What is super durable, comes in a variety of colors and patterns, and is a crafters best friend? Why that would be.... DUCT TAPE!! The most famous being Duck Brand, that one with the cute little ducky on the front. If you don't have duct tape in your craft drawer, get it. Believe me, there is so much you can do with it!
check out there website. they have a ton of different styles, colors, and patterns, as well as a how-to section!
I picked up some duct tape a while back at 5 Below (for only 4 dollars a roll!!!). The main reason for the purchase? They had one with mustaches ALL OVER IT! I had to have it, but then I spent days looking at it saying to myself ... what can I do with this. Then bam! I looked at my beat up, well loved, purse and said, "you gotta go" and spent the next few hours crafting myself a bag. I had enough left over to make a little hand purse as well. And guess what lovelies? I created a HOW-TO so you can do it as well, and it's a two-fer: 1 how-to, two different bags! Check it out...

Duct Tape Purse(s)

 
A lot of the crafting I have been doing lately has been upcycling some of my old clothing! 2 items which found their way on my list where sweatshirts from my undergrad - Suffolk. The sweatshirts where XLs that I had picked up along the way but never really wore, being that I was SWIMMING in them! Because they where from my alma mater, I had no desire to just discard them, so instead I upcycled them. What this post really ends up being about is that I used a wonderful book that I purchased a few months ago to re-create my wardrobe! The book was Cut Up Couture by Koko Yamase! I can't even begin to describe how awesome this book is! Just check it out:

Books to Craft By






This is one my favorite things that I upcycled with the aid of this awesome book. It was crafted from my XL
Suffolk Sweatshirt. I've received an unbelievable amount of compliments on it!
 

A friend celebrated a birthday a few weeks ago. She is a swimmer and I wanted to make her something that would be useful for her!

I started thinking about making her a bag out of t-shirts that she could toss her wet swimming gear in, and then she could just toss the bag into the washing machine and clean it!

This is what I came up with! It actually came out very spacious and was super easy to put together!

Check it Out!!!

 
A few weeks ago I was enlisted by a friend to assist with a puppet workshop for elementary and middleschool students. I knew I wanted to do brown paper bag puppets as one option; they are easy and demonstrate that anything can become a puppet and a puppet can be made from anything.

But I wanted to have a second option for the older kids who may have already had experience with the brown paper bag puppets. I still wanted it to be easy and I still wanted it to showcase that puppets can be anything so I came up with this little guy:

The Clothes Pin Puppet!

Isn't he cute? And he was super easy to make! Take a look at my how-to in the techniques section. It's a great idea for moms and babysitters on rainy days, and also for teachers. Speaking of teachers, I am thinking of starting an education page for my blog which will demonstrate ways to use certain how-tos in lesson plans. What do you think?

Looking for more puppets? Check out my how-to for SOCK PUPPETS!
 
I had a wedding a few weeks ago (not my own, of course). My man was in the wedding (not as the groom, of course!) and naturally I wanted to match him - the wedding color being Purple (which also happens to be my favorite color! No way!) I also wanted to create my own dress and thought it would be an excellent time to try a how-to from one of my favorite blogs: Sweet Verbena.

After creating the dress - An easy, breezy, beautiful (and super comfortable) maxi dress, I decided I wanted to try my hand at dip-dyeing and the ombre look. I experimented a little and was super happy with the results:
I can't wait to try this technique with other articles of clothing! I've also created a How-To for the Ombre Dip-Dying Technique, if you are interested in trying yourself!

Also, check out the How-To by Sweet Verbena for the Boho Maxi Dress, she really deserves all the credit for creating such an excellent how-to for an awesome dress!
 
So sorry for the lack of posts lately. :(. As you know life can take crazy course. Although things have been hectic, I have been crafting a little. Mostly pattern inspired crafting, but I wanted to share them with you!

It seems that the dresses I have worked on have had a very Twiggy/60's/Mod feel. I even recently cut all my hair off in a short pixie style - Mia Farrow would be so proud!   

Away we go!

the first dress I worked on was from a pattern I found in: Famous Frocks - a book I picked up a while ago and never had a chance to utilize! It's a really awesome book with easy to follow directions. I recommend it highly!




I really loved the final results! I made the dress out of a lime green broadcloth: that's another great thing about the book- each project gives a list of different patterns that would be suitable for the style of the dress. I feel so much like Twiggy in this gown:
The second dress I worked on was a black and white checkerboard dress made from t-shirts. I got the how-to from Rookie Mag. If you haven't checked out this website you NEED to. It's absolutely wonderful!


The how-to which you can find here gave super easy to understand directions and the dress literally took me only an hour! Plus, who doesn't like a dress made of wicked cheap and outrageously comfortable cotton t-shirts. Antother thing I love, is that you could use virtually any combinations on colors. I went for the more traditional - this time! I would love to try making a neon one next!
Once you have the mod dress down, you should also check out Rookie's tutorial for Mod eye make up. It is the final detail that really pulls the 60's look all together! Get the look here!
 
Just another How-To for you Lovelies! Phantom of the Opera Style...

Masquerade Headband