The third shirt is a really long, long-sleeved, white fitted women's dress shirt:
Which has really pretty pearly buttons and a lovely pattern to the fabric:
I've been keeping an eye out for something potentially suitable for an angel costume for Miss 6 for next Christmas's pageant, and I am wondering if this could be OK for the dress part - with alterations of course. I will take the sleeves out and the collar off and try it on her to see how wide/ long it is on her, and then see if inspiration hits, LOL. I will make a permanent (fabric? and feather?) set of angel wings further down the track, which will be attached to the dress by velcro. I'm hoping that with umpteen months up my sleeve I can come up with something long-lasting that can be rotated between my three girls over the next few years for various Christmas events!Making: Reusable substitutes for the cotton wool balls we seem to use a lot of around here. I use one every morning to apply distilled witch hazel toner (old habits die hard) but of course, I am keen to eliminate as many disposable products from my life as possible. So I finally got around to hauling out another one of my stash of old white flannelette baby nappies and cut half of it up into little rectangles, which I then folded into quarters and stocking-stitched around the three raw edges. Et voila! Two dozen small cloth pads:
The cutting was quick: the sewing was quite tedious! This bit would have been easily 10 times quicker with an overlocker (serger), but since I don't have one of those I had to make do with stocking stitch. And yes, the stitching is beige, because I couldn't be bothered changing the thread on the machine, LOL.Picking: Red capsicums, and the first yellow capsicum. The last cucumber :-(
Dinner: Ratatouille and home baked crusty bread.
Reading: Earth Garden magazine.
Contemplating: Looking for a second-hand overlocker on eBay. If I am going to be sewing clothes and costumes and things regularly, it could really come in handy?
10 comments:
I don't have an overlocker either... but a shop near me lets people rent time on theirs apparently, which I will investigate shortly.
I'd suggest wings (I'm picturing 2 wire coat hangers and white stockings) on elastic you put your arms through. If you use velcro you mightn't be able to use the dress for as many different costumes.
A neighbour made my sister a skirt with a velcro waist - a really long piece of velcro - so the skirt fitted her from age 4 til she was all grown up. I wore it to a friend's 25 birthday. It was ankle length on the four year old, and knee length on the adult.
Hi Kate, ooh, renting time is a great idea, I never knew you could do such a thing. There is a big craft shop locally that has machines and overlockers out the back for classes, I must go and enquire if they rent out theirs? Thanks for the tip!
As for the wings, we've had no less than five pairs of stocking-and-coat-hanger wings so far that have all been pretty much destroyed within no time at all (bent and/or ladders/holes in the stockings) *Sigh* This time I want to make something that will last LOL, so I am thinking fabric-lined cardboard trimmed with tinsel or feathers or something? I see what you mean about the velcro attachment though.
Oh and I love, LOVE, LOVE the velcro-waisted skirt idea! Even I could sew that - just a straight bit of fabric, hemmed and velcro sewn around the waist. Genius! That's now on my must-try list, LOL. Thanks :-D
Cheers, Julie
Great idea, using the old cloth nappies as facial wipes, I've got heaps of old terry flats I could use for that! And I bought a second hand overlocker from ebay, have been really pleased with it, it wasn't as cheap as I would have liked, but I bought a pretty good brand, so I knew that even though it was old it would still be working in quite a few years to come!
the cloth facial wipes are a brilliant idea. I need to make some for my daughter!! I NEED to pull out the sewing machine and USE IT for a few projects!!!!!
Really neat idea for facial wipes! I wonder if there is any type of exfoliating fabric you could put on the other side. Washable exfoliating facial wipes?? I use disposable ones now, hmmm... I wonder if I could make these with my very very limited sewing skills :)
Kristi
I see what you mean about the stockings. If you're going with cardboard it'll be heavier, which might mean that they sit wrong (feathers facing the floor), so you might need some way of attaching them at multiple points (rather than the biologically correct seam down the middle!). Velcro across the shoulders would work, and be pretty neat.
BUT if you were thinking of using the dress for anything else, perhaps loops on the wings that were safefy pinned on to the dress. Or shoulder loops on the dress, with ribbon ties on the wings.
Sounds fun. I only have a son, so it's probably not a problem I'm going to have to think about too much.
The facial wipes are an excellent idea, I was only looking at the little round ones I use everyday and wondering what I could replace them with. I was thinking about circles out of towelling, like I made as breast pads when I was breastfeeding. You have made my mind tick over now and think about squares. Will have to go thru my fabric stash and see what I have :)
My machine is still out from making the veggie bags out of tulle.
Perhaps you could use tulle to make the wings, with a layer of stiffening inside it?
Hi Keely, I reckon terry flats would work really well :-) I'm glad your overlocker is working well, I'm going to keep an eye out for a local one if it comes up for sale.
Hi Ali - yes, pull out your sewing machine woman!
Hey Kristi :-) I've seen some great wipes online that had flannelette on one side and terry on the other (and they were much bigger than mine) that ladies were using as exfoliating wipes. If *I* can sew these you can too, it's seriously simple! Have a go and let me know how you went!
Hi Kate, hmm I see what you mean about the wings possibly sagging, I think multiple attachment points is a great idea, thanks :-)
Lis, I made the wipes square because it seemed wasteful and time-consuming to cut up the nappy into circles: I'd have ended up with a heap of wasted bits and it would have taken me twice as long! There's no real reason why they have to be circles I don't think? Have a go and let me know how you went :-)
Cheers, Julie
I used all my nappies as hand towels in the bathroom - they lasted about 8 years before I had to use them for rags.
I lurve your blog! Another idea for the wings might be the tulle, or op shop curtain net, stiffened with a cornflour (corn starch?) mixture, and deffo ties or elastic for the shoulders.
After my babies were born and I needed extra sanitary padding, I used to use terry nappies. Cheap and when boiled, sterile and worked perfectly!
I pledge that today I will make my own facial wipes!
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