ribbon rose hairbow

for a gift exchange I made this hair bow. I had been going through some magazines and found a tutorial on how to make ribbon roses. it had several different roses in it, however the magazine was not in English so this was the only rose I could figure out by the pictures. I really ought to try looking up the tutorials online. I’m sure it would make more sense if I could read it. anyway this was all hand sewn. my first practice rose was a disaster but once I figured out how to do them they are actually quite easy. my second one was much nicer. one thing I did discover is you need to have a tight enough weave in the fabric or the knot on the starter thread will pop through and when one is half way through a rose that can be quite frustrating.
I completely free handed the beading. which I thought turned out pretty well. the lace was in my stash. and as for the shape of the bow I free handed that as well.
what I want before I go making too many more of these roses, is to get an awl. I think it would help in getting the ribbon through that first and last time, without cutting the fabric. because the knots on the ribbon go on the wrong side of the fabric and the ribbon has to be pulled through the fabric, which is not easy always easy. I had to make holes first and the problem with that is of course if you cut one to many threads on the fabric your hole will be too big and the knot will pull through. so an awl seems as if it would punch the correct size hole without cutting the fabric. I have needed an awl for other sewing projects as well. its amazing to me all the tools one needs for sewing.
I also have a few more things I made for Christmas gifts however those can not be posted till after the holiday, I can’t risk the giftee seeing them after all.

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A Christmas skirt.

for work I had to participate in a Christmas festival , and of course had “nothing” to wear. I didn’t want to wear what I had worn the year before that would have just been tacky right?

I found this dress in some stuff someone had given to my mom for my niece, except my niece will not be anywhere near that size for years to come, and rather then store it away for ages I snatched it up. the dress being in child sizing of course meant that it was not shaped correctly for me, though it did fit but looked like a baby doll style dress on me and that was not something I was going for.

I did like the plaid though so in s split decision decided to make it into a skirt! simple right? just cut off the top and sew it back together. well it should have been that. but they put the thing together in a rather complicated manor. so I ended up having to take it apart a bit more then I had anticipated. the lining and outer fabric where sewn together all around the bust. not unusual but I was rather hoping for just thread tacks. I was excited about not having to deal with a zipper it was already installed so I was going to cut it down, which I did and would have worked except I stupidly zipped it all the way up while I was doing a fitting. and pulled the head off. I was able to thread it back on but I had to undo the bottom of the zipper to do so. invisible zippers I have noticed don’t thread on from the top like other zippers but rather from the bottom. I also had to bring in the waist a bit which I did on the sides. I got it all back together thinking it looked really good only to try it on and have the waist gaping. and now here was a dilemma. I needed the waist smaller by about two inches. but having cut the zipper so short there was going to be no way it would fit over my hips if I took it up. so to solve this I opted to put 1/4” elastic at the top of the band just to snug it up that little bit, which did just the trick and of course allows for me to wear it all season and still be able to eat, since you know it will stretch.

so in the grand scheme of things I like the way it turned out. I don’t think in the end it was any easier then making a brand new skirt but that is okay.

and here I am wearing the skirt. you can tell I was coerced into sitting on Santa’s lap by the way I’m sitting. my work was hosting Santa though, so all of us did and I wasn’t the only one complaining. I also made Santa’s boot furs. I think I was given the wrong measurement though because they kept sliding down. but I can only go by what I was told. my coworker and friend actually made the Santa coat and hat. didn't she do a nice job? I thought it turned out really well.

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Happy Halloween!

Here is my Vanellope costume being worn! yea! I did Halloween this year on Saturday due to many factors, it was fun I met with some friends and we wondered around the Halloween festivities they had in town.



one thing I was not thrilled with on my costume is I think the sweatshirt is a bit long. I should have done a trial run before wearing it out in public. if (when) I wear it again I am going to take the time to shorten it. that way I wont have to keep pulling it up. besides that though I thought the costume turned out cute.

my hair things!


yeah my costume is a bit on the too blue and too light side, not quite as light as it looks in the pictures though it was really bright sunshine Saturday.

and a reminder pic of how little miss Vanellope looks.
had fun with this one. now its time to start focusing on Christmas.

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some non sewing aspects of my costume.

I have finished my costume yea!

here are some of the non sewing pieces of it. first off the leggings. I bought mint colored leggings, and used Jacquard textile paint I purchased on Amazon for the white stripes. number one lesson this taught me. don’t free hand paint things. I did mark with tailors chalk where I wanted the lines but they ended up a bit sloppy, not quite straight lines and such. I should have used painters tape or something so it would have been more even. I had to do two coats of paint so it took several days to do the painting. but it knew it would from the reviews of the paint. as for the quality of the paint it seems nice. I haven’t washed it or anything yet though so I don’t know how that will effect it. it does have a tiny bit of stretch to it, but not much without cracking. good thing I don’t need too much. if your going to need lots of stretch with the paint I suggest having your fabric stretched while you paint. the purple stripe is just puffy paint I had, painted on with a paint brush.
next is the hair things.

