Most Beautiful

Beautiful. I think this is one of the prettiest things I have ever made….MY SHELBY of course! (one of my two beautiful daughters!)  Ok, ok so now you know what I’m getting at— here is the Coffee Shop Lace Dress by Bella Sunshine Designs. Today this popped up in my Facebook feed as the one year anniversary of taking this photo. Don’t you just love when Facebook shares your memories with you? Sometimes they are just “Plain Jane”..and sometimes I just want to cry because I melt over my babies! This photo I just OOOGLE OVER! It is by far my favorite BSD pattern! I remember when I took this photo, and every time I just stare at this pic of my daughter — I sigh — ahhhhhhhmazing.  I’m so proud of this AHHHH moment! The dress, the photo, the sunset….MY GIRL! Sorry…I’m just in AWE…E-V-E-R-Y time……Just a mom I guess. 🙂

This was an amazing evening. Shelby had so much fun with this photo shoot.  She was like a little super model!

If you don’t own this pattern yet….You need to! I will be making more of these for back to school as she will be starting kindergarten in just a few weeks.

I would get into details of the pattern, but the photo just speaks for itself…the eyelet trim, the little panel in the front…I’m just melting and itching to go sew some more….ok, happy tears…LOVE!

MWAH!

Hands on the Arts 2013

This year we went to the “Hands on the Arts” festival and craft fair in Eastham, Ma, for the second year in a row. Last year the kid’s had so much fun and I couldn’t wait to take them back!

If you didn’t catch my post last year about this fair you can find it HERE.

The brief run down of this event is that it is all FREE! Well, the kids activities are anyways! They had a puppet show for the Littles, and a big tent set up with many tables so the kids could do all kinds of free crafts. Then of course there are awesome craft vendors to peek through! (****remember to support your local crafters!! They work sooooo hard!!!), and a few food vendors—did I mention the mouthwatering BBQ?? YUMMERS!

Anyhoo, enough with the words, this is what our day looked like:

Peter and the wolf puppet show. Thie kids LOVED this!

Sorting seashells for the mosaic project…

 

I have to say here that my youngest, Shelby, was too small last year to really participate in the activities, besides putting her handprint in some clay. So this year she was very excited to not have to sit in the stroller. She had so much fun beading her own necklaces and choosing the beads. As you can see she is very proud of her work here!

Painting seashells, rocks, and starfish. You can never go wrong with toddlers and a bucket of paint. They love it!

My oldest daughter, Hannah was very interested in the pottery wheel. Here the woman is teaching the kids how to use it. This was not a take-home project because many kids would assist with one item, but it was still a great hands-on activity for the kids to learn from.

You can’t see Hannah’s project too well, but she made a  girl out of clay. Very inventive.

I was finally able to snap a pic of what Spencer was up to! He loves to mess with tape, glue, cardboard, paper towel rolls, and anything random!

Each of the kids had an absolute blast. It was a day to be creative without restrictions. They had many choices of mediums to use, and nice works of art to take home.

And then we discovered that I locked my keys in my car. ://////// OOPS! Here are the Littles sitting in a shady spot while we waited for the AAA person to come pop open my door—–

*sigh, it never ends does it? 🙂

At least we had a good day anyway!

As Always — Don’t forget to visit me on ETSY, and LIKE my page on Facebook to keep up with all the goodies!!!! Remember to support your local crafters!

Refashion Runway Sew Along— Feeling Patriotic!

More upcycles! I know…am I killing you with my upcycle posts or are you loving it?? But come on— This is like my 4th post this week right?! That’s an accomplishment!

Sewwwwww, anyhoo, I finally finished my  sew along piece for the Renegade Seamstress’ Refashion Runway! This weeks challenge was : DENIM. Um hello<<<<< THAT”S MY THING! Right? I mean my business is “These Old Blues.”

So I have to tell you first that when I saw the challenge this week was Denim, I just about flipped. As you can see above that I’m ultra excited about it! My first thought was a CORSET. I have been DYING to make a denim corset. I know people say you shouldn’t make one from denim, the fabric is too heavy, and it tends to have too much stretch. I don’t care though. I want a blue jean corset!

