Wednesday, April 29, 2015

Mickey Shirt Make-Over

We did a little thrift shopping at Salvation Army in Burnsville, MN.  It is a marvelous place.  I won't get all the way on top of my soap box, but I will tell you I have been disgusted at the lack of affordable thrift stores here in the mid-West.  Plain t-shirts can be as much as $20...USED!  One time one of those $20 used t-shirts was a JCPenny brand shirt....I am sure sold originally for $7.99.

Anyway, It is a favorite past time of mine to collect silly little shirts like these two and make them into something fun for my 6 year old daughter to wear.  She is extremely tall for her age and we have a really hard time finding clothes for her anymore.  By altering women's clothing to fit her child body, sometimes we make magic happen...and then there are all of the other times.

Anyway, I found this weird ruffle-sleeved women's muscle shirt for $2 on half price day, so for $1.  I can risk $1!  I took the shirt and just closed the armpits in a bit, then tapered the shirt out towards the bottom like a dress.  

Here is what it looked like after the 5 minute alteration... 
Adorable!  So sweet and feminine with just two little seam adjustments.  That one turned out so well I tried another.

This Mickey was even winking at me, like he was saying, "You can do it!"

First things first, cut off the neck cuff.

Since the back of shirts is generally higher than the front, I folded the shirt in half so the shoulder seams line up in the middle and the front is folded over the front, back of the shirt folded over the back. 

Slicey Slicey!

So easy.  Since the shirt is made from knit fabric, there is no need to be too fussy about raw edges.  I just folded over the fabric around the neck hole and sewed it to make casing for the thin elastic.

A safety pin in the 1/8" elastic does the trick so you can feed the elastic through the casing just made...

Until you come out the other side.  I just tie the two ends into a square knot after trying the shirt on my smiley little model.  I do recommend evenly distributing the shirt around the elastic, then stitching a little stitch, about where the shoulder seams are, so that the fabric does not bunch all in the front or back whilst crazy play is happening later down the road.

More winking..."You've Got This!" 
Must keep going...

These are the original sleeves.  I just wanted a little smaller opening, plus wanted to add a little feminine touch, so I shirred two rows on the top of each sleeve.  I had my model put the shirt on, then pinned where I thought the gather should start and stop, then set about sewing with elastic thread on my machine.

Zip-Zip
Done.  Does my little munchkin like her new shirt???

Judging by the sassy pose she took, I would say yes.

I also shirred up the back a bit to gather some of the extra fabric.
Emmers loved her shirt so much she wore it to school the next day.

Love it!  Best $1 shirt ever!  I must make more...

Tuesday, April 28, 2015

ToolBox Tuesday! The Disc Sander

I have had a ton of people ask me how I get that beveled edge on my woodcrafts.  It is no magical tool or method, I just sand it that way.  I use my 12" disc sander.  

Delta Power Equipment Corp 31-140 Disc Sander, 1/2 Horse Power, 12-Inch
Mine is actually attached to my huge all-in-one machine, but you can buy one like this Delta 12" Disc Sander for less than $250 on Amazon.

***Excuse the mess.  I work here...A LoT!***
This is my well used machine.  I use it to sand every piece of wood that goes through my shop.  Disc sanders are awesome.  They make it possible to take off a huge amount of wood in just seconds.  *BeWaRE!*  They will also take off huge chunks of flesh or fingernails in seconds too.  I have really had a couple blink-or-an-eye encounters with the disc sander when it was running that left me in pain for weeks.

Basically I buy 12" circles of sandpaper, 60-80 grit, from my local Rockler store for just under $10.  I have purchased the ones off of Amazon and was NOT IMPRESSED, so now I only buy them from Rockler.  A normal person could use one sandpaper disk for months or years.  As long as I am not making fires {using a wood that tends to be more moist and sappy}, I can get away with 2-3 months of serious sanding before I need to replace it.  The sandpaper disk is self-adhesive.  You just peel the back off and stick it to the metal disk, push the on button, and away you go.

