Cookie Monster and Flower Clay Beads

Christmas 2008 I made necklaces for some of the young ladies (under 5 years old) in my life.

The first beads I made were flowers.


The other beads were cookie monster and cookies :) There were even a few beads left over that i could make myself a cookie monster necklace.

Halloween Clothing Reconstruction

I wanted to make a Halloween outfit without spending too much money for the economics themed party that was being held at some friends house. this costume is for a "slutsky equation" were the costume design gave emphasis to the first word.

I adapted the directions for triangle camisole found on this site

first you take a regular t-shirt, it can be one that fits you or not. this one made it to the pajama shirt/rag pile because it had a run in with the bleach.



second you cut off the shirt under the armpits, this tube of fabric becomes the base of the shirt now. at this point you would size the tube to fit you, in this case i did not need to make those adjustments.

third you cut out triangles from the sleeves, so you can leave the upper part of the shirt to cut 1.5 to 2 inch wide strips to make the strings that hold the shirt up.

once the triangles are cut position them on the shirt while you try it on, pin it in place and then sew it down. also before you do this you may want to hem the top part of the shirt to give it a finished look.

next you need to sew the strips together to make them long enough to tie around your neck.

once you have two long strips completed fold it around one of the triangles as shown here, pin in place and sew up the whole length of the strap to give it extra stability.

here is what one looks like, then do the same thing for the other side and you are done.

tada the finished shirt!

now what is a shirt with out a skirt??

i had this skirt, i didn't really like how it fit me and the zipper had recently broken so needless to say i never really wore it, so i decided it would be a prime target to adjust to fit me better. my goal with this skirt was to make it wider so it would fall at my hips and not my waist and shorter to fit with the Halloween theme.

here is the skirt in its original state


task one was to take of the zipper and the back seam.

then i measured about where i wanted to cut the fabric, keeping in mind the construction of a skirt where the front is a little shorter than the back by a half an inch or so.


i cut off the bottom length and pined it in place on the sides, keeping in mind the grain of the corduroy, once these were sewed in place i made a final fit adjustment and sewed the back shut. i made this a slip on skirt for ease.

then i hemmed the bottom and the raw edges on the back and voila! a new shorter wider skirt

Warm Fuzzy "Full Slanket"

This is a variation on the slanket or blanket with sleeves. hence the name "full slanket" as this warm fuzzy has a back to it. It is made with 3.5 yards of Fleece.
Directions are forthcoming but the main feature that sets this apart from other similar products is the side drawstring to pull up the extra length from your feet when you walk.

60th Birthday Quilt

For my Mom's 60th birthday i made a "community of love" quilt with squares submitted from friends and family from all stages of life.

here is a basic step by step process of what i did.


this picture has all of the 12 inch squares stacked by row ready to add the boarder in between. you can see the boarder in the background on the back of the chair.

next the squares are sewn together with a navy blue boarder. I cut 3 inch long strips and sewed in the long strip and cut it to length after it was sewn in place.

Then i sewed a long 3 inch strip across each row to finish the basic front of the quilt, then i sewed a 5 inch wide strip around each edge with mitred corners

now it is time to assemble the quilt and cut the fabric to size. i had to move all my furniture to the side so fit the backing fabric on the floor. [note the fabric should be right side up, i had to flip it after i took the picture]

on top of the backing fabric add the batting

then add the front of the quilt good side down, so the good sides face each other. trim and pin around all the edges

then sew around all the edges

and turn inside out.

tada! the quilt just after it has been flipped out. note at this point you need to sew up the hole you left to be able to turn the quilt out. also you need to "quilt" each intersection so that the batting doesn't slip around inside the fabric. i just sewed along the initial sewing lines so that the look would not change.

the finished product

the finished product at the party.

Hose wrap

This is another CPAP related craft. I wanted to make a wrap that would be easy to get on and off to keep the warm humidity from the machine to the mask without “rain out”

Iwas reading online about hose wraps that were made of fleece and sewen in a tube, but the comments I saw that they were hard to get on and off. I thought I would make a wrap of fleece to reatin the lightness, but make the attachment out of velcro. I made the fabric a little wider then to just wrap around the tube to allow for the possibility of not complete coverage.

I used a rubberband to keep each end in place.

I have used it for one night and I think it helps, also it is nice just to have something fuzzy and not so medical next to you at night.

