Black altered tee

I don’t usually go to tag sales, because I always buy stuff, and truly, I have enough stuff. But my friend and walking partner, Cindy, told me that there was a great yard sale with a pasta machine, and didn’t I want to make lovely fresh pasta for my Italian husband? (Well, no, not really. Love the guy and all, but can’t I just buy boxed pasta like the rest of the Italians?)

But, off I go to the yard sale. Dragged DS2, who got $5 to spend. He haggled on some snap together plastic roads that came stuffed into a huge plastic garbage bag. Oh, goody. More stuff, made of plastic.

Oh, sorry. Back to me.

Anyway, I bought some books for the boys, and some great tee shirts! They were ginormous teenage boy shirts– the kind that are black with aggressive graphics, so big they hang down to your knees…Perfect for a little altered art!

Here’s what I started with:

I needed to address the fit, first.  I generally lay the ginormous tee flat, then lay a favorite tee on top of it.  Then, I trace around the tee with the nice fit.  You can see from the above photo how I traced off a tee whose fit suits me. I use school chalk to mark everything from clothing to quilts.

Here I’ve chopped the tee up– this is the front!

Waiting for sleeves. I am not a trained seamstress, so I’m eyeballing those sleeves. I used the original sleeve as a pattern for a newly added fabric sleeve with lettering.  The fabric came from a thrifted pillow sham!

I received a serger sewing machine for my birthday (thanks again, Mommy!) I used it to sew all the seams together. It took me longer to figure out the threading than it did to sew. Now that I’ve got the threading under control, this is one machine that will get a lot of use! It’s so fast! ZOOOOOOM!

I cut the neckline into a roundy feminine shape, then serged the edge, thinking I would turn it under. I know that I need to fiddle with the tension and that’s why the neckline is so ruffly, but I like it! It stays as is, a serendipitous bit of serging.

Those graphics! I like them, but they are a bit aggressive!  Somehow, I never realized what the graphic was until I had the tee flat on the floor and I was looking through the camera’s view finder!  GRRRRR,  incisor man!

I know– tame them with flowers!

The finished tee!

So that I look as cute leaving a room as I did when I entered:

a touch of whimsey for the back of the tee:

La plume de ma tante

“La plume de ma tante” (my aunt’s pen) is what most people remember from their early French lessons. Is that like “run, Spot, run”? Maybe.

I began learning French when I was in 6th grade, back in the Middle Ages. In the first week, my clever teacher taught us a small “play”, in which I was to go into a forest, searching for flowers to bring to my mother. I still remember how excited I was, walking home, picking some wildflowers, and giving them to my mother with a flourish and a French phrase!

Now this little life tidbit will come into play later in this post, so tuck it away in your memory, and read on!

If you’ve been reading about the sad state of my winter wardrobe, you’ll know that I’ve been working on updating my sweater collection. I found an old black hooded sweatshirt, and thought, hmmmmmmm. Blank canvas!

I found a vintage black floral pillowcase, some black floral yardage in my stash, and some butterfly yardage. I did some collage work on the front and back of the sweatshirt, covering the various stains that magically appear on sweatshirts. It seemed ok, but it wasn’t speaking to me…

Until one morning, when my turn on the French stage popped into my head! Aha!

I finished collaging with more of a plan, including pulling off the bottom ribbing, replacing it with the striped fabric.

Pour moi, the piece de resistance is the lettering I added, which has made this one of my more satisfying and personal re-models:

Je voudrais bien aller dans le foret pour chercher des jolie fleurs (I would like to go to the forest to look for some pretty flowers)

C’est mignon, n’est-ce pas?!!

Orange altered sweater

Faithful reader, do you know that I’ve only lived in Southern California for 9 years? I moved here from Chicago, where I grew up. (That is the reason for the ironical references to the bitter cold of the SoCal winters. It amuses me terribly that I am so cold now, when the thermometer registers any number under 72. And of course, in the summer, when it gets above 85? SWELTER!! Can you say spoiled rotten Callie girl?!!)

Anyhoo, I realized that all of my sweaters are aging terribly! How can this wearable artist emerge from her lair looking so dated? And yet, with only a few short weeks to wear sweaters, this thrifty non-consumer is not about to plunk down hundreds to re-stock the old closet. (unless you all want to go shoe shopping. Then all bets are off and I’m in!)

