going, but final pictures are coming below.
I got the idea for the streamers and balloons on the wall from this link on Pinterest. I used tacky finger to secure everything to the wall, which keeps the wall from getting damaged. Unfortunately the tacky finger was blue, and it showed through. Easy fix. I took the same polka dot duck tape I used on the water bottles and ran a strip across the top of the boarder and the table cloth. I used a matching table cloth to hang on the wall; I didn't think my green wall flowed well ;-)

When I got off work Friday, I had 2 hours until the guests arrived...and then 2 came a half hour early. I was still getting everything to the table when 5 hungrey little girls were starting to attack. I made home made pizza rolls from a recipe on Pinterest (that I have used many times), cup cakes, cake poppers (my first attempt with icing and they don't look as good as I had planned-but they were still yummy), a snack mix of Buggles, Gold Fish, and Gold Fish Mix ups. You will also see the pretzels sticks and flower suckers I made in the picture as well.

Finally we had ice cream. I scooped it out ahead of time and placed in cup cake wrappers and refroze them. When they were ready, I put the ice cream in to the remaining plastic wine glasses I had purchased for the party tray craft.

All and all I think the girls had a great time. We had home made waffles and muffins for breakfast and now my 2 precious babies are sacked out in the middle of the living room floor. I think this Dixie Diva is going to curl up on the couch and do the same.

I hope our party ideas inspire someone to do the same! Please comment or share a link to your own party ideas, I'd love to see what you come up with!

G'nite!

Little Girl's Sleep Over Party ~ Wednesday

2012-02-02T16:44:00.001-05:00

As the week dwindles down I am getting the final preperations in order for my little girl's first sleep over party. I told her she could have 2 friends stay the night, 3 at the most. We are up to 4, possibly 6. So if you don't hear from me for a while after this weekend then you'll know I didn't survive lol!

On Wednesday I worked on a cake stand made with 2 items from the Dollar Tree: a silver platter and a 6 pack of plastic wine cups. I wanted to keep in the pink-black-white theme, so I pulled out the trusty paint. I took one of the plastic cups and painted it hot pink-2 coats.

Next, I took a pencil and stuck the eraser end into black and white paint to make polka dots.

After it had all dried, I coated it with a finishing spray and let it sit. It was then time to put it all together.
Because this is a plastic cup, I wanted to weight down the inside before attaching my silver platter to the top. Too much weight on either side of the platter and over she will go! I took some more of the glass rocks I had (I had these in vases with artificial flowers that had been stored away for some time) and filled the cup to the top.

I put hot glue all around the rim of the cup and attached the silver platter.

Viola!

Also on Wednesday, I made candy melt pretzels and dressed up the display box from Tuesday's post.

For the display box, I made ribbon and crepe paper flowers then attached them to the foam core with toothpicks.

To make the ribbon flowers, I took a needle and thread and began to make stitches on the bottom of the ribbon and started cinching it it. I didn't cut the ribbon from the roll until I had what I felt like was enough. I used 4 yards of ribbon for these you see pictured.
I then took the crepe paper, waded it up and then flattened it back out for texture, and then accordion folded it. Simple, cheap, and made with items on hand!

This mom is worn out and the party is not even here yet! Thursday brings the wall and table decor, candy suckers, and hopefully the home made icing.

G'nite!

Little Girl's Sleep Over Party ~ Tuesday

2012-01-31T23:05:00.000-05:00

The little Diva in the house is getting really excited for her sleep over this week. We've spent hours pining on Pinterest to get ideas. One of her favorites was decorating water bottles with duck tape. A very inexpensive and creative idea to customize for your party. Here is our version:

Her theme was to be pink and black, so I thought she would pick the zebra print like the one on Pinterest, but she liked this one better. They turned out really cute.

I've also been brainstorming for a way to display cake pops at the party. I've searched pinterest and party sites, but nothing really stood out. As I was cleaning up my craft area I came across an empty wipes container. I always save them, they make great storage containers for craft supplies, hotwheels and many other nick nacks. After a little more thought I decided to cover it in fabric, fill it with some decorative stones (to weight it down) and stuff a green floral block in it.

I'll do a final blog showing how it all falls together :)

And finally for today, here's a pic of the invitaion we put together.

