When life gives you holey jeans...

  .... make them into shorts and jean skirts!!

This summer was a trying time for finding shorts to fit my skinny girls! The shorts were either too big around the waist or too stinkin short  on their legs!! Now, I'm not a total prude but come on! Our girls don't need to be wearing shorts that barely cover their little rumps! lol So, we took to the pile of jeans that seem to be growing huge holes in the knees more and more every day.... I just cut them off above the knee and rolled them up a bit and wha la! We had new shorts that actually stayed up and the girls were thrilled...

The only problem with this solution was that now I had two perfectly good "legs" from the knee down left over! And it would be a sin to throw perfectly good fabric away right? :) So into the scrap pile they went! lol  I'm not sure when it first came to mind but I've been meaning to do something with them for weeks (ok months lol) now and just finally took them off the scrap pile the other day.



My girls were gifted these dolls from their Granny Annie and they have gradually been getting more and more into them. They love doing their hair, having tea parties and of course finding the perfect outfit to dress them up in! We just got the American Girl catalog the other day and they have been pouring over it for hours ever since! lol ( I remember doing the same thing as a kid) Unfortunately, the insane prices for these outfits have hindered how well these dolls get to dress and we've had to get creative on how to cloth them but still keep it fun for the girls.

Earlier in the spring, I used a baby blanket that I'd had given to us to create four matching night gowns for their sleep over....

 And we've been lucky enough to happen on to some in thrift stores too!  J is learning to sew and is asking for patterns for these dolls ( a great find at JoAnns when their patterns go on sale!) and now they each have matching jean skirts made with those left over jean legs! All I had to do was turn down the top, sew and add elastic! It was a win win for sure! I got something out of my scrap bin and the girls got new skirts for those dolls they love so much!! Who needs a $10 out fit from Walmart when we have our creative juices flowing!? :)

Dying to be creative!

I started this year off with ideas of what I wanted the new year to be... goals I want to accomplish I guess. Not really resolutions, because come on, how many of those do we actually follow thru on? I set a goal for myself to really use my stash of crafting materials this year, to at least try not to by any materials but rather use what I already have! I know I'm only two weeks into this challenge but I'm really excited with what we have accomplished so far and am really enjoying the joy that I feel when I have completed a project... So take a look into what the girls and I have been doing this week and how we turned this boring Fisherman's wool into something to really get  excited about! :)

 

We started with this Fisherman's wool that can be bought at Michaels or JoAnn's (use a 40% coupon and it's a great deal!)

 

I then used this chair to wrap the yarn around and get it ready for dying... you can see I had lots of help for this stage of the process! lol NOT! Kobuk enjoyed this step way more than I did! lol

Then we used cotton yarn to tie the yarn into something we could hopefully keep somewhat neat! I read that you could use cotton yarn because it will not get colored in this process and will then stand out easier in the mess of colors and yarn.

From here on, you should probably follow this tutorial. It's the one that we used and it turned out great! Definitely take her warning about the red tho.... that stuff is wicked!!! One the first batch the colors really bled... on our second batch R accidentally poured almost a whole packet in... and it was VERY RED!!!!! lol So red that I had to dump the water because the yarn wasn't soaking up all the color, nor did I want it too!! Luckily, I was able to add in some other colors and all was not lost. I'll have to post pics of the second batch tomorrow tho as it is still drying and we have yet to use the yarn baller with it yet! Another day!

Now J is plotting her newest  project... a scarf! She has been knitting for awhile now but only making little projects like book marks. So, I gave her a challenge. If she makes her own scarf and finishes it, I will make her a pair of matching mittens. I guess I gave myself a challenge too since I've never actually made mittens before! lol I like a good challenge and it has given her the boost she needs to keep going. She even asked if she could knit in bed instead of reading! I so enjoy doing these kind of creations with my girls. I hope they learn to love creating worthwhile and useful items and that with hard work and perseverance you can create beautiful things no mass producing machine could compete with!