Hi-lo dress makover with mini-tutorial

This is week 2's project for Merrick of Merrick's Art's Pinterest Challenge. Hilary's DIY jewelry cleaner was week 1, so this week it was my turn. Since a hi-low hem was on my list and I had a dress waiting to refashion, this dress was born.

Here is my new baby!

Business in the back...

No, not my bum, the dress! I refashioned a thrift store dress of questionable cuteness into this little beauty with a trendy hi-low hem!

...party in the front!

I hemmed it up so that it's the perfect length on my legs to be flattering.

 

I am so pleased with how this came out! I just changed the hem, cinched it in on the back so fits more snugly...

...and tied the ties in the front with a cute waist-defining bow:

 How I did it

I just love how this dress so much! I found it at the thrift store for $3.99 (see this post), and before I chopped it, it looked a little something like this:

So not flattering! It was too loose in the waist, too long...just dowdy. But I did love the pattern. The little teeny polka dots and blue flowers on the black background were kind of cute, and '90's florals are really popular this spring. So I decided to just go ahead and give it a try.

But I wanted something a little more "Forever 21" and a little less "I was 21 in the early '90's."

I was inspired by dresses like these:

Source: forever21.com via Domestic on Pinterest

Source: etsy.com via Domestic on Pinterest

First, I laid out my dress and made sure all of the seams matched so that it was folded exactly in half so that the two side seams touched:

Then I cut my new hem at an angle, leaving about an extra inch of length for hemming. I cut the front about six inches higher then the back.

So sorry about the embarrassingly bad picture! I was too excited to make this dress and I started working on it at night, which means the lighting was horrible for taking pics.

Last I folded the fabric over about 1/4 of an inch, then folded it over again for a new hem. I pinned the new hem in place and sewed it down:

That's it! There you go! It was a really easy refashion with fantastic results! I'm having to stop myself from buying up all the old floral '90's dresses at thrift stores. With results like these, who can blame me?

Now I get to try this new trend with something that only cost me $3.99, and is custom fitted to my own body! Love.

Jessica

Whip-It-Up Wednesday: Speedy Crab Cakes (gluten-free!)

I'm always on the lookout for quick and easy dinners for my kids family.  And when you don't eat gluten, it means you have to be extra creative!

I recently went back to work part-time, so I've been looking for meals that are fast, healthy and I can make in 30 minutes or less!

I love crab cakes and here is a yummy version that you can make in about 30 minutes.  They are baked, which makes them a tiny bit healthier as well.

Speedy Crab Cakes

2 small packages of fake crab (as I mentioned in my gluten-free crab-stuffed jalapeno poppers recipe, be careful to check the back of the fake crab package - many use wheat starch as a binder, but a few brands use pea starch which is safe)

3 green onions, finely chopped
3/4 cup frozen corn, thawed
1/3 cup light mayonnaise
2 eggs, beaten
6 slices of gluten-free bread (I used Udi's Gluten-Free Bread)
3/4 cup of cheddar cheese, finely shredded
salt and pepper, to taste

1. Preheat your oven to 400 degrees. To make gluten-free bread crumbs, put the six slices of bread onto a pan and put in the oven.  Cook until they are very very very dry (about 15 minutes).
2. While the bread is going, put the crab into a food processor.  Process until pieces are very small.  Put crab into a large mixing bowl.
3. Add the chopped green onions, the frozen corn, mayonnaise, the two beaten eggs, cheddar cheese and salt and pepper.  Mix ingredients together.
4. Once bread is super dry, put it into a food processor and process until you have bread crumbs.  Add 3/4 of the bread crumbs to the mixture and set aside the rest.  (If you find they aren't quite dry enough, you can stick them back into the oven until they have dried out.)
5. Mix everything together and using your hands, gently mold the cakes into a cake shape.  Gently roll them in the remaining bread crumbs.  Set cakes on a lightly greased cookie sheet (makes about 6-8 cakes).
6.  Bake in the oven for 10-12 minutes until cakes are warm and cheese in melted.  Put oven on broil for 3 minutes (watch carefully!) to create a nice "crust" on top.
7. Serve!

You can make different sauces (I've had crab cakes with a lemon-caper sauce or an avocado-mayonnaise sauce), but my husband and I decided that they are still tasty and moist enough to eat without anything on top.

Enjoy! ~Hilary

Striped Dress Refashion

This tunic dress started out life as this monstrosity:

Aaaaaauuuuuuugh! It's just SO BAD! 

But I loved the blue and white stripes, I loved the dolman-style sleeves, and the face that the stripes went different directions across the top. And I loved that fact that I'm pretty sure it is older then I am.

So I chopped it!

There was just no way to make this into a flattering dress, so I chopped off the bottom completely to make it a tunic top. With a belted waist it really shows off the cool sleeves.