I took 12 x 12 card stock and cut in to fours, decorated with scrapbooking stickers I had on hand and let my daughter decorate the back of each one.

Here's the great thing about Monday's post and today's post: most of it was FREE! Everything from the first post was made with craft supplies I had on hand (I love scrapbooking) and aside from the water bottles today's were made with items on hand or upcycled items in my home. The water was $1.88 at Wal-Mart for a 12 pack and the duck tape was about $3.50 (plus I have enough of it left for future crafts).

Over the next few days I'll be working on candy pretzels, candy melts, making the icing and creating the table and back drop. Check back tomorrow to see which one is next!

G'nite!

Little Girls Sleep Over Party ~ Monday

2012-01-31T13:22:00.001-05:00

My daughter has been begging to have her very own sleep over party for quite some time now. She is about to turn 7, and I wasn't sure we were quite ready for this yet. I'm still not! Our original plans were to go out of town for her birthday, but that thing called life came up and we are now planning a last minute party. I'm excited for her (even though I am secretly cringing at the thought!!). I do have some great mom friends that have volunteered to stay for a while, so hopefully I'll keep my sanity in check ;-)

I love making things for parties, it'sso much more personal. I remember growing up, my mom made every one of my birthday cakes. It would be a surprise most of the time, and the anticipation was always worth the wait. Eventually she took Wilton Cake Decorating classes and started teaching me. Then when I became a mom I wanted to carry on that tradition.

For my daughter's first 2 birthdays I made the cakes. Then my dear hubby convinced me that buying a store bought cake would be so much less stressful on me. He was right, I'll admit it. But it's also more expensive. My little girl picked a "character cake" and I had to go and get the matching plates, cups, yada yada yada. Cha ching, cha ching, cha ching. Ouch.

I've learned over the years (and with 2 children now) some creative ways to pinch a penny and still have a great party. This week I am going to try to throw together a quick, easy, cheap but super fun party for my little diva. I'm going to share with you some creations, a lot of them from Pinterest, and see just how thrifty we can get. Tonight I worked on cup cake wraps and topiary trees for table decor.

My daughter chose a pink and black "theme" for her party and it was going to prove a little difficult to find the right colors in cake liners. Instead I bought a pack of plain liners for 99 cent, then took to Google to find a cup cake wrapper tutorial. I printed the template and traced it on to card stock I had on hand. Here is what I have so far:

For some of the table decor, I decided to try some topiary trees from an idea I spotted on Pinterest. I took matching card stock from the cup cake wrappers and made 3 the same size. My wine glasses were short and skinny, so I added some floral brick to the top of the glasses for more height.

Check back each day this week as I show more of the party planning and will hopefully give you inspiration for your own DIY party.

G'nite!

New Years Resolutions Update

2012-01-18T08:44:00.000-05:00

I hope everyone is having a great start to the new year and that you are sticking to your resolutions! I've been working consistently at mine, but it appears that some of my resolutions are in conflict with each other.
Blog and Organize
You would laugh at the number of calendars I use, but it works for me. I'm a little it OCD, so there's my excuse. One of my calendars has general daily goals that I want to accomplish, and blogging is on that list three times a week. Instead, I have tried to stay off the computer once I get off of work so I can get other things accomplished on my list. Hence my problem.
So far I have been able to get a good bit of organization accomplished. For Christmas I received some new storage bins for my ribbon and a new craft table and chair. I was able to get all that set up and organize my ribbons, fabric and more. Next, I organized my kitchen cabinets and a shelf in my laundry room that had been bugging me for some time. I was also able to keep up with the house work and some laundry, all in the first week.
Baby Steps.
Last week, I started making Valentine's and Winter hairbows to update my etsy, website and Facebook pages. I made 22 bows, photographed them and got them downloaded. However, my housework suffered. Another conflict.
I spent all day Saturday getting the house cleaned and ALL the laundry caught up. Sunday I went to a couponing class and I am getting back in to the swing of saving on my groceries. I have also updated my blog, and other internet interests.
But how do I make everything work together? Where is that happy medium to make everything in my little world flow like a peaceful river should? It seems to get ahead or on top of one thing, something else suffers and I spend more time getting caught up. I think I need to rework the daily goals list!!
I promise there will be more crafts soon, but for now, how are your New Years Resolutions going? Any suggestions on my dilemas? I will keep you all updated as I grow in this process.
G'nite!