I pulled down this wonderful orange chenille funnel neck.

Funnel neck? How old is that?? Dragged it out to my studio, where I marked the center front from the top of the funnel to the hem, using my trusty white chalk. I then zig zagged on both sides of the chalk line, keeping close to the line without overlapping the stitching:

After cutting up the line, being careful not to clip too many stitches, I had a cardigan shape with a nice wide collar. Looking more modern by the minute!

I bound the front edges with a pink, orange, and yellow batik. Pink and orange is my favorite color combo– yippee!

I added mis-matched buttons, just for the whimsey, and put a belt on the back made from the same batik, with some buttons sewn on for fun.

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Ahhhh. Now my winter wardrobe is coming up to speed!

Holiday Crafts

My oldest son participates in his school Holiday Bazaar, which means I have to think up some appropriate craft to make and he sells it for 50cents. Last year, I spent $25 on craft supplies, and he made $8.

I doubt he will rock the business world anytime soon.

This year, I decided that I, er, I mean HE was going to make a craft using supplies from my prodigious supply warehouse (the fam calls it a studio, but it could be opened to the public, all major credit cards accepted).

I tried making some prototype stuffed monster dolls, which are so darned cute. Since the school says no item can retail over $5, I thought smaller might be more cost-efficient. I’m pretty sure he won’t get rich on this Bazaar, but I don’t want to be out too much cash!

These are my prototypes– I love them!! But…

The small size means that they were a bit challenging, even for me. And, since I am a professional cutter/sewer, and he’s 10, it’s back to the drawing board.

I have been diligently working on my wool felt quilt blocks, so of course, there are piles of chopped up wool sweaters everywhere in the warehouse. Darn– I mean, studio. The boys followed me into the studio last night (I try to take a different route every day, but they find me anyway.)

Anyway, the boys started playing with colors of felt, and soon had coerced me into letting them sew with my machine. My fancy, pricey machine with a needle sharp enough to pierce a finger, thus allowing us to further support the local hospital’s retirement fund. Fortunately, by the end of the evening, the machine was unharmed (the boys were fine, too.)

Here’s the result of our play time: a nice warm hat (in case the temperature dips below 80 degrees–brrrrrr!) DS1 figured out the fit and construction all by himself:

It is made entirely of cut off cuffs, with the top part made from a shrunken cowl neck ribbing. The words say “yo what now” which is apparently some kind of surfer-dude speak. I wouldn’t know, I’m old. And the ear flaps– what an insouciant touch!

And so– we are still working on ideas for the craft bazaar. I am hoping to be “working on ideas” well after the bazaar– having experience in this area, I can tell you that my role as Little Helper suddenly expands to MomYouDoIt when a group of his friends strolls by…

What now, yo?

So much stuff, so little room

I love to create handbags, scarves, silk cuffs, skirts…. but I live in a small house with a smaller closet (and some of you know that my closet is stuffed full of shoes–shhhh)

I had to do something to clear out a little space, sooooo– I just created an etsy shop! It was fun, fast, and intuitive (I am becoming much more computer-literate that I ever thought possible!)

Here are the photos of the items I’ve got listed. I’m not going to put a ton of things up for sale– I want to see how this goes. My kids are all excited– oooo, Mommy, if you sell that shirt for $2,000,000, can I have a new skateboard and a Wii, and a (fill-in-the-blank)? They are such wonderful, supportive children, aren’t they? And no, I did not list a shirt for 2 million dollars. Not even for a skateboard.

Wish me luck!

How to make a duct tape dress form for sewing and quilting clothing

Most people go shopping the day after Thanksgiving– the retail industry refers to this day as “Black Friday”.

My new-found cousin (who joined us for Thanksgiving, introducing us to “Tofurkey” and it’s accompanying amino acid, Tofurkifan) and I made a duct tape dressform on the day after Thanksgiving– giving birth to a new holiday, “Silver Friday”.

I love to create wearable art, especially Wild Onion Jackets or even altered sweatshirts! I was given a dressform by a friend who moved away. It was a wonderful gift, but it wasn’t really my shape. After learning about this method to re-create your own body shape using old tee-shirts and duct tape (link) I decided that this was the perfect way to introduce this new-found relative to the craziness that is my family. (Please, if you meet relatives via the internet, be sure to vet them carefully before meeting them in person, or you too could be sucked into a bizarre situation like dressmaking dummies! Fortunately for me, Michelle didn’t vet my family!!)

