Daddy Pants

Today my husband handed me two pairs of trousers that he no longer wanted. They were both in really good condition still, so he gave them to me to either pass on to someone else or do 'whatever' with. I instantly thought of a conversation I was having in a craft group about ways to up-cycle some great old tweed coats and thus was inspired to up-cycle them... I made them each into a pair of pants for my little guy.

I made them pretty much the same way as in my pajama pants post using a pair of the little guy's trousers that fit him well as a guide in cutting out the new ones. Because I like to save work where I can, I used the existing side seams in the trousers and lined up the bottom with the existing hem - it made me so happy when I came to the part where I would have normally hemmed them and it was already done!!!!

   

Once I had cut out each side, I placed the 2 pieces right sides together and stitched up the front & back from waist to crotch, and then stitched up each leg. For the first pair I just made a casing around the waist and threaded elastic all the way through. I thought the first pair was really cute, but wanted the second pair to be a bit more polished, so I made them with a flat front and used a wide elastic in the back only.

The little guy loves his new trousers and calls them his "Daddy pants". And I think they're pretty cute too.

Ribbon Charm Necklaces

Whoa this month has been busy! I had a lovely 2 weeks with my parents visiting, but that combined with back to school, the little miss' dancing, and the school gala drawing nearer and nearer, it's been a little full on... But I'm starting to get back into the groove of things and that means it must be time for a new blog post.

I whipped up a tonne of these cute ribbon charm necklaces for the school gala one morning. I made around 50 of them in just over an hour - and that was with the little miss' 'help'.

I had a whole pile of these little metal charms, that came with a bulk lot of buttons I bought ages ago, and no use for them. So I got some inexpensive rolls of ribbon from the local emporium (a roll containing at least 15 meters cost only $1.80!) and made them into cute little necklaces the kids can buy with their pocket change at the gala.







I cut the ribbon into around one meter lengths and folded each into half before threading it through the charm and knotting it through itself.

And then to finish them off I melted each end of the ribbon with a lighter so that they don't fray and unravel - a very important, but often missed, step when working with ribbon!

To display these cute little accessories, I covered a piece of sturdy cardboard with some plain fabric and will pin the ribbons to it to hold the necklaces in place. Voila!

Easy Peasy Buntings

Here is another craft I've made for the school gala... buntings!

So far I've made a total of 9 buntings for the gala. Because the goal of these crafts is to make things that people will want to buy that can be made for a minimal cost without taking up too much time, I decided to make these buntings one-sided and cut them with pinking shears rather than hem them. I then attached them by sewing each triangle straight on to a ribbon (making sure to leave enough ribbon on each end for hanging). Each bunting has 5 flags and measures just under a meter long (plus extra for hanging). The length was really determined by the average amount of scraps I had in each fabric pattern.

I think they're really cute and would be the perfect size to fit over a kitchen window, above a single bed, over an entrance way, or under a hanging shelf. Oh, now that I think about it - maybe I need to make some more of these for our house...

Jello Gummy Snacks

I am so excited about this one... Both of my kids LOVE packaged gummy 'fruit' (I use this term very lightly) snacks, so when I found this Homemade Jello Fruit Snacks Recipe on Pinterest I just had to try it! But to be honest, I'm probably most excited to be using my new Lego minifig mold that arrived in the post today...

The Lego mold is pretty little, so I got to up my awesome by cracking out my Star Wars molds as well!

The recipe is super simple, and once again the most difficult part was converting those cursed imperial measurements!!!!! To save you from the frustration, here is the recipe with no ounces in sight!

Ingredients:

• 1 regular sized box of any flavoured jelly (for those of you with access to actual Jell-O, it's the smaller of the 2 sizes you can buy)
• 4 1/2 tsp of un-flavoured gelatin (if you have gelatin that comes in individual envelopes, you will need to use 2 envelopes)
• 1/3 cup of water *or you can use 1/3 cup of juice instead of water if you prefer

Directions:

• Pour the water in a small saucepan and place over medium heat
• Sprinkle both the flavoured & unflavoured gelatin over the water and stir while over medium heat until all of the gelatin is dissolved
• Remove from heat & pour into molds

The little gummies turned out really well. They came out of the molds fairly well, but I would recommend using silicone ones that you can bend to help them out. The gummies end up a little on the sticky side, so I dusted the back of them with a little cornstarch so that they wouldn't stick to the container (or the other gummies) that I placed them on top of.

