I made this dress and leggings for a fashion show we had at my school last night. The first picture is a more accurate representation of the color. I don't have a good photo from the actual show, but I'll post one anyway.

It's been a while since I've posted anything, so here's what I've been up to lately.

Hackey sack from recycled yarn.


Beanie from recycled yarn.


Scarf from recycled yarn. This one is actually for me. Own design.


Wristwarmers. There are two, just not a picture of both of them.


Bookmark pre-blocking. Own design.


Nutcracker washcloth pre-blocking. Own design.

[Tutorial:]

(Tutorial posted under the pictures)

Okay, that was an exaggeration. But basically during the process of making these a few nights ago I wasn't paying attention and had the needle on my machine go all the way through my finger. Through the nail to the complete other side of my finger. I've been sewing for years and have never been that careless, so needless to say I was a bit shocked. I'm alright, I just have a hole in my fingernail and it hurts pretty badly.

Anyway, I have always wanted these leggings from American Apparel. You know, the sparkly $40-something dollar ones. The ones that most people find tacky but I absolutely adore. Then the other day after I was sitting online wishing how I had some, I decided I could just make some. So I made these out of some green knit dancewear fabric from Joanns that reminds me of the Little Mermaid. It was super easy and I will probably make a whole bunch of leggings.

The leggings from all sorts of weird angles due to my having to take the pictures myself:






(I told you, weird angles. But I felt I needed to show the waistband for whatever reason.)


Fabric close-up.

Now the inspiration:


And the injury:



Bleh, it still has blood on it. And look how bent it is! I was totally going to keep using it after cleaning it off, but no, it had to bend.

Tutorial:

Okay, so I promised this a while ago and just got around to it today. I couldn't find any fabric I wanted at first and I've been busy getting ready to head off to college next month. I've never written a tutorial for anyone before, so please ask me questions if I've worded something oddly or something doesn't make sense.

Materials:
1 yard (possibly more depending on your size) stretchy knit fabric (I like the kinds in the dancewear section.)

Matching thread

A pair of leggings or skinny jeans that fit you

Tutorial Notes:

Because we are using a stretchy fabric, I am using a stretch stitch on my machine. A serger would also work. I also sewed over each seam twice because they will be stretched so much and I wanted to add strength. If you aren't very experienced with sewing this kind of fabric, then please practice on some of your extra scraps left over from the pattern to get your settings right on your machine before risking ruining your leggings.

The process:


Lay out your fabric. Fold your leggings/jeans in half and lay out as seen in picture (except neater, I kind of just threw it down for the picture). Trace along the top, down the curvy side (the side with the crotch) and across the bottom, remembering to figure in seam allowances. Note: You may want to add more length to the bottom and/or top, just depending on what you're using to trace.


Now, flip your pants (still folded) over so that they are a reflection of what you've already traced. Trace the top, curvy side, and bottom again, so that you end up with the shape pictured above. Cut out. Make a second one just like it.


Now, pin each leg right sides together and sew down from the bottom of the crotch to the bottom of the leggings on each leg.

I forgot to take a picture of this step, but you pin the curved edges of each leg right sides together. When you sew this, you should be sewing from the front of the leggings down to the crotch and up the back all in one U-shaped seam.


Measure the circumference of your leggings and subtract an inch. Cut a rectangle with a length of the measurement you just figured out and a width double the length you would like your waistband to be (You may want to go ahead and try on your leggings to figure out how long you think it will need to be).  For mine I cut a rectangle with a width of 9 inches including seam allowance, so after it's sewn on I will have a waistband of about 4 inches.

Sew your rectangle closed with the two shorter ends right sides together so that you now have a circle.


Fold your waistband in half widthwise wrong sides together. Take your leggings so that they are right sides out and pin the waistband evenly around the top. You will have to stretch the waistband a bit to get it around all of the way. Sew the waistband on, keeping the waistband material gently pulled flat while sewing.

Try on your leggings to make sure everything fits right. Depending on what you traced to get your initial shape, you may have to take the legs in a bit to make them tight, but once you get this pair made right you can use them as a guide for future pairs.

Hem the bottom.


Try them on again for the fun of it.


Done!

Feel free to skip this text and go on to the photos.

I haven't posted anything in a long time, but I haven't had time to make anything because of school. Now that I'm finally done with high school I can get back to sewing and knitting. Both of these dresses were hard to categorize, because although the fabric started life as a different article of clothing, I actually didn't use any of the original construction for either of the dresses, but I put them in reconstructed anyway since they didn't start out as just fabric.The first dress was made right after I finished school out of a Spiderman tee (I only used the back of it so it was just plain red fabric), a black tee from Target and 2 tees from Michaels. I'm still trying to decide if I like this dress. The second dress began as a pair of pajama pants. I like this one a lot better.

Pictures:


This is the one I can't decide if I like or not.


This one is very comfortable. It's hard to see, but there are pintucks under the bust.

Comments appreciated.

I finished this a few weeks ago but just got around to posting it. I came up with what I wanted and found a pattern close to it and made some changes. I like it.

Ignore my little brother's crooked photo-taking skills. I'll try to get better ones later because this does the dress no justice.


Fabric detail.

I finished this a few minutes ago.

This isn't the true color.

This is closer to the real color, but it's still darker than this:

Back:

Comments appreciated.

Okay so I saw this shirt at Urban Outfitters and I almost bought it.
http://tinyurl.com/yo7lk9
But then I thought about it and I decided it would be kind of hypocritical to buy a brand new t-shirt promoting recycling. Especially for $24.

So I took a plain white shirt I already had, resized it, and took some of that Simply Spray stuff you can get at Michaels and made this.

floor shot


I promise it isn't that unflattering; I just need to pull it down. Oh and I didn't want to change bras so ignore my black one.


Side

So this is of course the Razor Cami by ohmystars that I fell in love with and had to knit. Pattern:
http://www.craftster.org/forum/index.php?topic=96299.0
While I was in Italy over spring break I was walking through this little market and found these two women selling yarn. I absolutely loved the color of this one (it reminds me of mermaids for some reason) and got 3 skeins for 4€. I bought it initially for a scarf, but those are normally so dull to knit, so it became this cami:

Floor shot:


Action shot:


I love it; it's probably on my top 3 list of things I've knitted.

I found this pattern online. I'm somewhat satisfied with how it came out.
front:


back:


on me (ignore random clashing tank top and necklace, they were already on):


boring stuff:
link to pattern:
http://www.berroco.com/exclusives/aphrodite/aphrodite.html
yarns:
Bottom: Jolina
Middle: Berroco Jewel FX
Top: Berroco Softwist