When I Said Random, I Meant It, a.k.a. A Springy Burst of Work

I have been trying to build up a good stash of material to play with when the mood strikes. While I know I can whip up a mean Halloween costume, sewing other kinds of things is iffy at best for me and I hate to pay full price for fabric only to make very expensive rags. In order to accomplish this good stash, I've been frequenting the thrift store and buying up their stock of fabrics. The following have been my recent hauls. Some are totally hilarious but were too cheap to pass up. All of them were purchased for under two dollars, most of them had more than 5 yards.







In addition, I have been saving various items that would normally go into the trash or recycle bin and trying to breathe new life into them. This item used to be an oatmeal cannister. I removed the paper label to reveal plain uncorrugated brown cardboard. I then painted it with white acrylic paint and a sponge-on-a-stick (my new favorite tool) and let it dry overnight. I then used a textural stencil kit to place the leafy design on it. I'm still not sure what it is going to be useful for but it did make me happy.



The last item was inspired by some crafty people on Craftster. I found a great tutorial for fabric flowers and was up half the night trying to make it work for me. I had little luck until this afternoon when I decided to try again. Again, I have no idea at this time what to use this for, but it is pretty and made me smile and feel springy even though it is gray outside.

Bachelorette Party

Two of my good friends from my softball team are getting married so we threw them a surprise bachelorette party this past Saturday night. If anyone out there has ever thrown one of these bashes, they know that the commercially made stuff for these parties is ridiculously expensive. Buck-a-suck shirts, made on cruddy looking, ill fitting men's t-shirts can run upwards of 30 bucks. Hokey looking headgear is equally expensive. The above ensembles were made for 7 dollars each, fit the girls beautifully, and were WAY nicer than any of the items on the market.

Cost breakdown:

Pink Longsleeve Shirts on clearance $3.00
Pink baseball caps at Dollar Tree $1.00
1/2 a roll of tulle from Dollar Tree $.50
1/2 a silk floral pick from Joann Fabrics $.50
1/2 a bag of Lifesavers from Dollar Tree $.50
1/2 a roll of white wired ribbon from Dollar Tree $.50
Curly gift ribbon from Dollar Tree $1.00

The veils were assembled using the wire of a floral pick to hold the tulle together, adding a large bow of the white wired ribbon to that, then the hotglue gun attached the curly ribbons to the wires from the picks, then hotglue to the top of the cap. The Lifesavers were attached to the shirts simply by wetting and applying them directly to the shirts. All of the writing was done by moi with a couple of Sharpie markers.