I also attach a vacuum hose below the disk to catch some of the sawdust.  What you see all around is the sawdust not caught by the vacuum.  You can see, every once in a while the hose gets nicked too.  Anything that comes into contact with the disk sander ends up dust ;0}

I will try to show you my technique.  Please be aware you must be a seasoned user of the disc sander before attempting to sculpt wood like I do!!!  I don't want anyone to lose a hand or anything.  This is very dangerous if you are not used to using a tool like this.

Turn on the disk and let it get up to speed.  Hold your wood at an angle, press against the sanding disk, and pull towards you.  The disk spins towards you and down.  Never push the wood in the direction away from you.  The spin of the wheel will push the wood back towards you and hard down on to the table.  

Quite typically, when I am sanding down edges, I just touch the edge to the edge of the disk.  It doesn't take long for the sander to bevel the edge off.

The zigzag I had to work with today was the perfect piece to show you.  With the disk only running one direction, and the size of the disk, I need to work from two directions.  First, I sand all the edges I can easily sand from the center of the sanding disk then towards the edge closest to where I am standing.

I go ahead and sand all parts that can be sanded like that.  Notice that I can only get to half of the sandable edge.  Now is the tricky, can-be-dangerous part.

I have to angle the wood so that I can reach the other edges.

I hold the wood upright and sand from the top side.  

There are cases I cannot sand like this, like when the pieces are just too huge.  Then I just do the best I can sanding the normal way and let the rest go.

The first side of the zigzag worked great!  Now to do the other side.

Then on to harder things....like the whole bunny!

The bunny is a good example of a piece I just go with the flow and sand what I can.  Around the ears and the feet I do try to sand from the other direction a tad, but when it is touch, I just improvise.  That is the blessing of making rustic crafts.  You can fudge it over and still LOVE what you get.

Here are a few things I have made using this sanding technique....



This Castle


That is how I sand my Ipad stands


Ignore my terrible picture here, but I used the sanding technique TONS to make these Christmas Decorations.

And these cute little candy corns!

Those are only a few projects from the last two years made using this technique.  I have been sanding my corners for years!  I have to get to bed, but feel free to cruise my Woodcraft labels to see more!

I am SO happy to tell you that we got our sewing machines all fixed and set up.  The Sew*CakeMaker's have THrEe sewing machines in the house, and they are all set up and ready to run.  I will be back tomorrow to show you the cute t-shirt remodel I did this weekend.
Have a great night!

Monday, April 13, 2015

It's My Boschday!

It might as well be my Birthday, cause Baby, I brought home a Bosch today!!!  

New Tool!  New Tool!!!  AHeM!  I have a New Tooooool!
I got a palm router with interchangeable plunge base.  Yep.  Honey, we can sell the kids.  I have moved on to entertainment I don't have to feed!

I have been selling these saw frames for....well....almost a decade, and have never had the router to inset the picture.  Well, Ladies and Gentlemen...I do now!  
I am E-X-C-I-T-E-D!

Here is my frame on Etsy...
Now I can sell something that is not only cute, but professional! WoWoo!

I can use the router for this frame too...
Dad You Rock! Guitar Frame-Blue
AAAAaaaandddd, I can make a billion other frames {in all of my spare time, yeah right!}.
A girl can dream though!

Let's just take a closer look at that groove around the photo frame....It is so sexy smooth!
Thanks Hubbs for my gift!  It has been nice knowing ya ;0}
I will be in the garage from here on out.

I think I need to shop for router bits.....


Thursday, April 9, 2015

I {Heart} Baby Bellies

I have been doing mini sessions every time I visit Fairmont, it has been a while since I had a maternity shoot.  Heaven.  That is all I can say to describe this session with Amber and Baby Daddy.  
So sweet and youthful, we had such a fun time.  I enjoyed their sense of humor and the chance to get a little creative outside.  Have I mentioned lately, I {Hearth} Baby Bellies!?!

Cause I do!











Novelty Print Quilt Pattern

I have had a hard time finding good quilt patterns for novelty prints the past couple times I purchased them.  I made up this pattern so tha...