So, without further ado, here is a tutorial on how to make a duct tape dress form, complete with the day’s photos!

First step, choose an old tee shirt that kind of fits. You will be cutting it up, so don’t choose a shirt you love! We cut up the back so that we could then re-tape the shirt to make it tight. You want to avoid excess fabric which creates wrinkles, which creates added inches on the finished dress form.

We re-taped the shirt to fit my figure a bit more snugly.

We (and I really mean Michelle– I just stood there, absorbing the humiliation!) criss-crossed my breasts with tape…oh, look! a Playtex living bra!

Continue wrapping your breast area using diagonal strips of tape. Make sure you don’t squish yourself!

Here you see the finished first layer– wrapped vertically from neck to micro mini. (***IMPORTANT NOTE!!! Do not– NOT– think that it’s a good idea to wear a pair of leggings for your bottom layer! It is NOT a good idea– how the heck do you think you’re going to get yourself out of this outfit at the end???!!! Please know that here I am serving as a horrible warning, not a good example! Wrap a plastic bag or another piece of old tee shirt in a skirt form. Muuuuuch better idea.)

We initially thought we’d make a short-sleeved dressform, so we (again, with the “we”. Michelle did all the work, and I just stood there.) If you think you’ll make a short-sleeved dressform, cut up your sleeve and re-tape it to snug up against your arm. We ended up cutting off the sleeve for the final dressform, but who knew?

I’m pointing to the beginnings of the horizontal wrapping layer. You need to pull the waist tight– don’t add pounds to your figure, unless it’s with chocolate. Chocolate is much more fun than duct tape. You can see how much excess we got with that first vertical layer– see the gathers at my waist? Cinch it in, Miss Scarlett!

Hooray– we’re almost finished! See how much, um, curvier I am compared to the dressform? At that point, I felt like I was in a full length girdle. Thank goodness we don’t wear corsets anymore– this is not comfortable!

Okey dokey. Now we’re done with the duct tape…and it’s time to cut me out. This is where we had that sinking feeling….how do we cut me out of the PANTS??? No one’s been near me down south with a sharp instrument since I had my c-sections. How well do I know Michelle? Is she trust-worthy? Shoot– I didn’t vet her, either. Deep breath, close eyes, CUT!!

TA DA!! Here we are– Susan and Suzette. We re-taped the duct tape dress form over the original dress form, adding stuffing as needed to pad the duct tape form. We are currently exhausted from all our hard work, but when we recover, we (meaning I– poor Michelle will have escaped by then) will take measurements. By the way, how do you gain 3 pounds from one little Thanksgiving meal??? Oh, I digress.

I had never seen a duct tape dress form put on top of an existing dress form, so I thought it might prove helpful to post a how-to for those of you with an existing dress form which didn’t fit your personal body stats! If you don’t have a dress form, there are other ways to “stuff” the duct tape form: expanding insulation foam, craft batting/stuffing/foam bits, etc. You will also need something to use as a center post stand: I wonder if you could salvage an old table lamp? Try it and let me know!

I can’t wait to use the new dress form to help me out when I make my altered wearable art, or better yet, my Wild Onion Jackets. I think it will prove invaluable to learn where NOT to place certain appliques, how best to accentuate my better figure attributes, etc.  The dress form will come in handy when I make all the new Wild Onion Jackets to show during the classes I will be teaching at Quilting with Machines!

So, statistics: about 3 rolls of duct tape, one old tee shirt, one pair leggings (but you’ll be wiser than that), one unsuspecting relative, one digital camera, one afternoon, one bottle of wine. Two good senses of humor. One blog.

Addendum: I went out to measure me/my dressform. The dressform is about 1 to 1.5″ bigger than I am– I will try to re-wrap her, cinching her in a bit. Either that, or I need to start eating more to gain the extra inch on my body so we match…

Wearable Art Connection fashion show

Some of you know that I belong to the Los Angeles Wearable Art Connection. Every year, there is a challenge fashion show; this year the challenge was to create a vest.

I entered in the “Manipulation” (fabric, not people!) category, and I’m pleased to tell you that I was voted into First Place! Ok– enough about me, I know you want to see the goods!