Eye Mask

I needed an eye mask to block out he light as I slept, but one that wasn’t very rigid so I could flip it up to see out from under my CPAP mask. NOTE: if you want to make one for use without a CPAP i would add some batting inbetween the two layers to keep some rigidity while you sleep.

I made this one out of a few scrap pieces of t-shirts and elastic.

First I made a pattern on paper based on my glasses, cut it out to test the fit and modified it until I thought it would block out the light I needed.

Then I layered the two fabrics I was going to use and cut out the pattern with a ¼ inch seam allowance.

Next I sewed the elastic into the light blue fabirc which is the front fabirc so nothing would bother my face. I made the elastic long enough to keep very loose tenstion so it wouldn’t fall off my face.

Then I sewed the two pieces of the eye mask together inside out leaving the two openings unsewn so the strap would be right side out. Then I sewed those holes together and I was done.

MP3 Player/Eye Glasses Bag

I have been criticized for making a new bag for every new thing I buy, which is not far from the truth but it keeps things safe and organized, so I am ok with this criticism.

I bought an MP3 player to help me study for an exam and have found it helpful while exercising as well, but I needed a way to keep it safe and in order in my bag between uses so I made the bag as follows. This is similar to the external hard drive bag I made but the drawstring mechanism is different.

For this project I used the end of a long sleeved shirt, a piece of pre quilted fabric and a piece of ribbon.

First cut the sleeve to legnth for your item, long enough for the item to fit with a little extra room and some overlap to “trap” the ribbon.

Second cut the pre quilted fabric, as long as you want for the item and an extra ½ inch for sewing the fabirc together. NOTE: Pre quilted fabric is used for ease of use and to give some extra padding for the item.

Then you need to sew the pre quited fabric along the line of the edge of the sleeve fabric. Note likely this will not be a straight line so sew accordingly.

Next we need to do the basic assembly. Turn the sleeve fabric inside out so that in the outside is on the inside. Then turn the pre quilted fabirc inside out so that the pattern is on the inside and put the sleeve inside the pre quilted fabric.

On the skinnier side turn in the bottom edges and sew this shut.
One the skinnier side turn in the bottom edges and sew this shut.

Next you need to create the draw sting channel by folding the sleeve fabirc over quilted fabric to trap the ribbon.

This is probably eassiest done by pinning the ribbon in place underneth the sleeve fabric, so the ribbon is not sewen into fabric. Note also you need to cut along the seam of the sleeve fabric to the top of the pre quilted fabric to allow the ribbon room to come out.

Then you are done. It is also good for some big sunglasses that won’t fit into a traditional case and the sleeve fabirc is also very soft so you can clean your glasses eassily as well.

27* Dresses

This is a little video i made showcasing the outfits I made over the course of my childhood for my favorite stuffed animal, Beethoven. I recently found them while cleaning out my things from my parents house.

Grocery Bag Holder

This is a very simple project you can do in about an hour. My sister wanted me to make a grocery bag holder and dispenser, she picked out the color and I sewed it all by hand. One note the pre quilted fabric is a little difficult when it comes to stringing the ribbon.

I took about a 15 inch square folded each of what will be the open ends over ½ inch or so depending on the ribbon you want to use. Then pinned the long edges together and sewed along the pin lines. Note: do not sew over the pockets created when folding the edges over.

Then string some ribbon through the pockets you created. This is not always an easy task, you can try a needle to guide the ribbon, a chopstick to push the ribbon, or what I ended up using was a long bit of wire folded in half to give you something that is sturdy enough to push, yet still bendable to make it around the corners. The ribbon will be short on one side to tie the ribbon in a bow and the other long to be able to hang it on the wall.

External Hard Drive Bag

External Hard drive bag

I was running out of space on my flash drive and decided to go big and get a 160 GB hard drive. Then I came upon the realization I didn’t have a way to keep it safe. I decided to make a little pouch to ameliorate the situation.

I used the sleeves from two of the leftover shirts of my t-shirt quilt along with some spare batting and ribbon. When cutting the sleeves make sure to leave some excess above the make crease for the drawstring portion of the bag.

I then pined and sewed the bottom of the bag and batting together, making sure the batting didn’t show outside of the bottom seam.

Next sew the black fabric down over the batting and pin the ribbon just above the main seam on the outside fabric. You will have to cut a slit in the outer fabric to let the ribbon out.

Now sew the outer fabric over ribbon.

Next sew these two layers together and be careful not to sew the ribbon into these layers.


Tada you are done!