Homemade Pizza Rolls

2012-01-16T09:05:00.000-05:00

I am addicted to Pinterest. Love, love, love it. If you have never visited the site I give you one warning: don't until you have at least half a day to spend on it! It's a place to store all your "favorites" by photo. And you can see what everyone else is "pinning" about as well. Moving on.

I found a quick snack/lunch to try out with the kids this weekend and I wanted to share with you my version. It's homemade pizza rolls which are made very similar to pigs-in-a-blanket. Here's what you need:

Cresent rolls

Mozerella String Chees
Pepperoni slices
Butter
Garlic Salt/Powder

Preheat oven to 375

Spray a pan with cooking spray or use parchment paper (my new best friend in the kitchen!)

Melt a little butter coated with some of the garlic.

Next, roll out your crescent rolls and start adding your pepperoni slices and half a stick of string cheese.

Next, start rolling up and coating with the butter as you roll.

Finish rolling and coating. Bake for approx 15 minutes and let cool.

I made a couple of pigs in the blanket as well, just in case they didn't like the pizza rolls. It wasn't neccessary...they devoured them! You can eat as they are or dip in some pizza or marinara sauce. These were really good and I think we might even make more today. Super quick and easy, plus a hit with my kids. Its a win-win!

This is officially the first idea I have tried from pinterest and I can't wait to try more. What about you? Are you additicted to Pinterest? If so, what have you made from an idea sparked from Pinterest? If not, let me know your email and I will send you an invite.

This post was inspired by a very crafty and hip mom, Morgan, over at Miss Priss. I love her blogs about life, family and crafts. She is very inspiring and reminds me that I am not alone with the challenges we face as a mothers. Stop by and check out her blog and follow her on Pinterest.

G'nite!

New Years Resolutions

2012-01-03T22:58:00.000-05:00

Happy New Year!

Rarely do I get swept away into the "New Years Resolutions" that every one sets, but this year is different. Trust me, there are always things I want to change each year. I've just never took the time to make a list and concentrate on it. So I'll give it a shot :-)
Here is a general idea of what I would like to see happen this year:

1-Read Bible daily
2-Pray more
3-More Family Time
4-Date night with hubby at least once a month
5-Laundry-at least one load a day and maybe I won't get behind!!
6-Blog: I've just recently started this adventure and would love to learn more
7-Journal about all sewing I do this year
8-Couponing-get back at it
9-Excercise at least twice a week
10-Work on website
11-Take better care of ME
12-Organize
13-De-clutter
14-Cleaning-get a schedule and stick to it
15-New business ideas
16-Get my Etsy page better designed
17-Spend a little more time scrapbooking

I think that's enough for now! We'll see how it goes and I'll post any updates along the way. What are your biggest resolutions this year? Or do you skip the bandwagon like I normally do?
G'nite!

DIY Cookie or Cake Tray

2011-12-20T10:58:00.000-05:00

One of my favorite holiday traditions is to bake lots of goodies with my kids on Christmas eve. The only thing is, we don't have a cute little display for their artwork of edible beauties. Of course there are all kinds of cake stands, single or tiered, that correspond with each and every holiday out there that I could go and buy-but where's the fun in that? Not to mention when you're spending all your extra money on Christmas gifts it doesn't give you much room to budget in expensive decor.
So I did a little research on how to make my own. Anyone that knows me knows I will find a way to make something myself. You can take an old candle holder and plate, hot glue together and have an elegant little cake platter, or even use an old wine glass instead of the candle holder. This is a great idea and you could use mismatched items from your home or check the local good will. I decided to go to the Dollar Tree and see what I could come up with. I started to get the holiday plates and make a Christmas scene, but then I thought about how many other occasions I could use it for: birthdays, Valentines, Easter, ect, ect. Here's what I opted for:

A couple of plastic "crystal" platters, and some wide glass candle holders. Now keep in mind, you can use as many of these as you would like as long as you keep the weight of your items distributed evenly.

Next, place some hot glue all around the bottom of one of the candle holders, then center it on your first tray.

