A ton of my friends have their birthdays/graduation parties within the same week.  So this morning I went into working overdrive - and sewed these totes for four of them.  I would make one for all of my friends, but it's so much cutting and piecing with all this patchwork! too exhausting.

and here they are. please tell me which one is your favorite!
The reverse sides are solid fabric or stripes (saves on labor)







the obligatory artsy shot


look! handpainted name tags!

I love the look of fabric covered notebooks and I figured they couldn't be that hard to make.  Here's my version:



and another made from scraps of old clothing and remnant flannel (I made the button too out of fabric snippets and stray beads):



i love floral fabrics!

I found this dowdy 80's skirt in my attic - completely unflattering shape but i liked the color.  So I hacked it up and used the burdastyle.com pattern for the Ruby shorts to create these shorts just in time for summer.  not sure about the buttons, do you think they match the fabric?
  

I made this for my best friend's little sister's birthday - do you think a newly minted 13 year-old would like this purse?


and action shot:

thank you so much for this amazing tutorial - the pictures and instructions were really clear :-)
here are my bags- my very first time machine-sewing a zipper!

Looking around in my brother's closet, I realized he has tons and tons of over-sized t-shirts he never wears.  Surely he won't miss just one...
The sleeves are raglan (I modified a free dress pattern from burdafashion.com, if you want the original one, here's the link: http://www.burdafashion.com/en/DOWNLOADS/Free/1333669-1413206-1333668.html)
Here's me wearing the previously ENORMOUS shirt. But actually after reconstructing it, I only had a few scraps of jersey left. 

And here's my new shirt! It's the most comfortable article of clothing that I've ever made.   I'm happy with this except my neckline alteration turned out quite a bit lower that I had anticipated. By the way, shirring fabric is my new obsession; it's so quick and easy!

I was really inspired by everyone's beautiful freezer paper stencils so I had to make my own!  Except I wanted to use my stencils multiple times, so I cut my stencils out of those thin plastic binder dividers. 
and I used regular old acrylic paint mixed with textile medium from Michael's.  I've never stencilled on fabric before, so I was pretty nervous and practiced my first one on an inexpensive tanktop.

here's Amelie Poulain and her doppelganger:




And my second stencil: an old-fashioned typewriter

Rummaging around the old clothes in my attic, I found this lambswool sweater.  I loved the rich red color and soft feel, but the sweater was enormous and there were tons of motheaten parts.  The camera had a hard time picking up the holes, but there were probably about twenty small holes.
I cut out most of the holes by taking a slice out down the front, and then embroidered red flowers over the rest of the holes.  Then I cut the hem and silhouette to my size, lengthened the sleeves, and used bias strips to trim the neck and bottom.  and finally I found a use for that gorgeous midnight blue chiffon ribbon! The red lambswool shines through and makes it glow in a purplish way.

Please excuse my birdsnest hair and remind me never to wear a french braid overnight again

BEFORE:


and AFTER:

[You craftsty people are SO inspiring; looking at the best-of-craftster page, I had to start sewing again! Made from an old pajama shirt and a $1.25 piece of remnant calico, this dress took maybe four hours to make. I can't wait until the weather gets warm enough for me to wear this!]

You craftsty people are SO inspiring; looking at the best-of-craftster page, I had to start sewing again! Made from an old pajama shirt and a $1.25 piece of remnant calico, this dress took maybe four hours to make.  I can't wait until the weather gets warm enough for me to wear this!

Before picture:


After Pictures:

I am now OBSESSED with knitting gloves! I started with mittens, and then progressed to a very lumpy looking holey glove, and now dpns are my best friends! (hahah i am really obsessed)  These are my mom's christmas present (her hands are exactly the same size as mine - so convenient) It was relatively quick to knit, so I proceeded to knit a pair for my dad.  Now time to knit a pair for my brother...