Milk Jug Watering Cans

It's not rocket science, but turning a few old plastic milk jugs into watering cans has provided my little ones with hours of fun! Gotta love Pinterest for pointing out the obvious, which sadly I probably would never have thought of on my own.

To turn an old milk jug into a watering can, all you need to do it wash it out & poke a few holes into the lid - and voila! My kids also chose to personalize theirs with permanent markers.

(We used the 2 liter sized jugs as I thought anything bigger would be too heavy for the kids to use.)

I actually like these home-made watering cans better than the store bought ones when it comes to my kids helping me with the garden... Since the only holes are the ones you make in the lid, the water comes out great at first and then slows right down as it drains out of the jug (until it fills with air again). This is perfect for 3 year olds who don't understand the concept of less is more!

And now that the garden has been fully watered, the kids are having a blast playing with them in the paddling pool!

Rag Curls

Since starting the Irish dancing dress, Irish dancing has been on both mine and the little miss's minds a bit extra lately... She can't wait to preform in her new dress and really, really wants a wig. I myself am not ready for her to get a wig... she's already got such gorgeous hair and she's only 5 years old - it's just too soon for me! I've got what seems like an unlimited amount of fabric scraps, so I thought we'd try out rag curls and see what would happen...

I flicked through Pinterest to see how others had done rag curls - looking especially for tips on how to get nicely shaped ringlets. A few tips of the best that I found were:

•  to start with dry (or mostly dry) hair because if the hair is still damp when taking the rags out, the curls will just fall right out (and use lots of mouse or gel and hairspray instead)
• roll the hair vertically and remove them by unwinding/pulling straight down to get good ringlets
• make a small ponytail with the front section of hair as this is how it is 'styled' for Irish dancing anyway - the curls won't get combed out tying it up afterwards.

I cut up some fabric scraps, put on a DVD, and got started. I put hair mouse and hairspray in her hair before starting as well as a little bit after every layer or so. I ended up using 43 rags in her hair in total. I was a little shocked that the little miss sat nice and still for the half hour/45 minutes it took to roll up her hair.

And then she slept...

I was a little worried that there would be lots of screaming while I took all the rags out so I went nice and slowly and was as careful as possible. Fortunately there was only a complaint or two when I came across a few bits of a knotted hair.

I'm quite pleased with how it turned out for a first try (and the little miss is absolutely thrilled!) but next time I will use some rolling papers to fold around the ends of the hair so they don't end up too kinked and will be less likely to get tangled around the rags. The little miss has already asked if I can do her hair like this for when she goes back to school and has been jumping around to see how the curls will bounce when she's dancing, so I guess I'll be doing it again the night before her next performance...

Jellyfish Costume

A month ago we went to a little friend's "Under the Sea" birthday party and the little guy & I needed costumes (the little miss already had a mermaid costume complete with fishy-swishy tail so she was sorted). The little guy isn't really a costume kind of kid, so I did a bit of searching on Pinterest for something fishy that wouldn't involve trying to get the little guy to wear something new...

I loved the (many) jellyfish costumes I found online and after looking through a tonne of photos I decided that an umbrella-jellyfish would not only be the easiest way to go, but also the most likely way to get the little guy into a costume. I had originally planned to get some light coloured, cheap child sized umbrellas and attach tentacles hanging down from the top as I thought the clear ones would be too expensive or difficult to find; however, it turns out the opposite was true! I had also planned to make the tentacles from strips of bubble wrap, but I never did manage to get any in time for the day of the party. Luckily I had a giant roll of white packaging ribbon just hanging around, so I cut it into strips and taped it around the edges. I was hoping they would look ok, and I was pleasantly surprised at how well they actually turned out.















The little guy loved carrying his jellyfish around the house prior to the party and he made a grand entrance in his costume, but it was quickly discarded so he could run around and 'party'. It wasn't abandoned for long though - many a child was seen dancing around with the jellyfish umbrella throughout the party.

Me & my little sea creatures.