Then you will coat the rim of the glass with hot glue and affix the other tray on top, making sure to center quick before the glue sets.

I started out with just 2 platters and, upon the hubby's suggestion, added another tier. I'm pleased with how these came out, and I can use them for any occasion. You can always dress these up by adding some ribbon or fake flowers around the center. Another good thing about the glass candle holders I used, is that I could have filled the glasses with ornaments, confettii, or any other light weight item. The possibilities are endless!

Here's the final product:

Wishing you and yours a Very Merry CHRISTmas!

Amy~Dixie Diva

Keepin' It Real

2011-11-16T09:12:00.000-05:00

It's heartwarming to know that other mom's are as imperfect as I am. We all tend to hide it as best we can, but let's face it, none of us are She-Ra...we just pretend to be. I follow several other "mom" blogs that have recently helped me to remember I am human. Mom's just like me that love to craft and in photos everything looks to perfection. But behind the scenes is utter chaos just as in my own home. I'M NOT ALONE!!
Now, I'm OCD to an extent but that does not include being all neat and tidy all the time. That's not to say that tripping over the same toy three days in a row won't make me a little testy, it's just not my biggest priority. I like to say that a clean home is not a lived in home and trust me when I say we LIVE in ours! And for you mom's that can do it all and keep your home all neat and tidy, you go girl! But are you living on caffeine?? I want to know how you do it and manage to stay sane, especially if you are the mom of 2 or more.
So with all that being said, a fellow crafty mom blogger Crunchy Catholic Momma posted this:

Keepin it Real on Tuesdays.

Take a picture of one of your rooms (the way it really looks when no one is watching). Blog about it or post a picture on your Flickr, then link to this post at the bottom linky link. Lets stop pretending our lives are picture perfect, reality is more fun anyway and we can all share in the fact that we are not super heros we are women with real lives who make awesome stuff but forget to scratch off a few things on the To Do list.

So with that being said, here's my "Keepin it Real" for this week.

This is just one little corner of my office. Notice the multiple Halloween containers, my shoes I just took off, the mixer that I have desperatley been wanting that still hasn't been used b/c I can't find room on the kitchen counters! Oh and if you look closely in the corner, you will see the broken drawer leaned up against the art stand. Don't you love my pop tart box holding my sewing patterns? If it's a box that can be used in any way, I keep it.

So there you go, just one tiny space in my house that actually looks better than it did a week ago. My office has slowly become the catch all room. No where to put it? Just put it in mom's office. Alright, I've braved my keepin' it real...anybody else dare to share?

G'nite!

That Thing Called Life....It Happens

2011-11-14T20:15:00.000-05:00

So I had this fantastic plan to do "100 Craft/Gift Ideas for Christmas" in the 100 days leading up to the big day. That thing called life happened.

Husband got sick, cheer/football started, craft fair, county fair, I got sick, ect, ect. Like a lot of things we do, we start with such good intentions but then things happen and guess what? We're human.

So instead I am going to show you some of the things I've been working on and when I can, I'll show you tutorials. Any patterns that I purchase I won't be able to give you the how to, but I can tell you where you'll find it. I'm all about home/hand made everything. You don't have to be a pro, just a little creativity and if you don't have that don't worry. There's plenty of inspiration out there to get you started.

Now, I'll leave you with this (before I have to go referee the kiddo's). For homecoming week at my daughter's school they gave the kids a theme for each day. The first one was to wear a shirt or hat showing your favorite team. Of course we had nothing on hand for our daughter so off to buy fabric I went. Check out our little Tennessee Vol girl :)

This is made from a pattern I got on one of my all time fave sites http://www.youcanmakethis.com/ and the pattern is The Pink Dress by Lily Bird Studio. LOVE this dress pattern. It puts a new twist on the Pillow Case Dress. Now the first time I made it, I worked on it all Sunday afternoon. But it was a new pattern and my 3 and 6 yr olds were going at it non stop.
I can tell you one thing about it that I did different. When I unfolded my fabric, I realized that with the way the fabric was laid out, I didn't have enough for the length of the dress. So what I lacked for it, I just added to the bottom band. The same can be done with lots of patterns, even one that doesn't call for a bottom contrast band.

Ok, that's it for today but I promise to keep these more regular...lol!

G'nite!