Repurposing an Old Sweater

Here's what you do with a perfectly good angora sweater your sister no longer wears.  This is what I started out with. 

First and most importantly wash it in really hot water and put it in the dryer.  This way it will be washable in it's future life.  The next step was to take it apart.  I took off the sleeves and the belt on the bottom.

I shortened the sleeves took in the bodice of the sweater and attached a 5 inch piece of black velvet to the bottom of the sweater. (I think if I had it to do over I would cut the sleeves a little shorter.) I then cut inch long strips of velvet and made ruffles which I then sewed on to the bottom of the sweater. 

  I found that the v of the neck was too low on my daughter so I added a piece of the velvet to the neck line to bring it up to a more modest level for a 4 year old. 

The head band was my daughters idea. She figured out that the top part of the cut off sleeve fit her head perfectly and kept her ears warm.  So I finished the edge and attached a ruffle to the back.  She insisted that the belt needed to be a scarf and that it too, needed ruffles. 

The little model is very happy with her new Christmas dress.  Mommy suggested we buy her some nice new plain pink tights but, she has insisted that the stripey ones were perfect. 

Pretty cute if you ask me. 

When happy accidents colide, they can create beauty.

It's Christmas time and things this year are tighter than usual. So to save money I decided to make all my presents. One problem, I got stumped with the idea of what to do for my parents and in-laws. I'd already made all the presents for my Nephews and Niece and I was running low on time and inspiration. So I turned to a couple of the blogs I like to follow and there it is was Inspiration! (Sorry for the poor quality of the pictures the lighting is not great but trust me these look so much better in person.)


These are the two ladies that got me thinking, Living with Lindsay's post found here. As well as Homemade By Jill's post here.

Silhouettes!, perfect for my Mom's decor and it would match with previous presents I have given my in-laws. Now what kind of silhouette to do. I toyed with the idea of a pillow and then decided on a paper cut out framed. Out I went to look for the supplies.

1. Paper from Micheals no problem
2. Subjects to silhouette easy... I have children!
3. The frame... this is where i got stumped.

Why? Being the difficult person I am; I decided I wanted to use an oval frame. Do you know how hard it is to find an oval frame?? I sure didn't think it was going to be such a problem. Of course I didn't want just one, I wanted six!

Then by accident I found them. In their original state they were ugly really ugly! Gold and silver plastic frames with what I thought was a plastic mirror in them, but they had potential besides they were a $1. Once home I got straight to work dismantling them and found to my surprise that they were real mirrors.

When I had wanted to do a paper silhouette I thought that I could live without the glass front as they weren't really frames and I was having so many problems finding them. Now I had a better idea! Flashback to Living with Lindsay's etched silhouette on the mirror. Ping! that was it I knew what I was going to do.

Okay so I had no idea how pleased I would be with this or that I might want to post this so, I did not take step by step pictures.

Here's what I did: After taking apart the frames I painted them black with acrylic paint as a base coat. Took a picture of my children and followed the basic principles described in the above links. Then after cutting out the stencil I thoroughly cleaned the mirrors and applied spray on adhesive to the back of my stencil. I placed the stencil on the mirror making sure to firmly press on all the edges of the stencil to prevent bleeding. Here's where trial and error began, trying to stencil in the usual manner provided less than spectacular results and chipping. So do not bother trying to use an acrylic based paint or any other sponge or paint brush method. What you need is spray paint. Rust-oleum Universal advanced formula to be exact. I chose the satin finish. So holding the can directly above and parallel to the mirror I started spraying. One good solid coat is all you need. I very carefully and immediately removed the stencil and was delighted with the results. One quick coat of the same spray paint over top of the base coated frames and I was done. The hardest part was waiting till they dried to see it all together.

I must say, I am pleased with my results. It's amazing what you can do with some dollar store framed mirrors, a can of spray paint and time. Christmas Crafting almost done.

Christmas Craziness

Two weeks to Christmas.... Yikes!

Well I just put out the decorations and hung the wreath on the door as of Yesterday. Yes I know I'm quite behind but things as usual are crazy around here. My goal this year has been to not buy a single present and so far so good. If I can't make it I'm not giving it. It takes a bit more time but , I think I might be able to do it. I'm almost done and I only have about 5 presents left to go. Totally do able right??? There are a couple of things that "Santa" might have to buy but most of that is for the stockings and that's stuff like toothbrushes and toothpaste etc..

Okay so to the point. I don't know if anyone has ever read this blog but if there are any that do here is something super cute and free that you should try. Especially if you have little kids. My daughter and son were so excited when they saw this.

Sympatico.ca has set up this video email message from Santa to your kids that includes their names, age, pictures, what they would like where they live etc... It is really well done and when he says the things pertaining to your child it is without the computer generated choppiness. Best of all it's FREE. I had so much fun with this that I sent some to my sisters. You get a couple of different options as to what will be said. I recommend that if the child is two and up the more enjoyable option is the one geared for children aged 3 and up. So here's the link and have fun!

http://santa.sympatico.ca/watch/613241527333d6e138f429100304df50

Merry Christmas!