I started the pattern work….Now I’ve NEVER made a corset from scratch. I have upcycled other corsets but never done this whole entire process. So I’m teaching myself how to do this and realizing this is pretty hefty project. I will not be able to do a great job on this if I rush it and try to finish it in a week. So once again my corset is on the back burner—but it is in progress! I have the pattern in my muslin so I can try it out and make adjustments before cutting into the denim. I promise I will share with you all when I have it completed. 🙂

On to the project for the Refashion Runway Sew Along. I was doing laundry and thinking about what I could do that would really show off my talents. I was overwhelmed with the possibilities. As I’m folding clothes I came across this piece:

So this cute little denim jumper was getting a bit too small. My peanut is finally growing!

This is an 18-24 month jumper that fits more like a 12 month outfit. Shelby is 2 remember?? Well most of her stuff is about 18-24m anyway because she’s tiny, but she is FINALLY starting to sprout. The last time she wore this little number, every time she moved the dress hiked up and I could see her diaper hanging out. The dress still fit her width-wise, so I imagined just adding a ruffle to it.

I’ve also been imagining an awesome 4th of July outfit for her—-and then it hit me!

OOPS! Yup I cut it in half! I  was sensing that it was time for an upcycle…or “Refashion”

I cut the dress in half and decided to make a 2 piece outfit. I’ve been dreaming about stars and stripes with chevron for months now. So first I handpainted stars all over the denim top and bottom. Then added red and white chevron to both the top and bottom. Then a blue patriotic ruffled edge to the top and more blue ruffle on the bum of the skirt. I also upcycled a pair of red shorts to go under the cute little skirt. For those little bend over moments. 😉

I tried to get a close up of her cute little bow….she wasn’t happy at this point. She even pouted and told me no. I snapped the picture anyway. LOL. She really just wanted to spin around and play, but I was trying to snap pictures quickly before it started to rain again! Sorry sweetie! She IS getting better at this posing thing though.

The bow was NOT handmade by me. I purchased it from Princess Izzy Boutique on Facebook. SHE HAS FABULOUS ACCESSORIES, and is VERY reasonably priced!!! She is also on Etsy and you can find her shop HERE.

Excited! She really loves it!!!

 

As Always — Don’t forget to visit me on ETSY, and LIKE my page on Facebook to keep up with all the goodies!!!!

Still coming up soon is my Purse Renew Tutorial! It’s in progress peeps!

Happy Memorial Day

Isn’t this a great image? A friend of mine posted this on FaceBook and I was just in love with it. 🙂

This weekend was Memorial Day. It was a time for giving thanks to veterans and remembering those we have lost to wars. I spent the weekend in silence from my blog because I spent this time with my family, sharing and being thankful for our freedom. Some countries are not as lucky as we are.

We had a cookout, I was happy to spend some quality time with my sister from out of town, and we took the kids to the Drive-in movie theater. It was a great time! Sure I did some crafts over the weekend that I am dying to share, but I didn’t feel ready to share. I wanted to give my friends, family, and fellow bloggers a break from my ramblings about crafty things.

Although I have to say that this guy here in this video is a jerk for saying he is uncomfortable calling our fallen soldiers heroes. I saw this yesterday and was instantly bothered by it. Even though he explains himself, it just doesn’t make sense to me. Whether the term “hero” seems to lead to more war or not, it is just plain disrespectful. Obviously that is a matter of his own opinion, and this is mine. Our soldiers are the reason we have so many luxuries today including our freedoms and Constitutional rights. He would have NO RIGHT to say this if it were not for our military.

Whether this idiot has an inkling of respect for our military or not, I DO, AND I THANK YOU MEMBERS OF OUR MILITARY and their families! HAPPY MEMORIAL DAY! YOU are the reason we are here today!!!!!

I know war is a controversial subject but we still have to be thankful for what we have. What are your thoughts on this video?? Do you agree or disagree?

 

As Always — Don’t forget to visit me on ETSY, and LIKE my page on Facebook to keep up with all the goodies!!!!