I painted two buttons I had with red paint to make them look like peppermints, then glued them with E6000 glue on to barrettes, and bought some plastic rhinestones, that I then glued onto bobby pins for the round sprinkles in Valenope’s hair.

now the gummy bears were more of a challenge as I had to find them. but I managed to find this really neat place on etsy that sells all kind of cute food things like plastic gummy bears. they look really real. so definitely not something one would want around little kids. I used E6000 glue to glue these to the barrettes as well, and am hoping it will hold. the site says to use silicon glue on the gummy bears, but the E6000 glue seems to be holding them . at least all of them except the green one, not sure why that is, but oh well I just wont wear that one.
delishbeads on etsy

for the candy jimmies I am going to use colored bobby pins. I tried to make some out beads which looked cute and I might use some of them, but my hair was not thrilled with them, tangling in the beads when I tried to take them out and breaking my hair. so I was not much of a fan of the ones I made.

the licorice hair tie is actually sewn! I bought some red macramé rope, cut it to the length I wanted, burned the edges, zigzagged three pieces together on my machine then hand sewed them around a piece of red pipe cleaner. which gives it the stiffness and flexibility I needed. I made three pieces then braided them together. and sewed the ends so they wouldn’t come apart. I then tacked it in a few places to make sure the middle would stay together too.
so that’s it my Venelope Costume is finished!

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Vanelope skirt

I finished my Vanelope skirt a while ago, but am just now getting around to posting it. its a very simple skirt with two layers gathered onto brown satin, one layer is shorter then the other to give it the layered look, then I added a waist band with full elastic. like I said super easy. I think it turned out cute and I will probably wear it not only for Halloween but also for everyday wear. all I have left on the costume now is painting the leggings. I need to get to it, time is running out.

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Vanellope Hoddie done!

I was finally able to go to the fabric store and found some cute knit with hearts on it. its slightly more green but I figure that’s okay. they had some without hearts but I liked the hearts better so its the one I ended up getting. the construction then went pretty quickly. actually the tiny piece I put in at the front of the hood to cover the stitching on the inside took the longest to put in. it was a piece not called for in the pattern but I wanted it to cover the stitching at the front of the hood. oh vanity can cause such frustrations. I used McCall's pattern #M6614 view D, with only a few minor changes. one being that the pattern is for a zippered front hoddie, and Vanelope’s is a pull over, so I cut the front piece on a fold rather then in two pieces. I also constructed the hood slightly different, since I needed button holes to put the string through and the pattern didn’t call for it. I did all the inside seams with just serging which works great on fleece and knits plus its what the manufactures do. it looked really good till I was trying to put the hood on and it wasn’t working. it was then I realized of course its not fitting, my serger stitch is only a quarter of an inch seam allowance and the pattern calls for five eighths seam allowance, so with four seams I had an extra inch and a half to work in plus the fact I needed to overlap the hood a half inch and the fact of it being cut on a fold not in two pieces added a bit too, so I am left trying to ease in a good three inches, and that just wasn’t happening. so I did some math and went back to the serger where I took off what I needed, and amazingly the hood fit easily after that. yeah that was poor planning on my part. its just one of those things I didn’t even think about till it wasn’t working then it was like oh yeah duh! I opted to go ahead and punch holes into the front with an awl for the red ribbon, since in the end I think it will look the best. so far I’m liking the way the costume is coming, I can only hope we have the perfect day to wear it when the time comes, not to hot, nor too cold, because around here one never knows what the end of October will bring.

the fabric I lined the hood with

the tiny piece that took forever to put in. and it really doesn’t look all that great, but it keeps the serging from showing, which is what I wanted

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Vanelope Von Schweetz hoddie

so I made it to the fabric store and bought the underlining for the skirt, and my fleece for the hoodie. here is what I have done so far on the hoodie for my Vanelope costume. the color looked a lot greener in the store, but that’s alright I think its close enough and I’m not entering any contests or anything its just for fun. I could actually be done with this by now but unfortunately ran into a slight problem, one that is totally my own fault! I forgot my list when I went to the fabric store which led to me forgetting to buy lining for the hood. something I feel its needs. otherwise my not quite matching serging shows its a bit darker so I don‘t like the way it looks on the outside. plus a lining will give it a much more finished look, which I want. I went ahead and put as much of the hoodie together as could without the lining. so the hoodie is now on hold till I can make it back to the fabric store. and this is something I really want to buy in person, so as to match colors as best I can. the fabric store is an hour away though so I want to combine it into another trip. I’ll make a special trip if its something I have to now, or for a bigger purchase but I hate to go that far for less then a yard of fabric. when I have six weeks to complete this. and will probably be out that way before then. if not I will make a special trip, but I highly doubt that will be necessary. the other thing I am trying to decide is how I want to add the red ribbon stitching to the pocket. do I want to punch it through the fabric which is how its supposed to look, or do I want to sew it on top without going through the fabric. I’m just not sure I want to put a hole in the fabric for the ribbon. but since this is fleece it wouldn’t really hurt it to do so, I would just have a little hole. and if I poked it through with an awl it wouldn’t be too large. I’m going to think on that one. so far so good on this one, which makes me happy.

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