(Ha ha! Just teasing you! I’ll show you the real deal– this is just me, standing up at the podium while Diane Ricks reads my artist’s statement.)

This is the full outfit. Although the challenge only called for a vest, I was inspired with a full blown vision of the skirt, too! I created the fabric for the vest with my embellished noodles technique, using my own hand-dyed fabric for the background. The zinnias are made with gorgeous hand-dyed strips from Judy Whitehead. (Thank you sodypop! Your gifts are always appreciated– and loved and used!)

Here is a close up of the vest. I’ve embellished the fabric with silk flowers, fabric charms, Angelina fibers, and crystals:

Here is a close up of the skirt. It used to be a pair of white jeans. The inset is a piece of my hand-dyed cotton in a different coloration from the vest, with wavy strips of the vest’s fabric raw-edge appliqued to create some graphic tension. The zinnias are made using the same embellished noodle technique as the vest– I simply created them separately and appliqued them onto the skirt. I stencilled “Zinnia, Zinnia, Zinnia” using acrylic paints mottled to mimic the hand dyed background fabric:

Here is a photo of the flowered cuff I created using Judy’s hand-dyed cotton:

And, courtesy of Mary Norton from Fibervision, here is the newly crowned Zinnia Queen, modeling the entire outfit. Dig those bejewelled shoes!

Another rusty post

You all are going to want to update your tetanus shots: here’s some more rust, coming your way!

I’ve posted previously about the fabric I’ve been rusting, dyeing, stencilling, and what all. Now, how about wearing your rust?

These are some silk scarves that I rusted, then overdyed, then stamped or stencilled or silkscreened. I’ve also done a silk knit tee and a long-sleeved button front silk blouse– but don’t seem to have photos!   Oh brother.  I sent them off to the Elverhoj museum without documenting them.  Well, I’ll just have to rust some more clothes to share with you all!

Meet Doris!

I am lucky enough to belong to a wonderful group of talented art quilters, called Fibervision.

A few months ago, we decided to work on a re-vision challenge. Everyone who wanted to participate brought a UFO (quilted, unquilted, blocks, it didn’t matter. We are women who do not do rules. We have found that if there are rules, we break them, just to be ornery.) A “UFO”, for those unfamiliar with quilting terms, does not reference Roswell, but refers to the myriad of unfinished projects (or objects) hanging out in our studios.

Anyway, we gleefully put a project from our studios into a brown paper bag, and tossed them onto a table at a FV meeting. Everyone picked a bag, and we dragged someone else’s unfinished work back to our studio to do whatever we wanted with it. It was actually quite freeing to have no emotional attachment to the work, and people chopped and painted with abandon. Hopefully, by the time you are reading this, the photos will be up on our website so that you can see what happened!

Here is a photo of the quilt top I got in the swap– an abandoned project from a Ricky Timms workshop. I loved the colors and fabrics, and was inspired pretty immediately!Many thanks to the extremely talented Ruth Walters for donating her UFO!

I have been making skirts from pants since high school, and I usually have a pile of pants sitting in my studio waiting to be transformed.

I realized that I had these olive green pants (that NEVER flattered me) waiting to be chopped up, so….

I split the inseams all the way up, re-pinned them so that they would fit like a skirt with a slight flare, added some interesting batik fabric I had in my studio, and proceeded to add Doris to my new skirt:

Doris’s birthday hat is made from the “tulip” part of the original work’s applique flower. I stencilled polka dots onto the fabric using Shiva paintsticks in copper. There are beads at the tips of the hat. Doris’ face is made from ivory felt, hand embroidered with floss from an original drawing.

Doris’ body is a piece of my own hand-dye, also stencilled in a swirly pattern with the paintstick. She wears  velvet flower petals (I suppose flowers are my “signature”, since I put them in everything, somewhere or other!).

Her legs and feet are the upside down stem/leaves from the original flower.

Here is the full view of my skirt. I love it!!

The border from the original piece became the border of my skirt.

Leftovers from the original?  I ended up with a 1″ square and a 1/2″ x 1″ rectangle of original fabric– how thrifty!

Here is Doris’ blurb. It came to me all of a sudden, and I quickly wrote it down on a scrap of paper. Fortunately, I didn’t throw out the scrap before I had stencilled it onto my skirt!

“Doris is a Diva. She celebrates her birthday every day, with cake and confetti. Her motto is: Eat dessert first.”