The neckline I changed completely. It used to be a horrible tight boat neck, so I cut it off to make it an off the shoulder top:

Such a quick and easy sewing project! I didn't even have to hem the bottom because it's jersey, so it won't fray. And the neck I just turned the fabric under and sewed it down, simple.

These are my favorite kinds of projects. The ones that require minimal work for really awesome results!

Girl's hi-low circle skirt tutorial

 My Girl has been growing like a weed lately! She seems to get taller about every 30 minutes (my husband is over six foot six, so we are not surprised by this at all). So needless to say that at a very grown up four and a half years old, the summer clothes from last year no longer fit her.

So of course she needs some new skirts! 

She requested something pink (shocker)

and of course it had to be twirly

She also requested that it be something "like a pop star would wear."

This is how a pop star would wear this skirt

I thought that a hi-low hem would be a cute pop-starish twist on a twirly circle skirt! This idea was Girl-approved because apparently a hi-low skirt is what pop star Kiera wears in Barbie: Princess and the Pop Star.

This is the easiest skirt in the world to put together! There are literally two seams to sew, and took me about an hour start to finish (time added for the Dude's lunch and nap).

You will need:

Some jersey fabric, I used an thrifted pillowcase but I would estimate about 1/2 a yard

a skirt that fits your girl 

matching thread and a sewing machine

First, measure the length of your girl's skirt that fits her. In this case my daughter's skirt was 13 inches from waist to hem:

Next, fold your fabric in half, then in half again:

Then, from the corner shown above (where the fabric is folded twice) you will measure down the side for the length of your skirt:

With a pencil, mark this spot. Then, measuring from the same corner, put your measuring take at an angle and measure your length, making another mark.

Continue to make small marks all the way across the fabric, until you have a quarter circle marked out. You will then cut along the marks you made, so it looks like this:

Unfold your circle!

Next you will measure your girl's waist:

Then I used a super scientific method for cutting out the waist...I found a circular dish from my kitchen that had the same circumference as my Girl's waist. I set it off center on my fabric circle and traced around it. I'm actually a little embarrassed by this, there has to be a better way! But I'm lazy, I own my laziness.

Cutting it out was easy, since I just traced the bowl:

See how the opening for her waist is off centered? I put my bowl about three inches closer to one side of the edge of the fabric circle then the other. This is what creates the hi-low effect.

Next I measured out a 4 inch wide strip of fabric as long as my daughter's waist measurement, and doubled it over.

After you fold it over, fold it in half lengthwise like this, and pin:

Leave yourself a generous seam allowance on this, the waist will stretch because it's jersey, so I ended up taking about an inch off each side:

Once you've sewn your waistband into a circle, you can then pin it into the circle you cut out for the waist of the skirt.

I had to gather mine slightly first to make it fit:

 then I pinned it into the waist opening, stretching it slightly so that it will fit snugly.

Sew all the way around with a zigzag stitch, and you're done!

You don't even have to hem it, because it's jersey. It won't fray! Just put it on her and watch her feel extra cool, just like a pop star.

If you try this for your own little girls (or yourself) please let us know how it turns out! We love hearing feedback and seeing what our readers create.

Jessica

We were featured!

Our Ugly Skirt Refashion is featured today by Sumo from Sumo's Sweet Stuff! She does a showcase every Saturday of her favorite posts from her linky party. And we were picked! Yay! Go check it out and share the love!

Pinterest Challenge: DIY Jewelry Cleaner

I have seen tons of different jewelry cleaners online.  Some look easy and use things like dish soap and baking soda (easy, safe, clean) and others use things like ammonia (which probably is great, but totally freaks me out psychologically!).  For years I used my toothbrush to clean my ring, but it definitely strips the pretty white gold plating off of my ring, so I'm intrigued by a cleaner that cleans without using any harsh scrubbing tool and is made from natural ingredients.

I looked around and finally decided to try this cleaner from the lovely women at Homemade Mamas (this is a SERIOUSLY awesome site....tons of great ideas and natural cleaners which I love!).

Click on the picture to get to the original "recipe!"

Here's the before, during and after pictures!

(*I did these at night with a not-fancy camera, so the pictures definitely don't completely capture the difference  between the before and after pictures!*)

Before: Not awful.  I try to keep my ring clean and pretty since my favorite man in the world gave it to me, but it still could be much shinier and I'm pretty sure there's diaper cream or mushed up baby food stuck in the prongs.

During: Quick and easy to make.  The first time I tried it, I'm not going to lie.  I was concerned there might be a tiny ball of metal after all of that bubbling and soap instead of my ring, but it did come out whole and undamaged.

Bubble, bubble, toil and trouble (a little Shakespeare shout-out for my mom)...

After: So much cleaner!  I love it!

Ooh....sparkly.

I'm definitely hooked on natural cleaning solutions and I'm looking forward to trying other cleaners.  Next on my list: this homemade tutorial of cleaning a microfiber couch from Homemade Mamas.  After two kids, three pets and guests galore, I need a good cleaner for my microfiber couch!

So excited!